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Scottsboro: An American TragedyPBS Movie GuideDirections: Watch the documentary and answer the following questions as you watch. All guides are due by the end of class. 1. What was the image of Black men that the Scottsboro case met head on?They were anxious at all times to rape a white woman. 2. What Scottsboro teaches us is that we cannot understand the power of our history as it relates to race, poverty, sexualism, in the struggle for justice. 3. Describe Alabama during the 1930s Great Depression Era? Alabama was a world coming apart with massive unemployment in a state that had always been poor, with increasing conflict between classes and races. It was a state that was in calamitous conditions that was disintegrating. Hobos were living on the railroad by the thousands and tens of thousands. 4. Who defended the boys in the first trial? Were they properly represented? Why or why not? A Chattanooga real-estate attorney. No because 5. The two groups that came to help the boys were the NAACP and the Communist Party of America.6. Why did the Communist Party of America help the boys? They seized on the depression as evidence of an inevitable decline of capitalism and a rise of a workers paradise. They were opportunistic and focused on southern blacks specifically. IE they just used the boys to further their agenda. They wanted to gain support of blacks in the South and used the case as an example of the “lynch system justice” they were preaching against. 7. True or False: The two groups liked each other and supported each other. False8. Why did the boys get a second set of trials? Their legal rights were violated due to inadequate representation. 9. Who defended the boys during the second set of trials? What was special about him? Why was he hesitant to defend the boys? Samuel Leibowitz was a criminal defender with an impressive record 77 wins/78 murder cases and 78 was a hung jury. He was hesitant because of his political differences with the Communist party, but ultimately took the case for personal reputation. 10. True or False: Victoria was an extremely difficult witness. True11. Who was the final witness for the defense?Ruby Bates12. Why was Samuel Leibowitz na?ve?He was not prepared for the cultural differences in the South. He cross-examination came across as an attack on Southern womanhood and not as an attack on the witness. He brought the Negro rights issue back to the South and he was not well received because of it. He was not prepared for the attack on himself, a Jewish lawyer from New York. 13. The verdict was guilty and was sentenced to death by electrocution. 14. True or False: The case became personal for Leibowitz.True15. True or False: Judge Horton’s personal beliefs about the case were affected by the trial outcome.True16. What does Horton due about the guilty verdict? He overturns it and calls for a 3rd trial.17. What movement did the Scottsboro Boys case spark?It rekindled the movement for equality.18. Who was the 3rd judge?Callahan19. How did Leibowtiz get his appeal for a fourth set of trials? (Hint: it was a US Supreme Court Case)The juries were all white and blacks were intentionally left off the jury. 20. Why did Leibowitz set away from the case?Pressure from the South and others to free 4 of the 9 boys. 21. What brought the Scottsboro affair to an end?Time22. Explain the quote” And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” What relation does it have to the Scottsboro case?Answers will vary23. Explain why the Scottsboro case considered a tragedy? Answers will very ................
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