Following
our rally in Madison Square Garden [in New York City - A.S.], a riot broke out. Fascist members of the Catholic War Veterans
attacked a group of progressive students who were peacefully picketing an anti-Russian
motion picture showing at the Roxy Theater.
Our supporters leaving the rally went to the aide of the students. The police arrived and indiscriminately beat
and arrested participants from both sides.
Vigilante
events are occurring more and more frequently.
H.A. has protection, but his supporters do not. In rallies were H.A. is not a speaker are
especially dangerous because we do not have secret service protection. Rallies at Duquesne University, the
University of Pittsburgh, Harvard University, Yale University, the University
of Colorado, and UCLA have resulted in rowdy confrontations with rabid
anti-Wallace vigilantes.
Even
in cities where H.A. is speaking we frequently have difficulty getting the
cooperation of the local police.
Detroit’s Police Commissioner Harry S. Toy is nuts and an excellent example of this problem. He thought communists were entering the
country from Canada disguised as rabbis and said that all leftists should be
imprisoned. After Walter Reuther
[President of the United Auto Workers – was shot in his home in Detroit on
April 20, 1948 – A.S.] was nearly assassinated, the bigoted Toy used this as an
opportunity to round up H.A. supporters as suspects – almost all of them being
those supporters who were darkly complected or those not of the Christian
faith. This diversion allowed the real
shooter to get away. When we spoke
there, we bypassed Toy and obtained uniformed officers hand picket by the new mayor
[Democrat Eugene Van Antwerp –A.S.] for additional security.
Fortunately,
some of the behavior is so excessive and idiotic that it is comical. A New York judge announced that he would take
into account a parent’s support of H.A. as a factor in determining child
custody. A school board banned the book
Twenty Modern Americans [a textbook by Alice Cecilia Cooper – I have
requested the file on her – A.S.] because it contained a chapter on H.A. The most bizarre was when H.A.’s chief
poultry breeder [I do not know this person – I have requested the New York
office research this person – A.S.] from the Farvue Farm went to pick up
hatching eggs sent from Europe to a New York airport. Knowing that they were for H.A.’s farm, a
U.S. Customs official deliberately threw one of the eggs on the floor. H.A. in his normal even manner suggested
that, “Undoubtedly he looked at my poultry expert as one of ‘Henry Wallace’s
Communists’ and began to see red.”
If
only this was the limit of their actions.
On
May 1, Senator Glen Taylor [of Idaho –A.S.] was roughed up and arrested by
police in Birmingham, Alabama. He was
there to speak before the Southern Negro Youth Conference [a Communist front organization designed to create dissension with the Negro race - A.S.] in support of
H.A. Using an ordinance forbidding
integrated meetings, the city police chief, Eugene “Bull” Connor, ordered his
arrest. The police shoved Taylor,
knocked him to the ground, and taunted him.
They told him that their boss said, “There is not enough room in town
for Bull and the Commies.” He thought
they were going to beat him to death.
Taylor was photographed, fingerprinted and jailed. He quickly made bond and was released. Taylor immediately returned to Washington and
relayed his experience on the Senator floor.
Neither of the Alabama Senators [Lister Hill and John Sparkman – A.S.],
his colleagues in the gentlemen’s club, offered an apology for their state’s
conduct.
Much
worse was to follow just days later. On
May 7, one of our supporters was murdered.
Robert W. New Jr., a twenty-eight year old maritime worker, was murdered
by a co-worker. Rudolph Serreo said he
slit New’s throat because he was a “nigger lover” and Wallace supporter. Serreo’s attorney, Thomas P. Stoney, said,
“At the trial I will prosecute Bob New for raising unrest among the colored
people in the South. I will prosecute
him also as the chairman of the Wallace committee and as the despicable, slick,
slimy Communists prowling the waterfront.”
With the trial being held in Charleston, I am certain Serreo will not be
punished.
Almost
everyday there is a new outrage and the rhetoric of the Whiskey Rebels is
fueling this lawlessness.
© 2015 Ron Millar
© 2015 Ron Millar
