African American Labor History and the Supreme Court Victory of Angelo Herndon, 1937

Angelo Herndon

Ephemera and pamphlets

Damon, Anna. Victory, 1937, documents the Supreme Court decision freeing Angelo Herndon, an African American labor organizer convicted under Georgia’s insurrection law after organizing Black and white unemployed workers in Atlanta. The pamphlet records radical legal-defense organizing through the text of the Court’s decision and Damon’s introduction, revealing how Herndon’s case became a national test of free speech, assembly, and anti-Communist prosecution. Herndon’s case reached the Supreme Court, which ruled in his favor in April 1937.

Damon, Anna. Victory, Decision of the United States Supreme Court in the Case of Angelo Herndon, April 1937. Chicago: State of Illinois, 1937. 30 pages. 8.5 x 6.5 inches. Damon writes, “The decision will be a spur to the fight to wipe out the repressive laws against labor and political groups which still disgrace the statute-books of thirty-four states,” and concludes, “Herndon is free...all other labor and political prisoners, next!” The pamphlet presents the Herndon decision as a legal victory and as a call for continued defense of workers, radicals, and political prisoners.

Herndon had been arrested after helping organize nearly 1,000 Black and white unemployed workers at the Atlanta federal courthouse in 1932; the case against him relied in part on Communist literature found in his room. Light soiling on front cover not affecting text; good. A concise Depression-era civil liberties pamphlet preserving the legal and political significance of Herndon’s victory.

Item #17956

Price: $450.00