Carl Murphy Elected to NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Board

    PRESS RELEASE 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
107 WEST 43 STREET *© NEW YORK 36, N. Y¥. © JUdson 6-8397 

THURGOOD MARSHALL ella, B. SPINGARN Director and Counsel 

ROBERT L. CARTER bales WHITE 
Assistant Counsel cretary 

ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS eID DEMME Press Relations Treasurer 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 

CARL MURPHY ELECTED TO NAACP 
LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND BOARD 

NEW YORK - Carl Murphy, president of the National Newspaper 

Publishers Association and president of the Afro-American newspapers, 

Willard W. Allen, Sovereign Grand Commander, The United Supreme 

Council, 33°, Prince Hall Masons and President of the Southern Life 

Insurance Company, and four other religious, labor, and lay leaders 

were elected to the Board of Directors of the NAACP Legal Defense and 

Educational Fund, Ine., it was announced this week by Thurgood Marshall, 

Director-Counsel of Legal Defense, 

The new members were unanimously elected at a recent meet 

ing of the Board held at Legal Defense headquarters, 107 West 3rd 

Street, New York, N. Y. 

The other new members are Rabbi Judah Cahn, Temple Israel, 

Lawrence, N. Y.; George K,Hunton, national secretary of the Catholic 

Interracial Council; Mrs. Daisy E. Lampkin, Vice President, 

Pittsburgh Courier and Charles S, Zimmerman, secretary-treasurer, 

Dressmakers Union, Local 22, 

NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., is the 

legal arm of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored 

People which has waged a long and uphill fight to establish the consti- 

tutional rights for Negroes to vote, to educate their children without 

regards to race, to travel without being discriminated and segregated 

against, and to work and live as other people, 

During the past 15 years Legal Defense has participated in 

hundreds of cases throughout the land, and its lawyers have appeared 

37 times before the United States Supreme Court in major cases in- 

volving the’ basic rights and principles denied Negro Americans, 

Among the most celebrated cases are the Smith v. Allwright 

which affirmed the right of Negro citizens to vote in primaries; the 

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2) e 
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Sweatt and McLaurin cases, which established the right of Negroes to 

attend state supported graduate and professional schools in states 

which had previously barred Negroes. 

The most recent and most comprehensive cases ever prepared 

by Legal Defense are the now famous school segregation cases which 

ask the United States Supreme Court to outlaw segregation in public 

and elementary schools. 

The election of the six new members brings the governing 

body of Legal Defense to a total of 3h. 

Mr. Murphy is a Howard graduate, received his A.M, at 

Harvard University, attended the University of Jena, Germany, was an 

assistant professor of German at Howard (1913-1918) and received 

numerous awards and citations. He has served on many state and city 

committees and commissions, was the Maryland delegate to the lth 

Annual Session of the National Enter-Denominational Ministerial 

Alliance of America (1930) and represented the U. S. government at 

the inauguration of the President of Liberia in 1952, 

Mr. Murphy was elected president of NNPA in 1953, is chair- 

man of the Trustee Board of Morgan State College alg a member of the 

board, and is trustee of Downingtown Industrial School since 1926, 

Mr, Allen is a native of Buckingham County, Va., has been 

successfully engaged in the real estate and insurance business since 

1915. He became president of Southern Life Insurance Coe, in 1925, 

for 31 years grand master of the Maryland Masons (Prince Hall) and 

head of the United Supreme Council of Scottish Rite Freemasonry of 

Southern Jurisdiction (22 states). He is a member of the Pythian 

Order and has served on several local and state committees and 

commissions.s 

Mats: 

#1 - Mr. Murphy 

#2 - Mr. Hunton 

#3 - Mr. Allen 

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U. S. SUPREME COURT ASKED 
TO REVIEW TWO DEATH CASES 

NEW YORK - The United States Supreme Court was asked within 

the past three weeks to review two cases involving Negroes by lawyers 

of NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc, One is in Georgia 

and the other in Alabama. It is alleged that the constitutional rights 

of both convieted men were violated. 

The Georgia case involved a Negro, Ozzie Jones, who was 

found guilty of rape and sentenced to death on October 7, 1952, by the 

Superior Court of Chatham County, Ga. On appeal to the Georgia 

Supreme Court the conviction was upheld with one judge dissenting, A 

petition for writ of habeas corpus filed in the City Court of 

Reidsville, Ga., was denied and the Supreme Court of Georgia in 

affirming the conviction denied a petition for a rehearing, 

In the Alabama case, a 17-year old Negro, Jeremiah Reeves, 

drs, was also convicted for the alleged rape of a white woman, The 

conviction was upheld by the Alabama Supreme Court and an appeal for 

a rehearing denied, 

Ozzie Jones was arrested and convicted on the testimony 

given by a white woman who identified him by the light of a match, 

Jones was represented in the lower court by an attorney who 

did not prepare for the case because he had not been paid and was not 

in court when the case was called for trial, He had to be sent for 

by the trial court. 

He did explain to the court, however, that he had no inten- 

tion of defending Jones. But despite this, he neglected to inform 

the court that he was totally unprepared, and had not subpoenaed any 

witnesses. He did not ask for more time to defend Jones, but asked 

to have 15 minutes with him, 

However, immediately after the trial, the attorney made a 

statement to the press saying that he knew nothing of the date of the 

trial until ten minutes after the trial was supposed to have beg 

and did not have adequate time to prepare a defense. 

Upon hearing this statement the court, which convicted Jones, 

convicted the attorney in a contempt proceeding, 

The case was appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court 

August 31, 1953. The lower elena decision was upheld with one judge 
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dissenting on November 25, A request for a rehearing was denied 

December 8, 

However, the lower court, in the application for writ of 

habeas corpus, found that: 

(a) "The evidence introduced in behalf of 

the applicant substantiated to a large ex- 

tent, the allegations of the petition and 

while there was evidence to the contrary, 

one could not help being impressed with 

the conviction that the attorney had made 

very little, if any, preparation for the 

trial of the case and was not adequately 

prepared for the trial of a case of such 

gravity and importance." (R. 67) 

In their petition to the UeS. Supreme Court, NAACP Legal 

Defense attorneys ask for a review of the case on the grounds that 

Jones, whose lawyer did not prepare for his defense and who was com- 

pelled to defend him by the court, did not have representation in the 

court and is entitled to a new trial. 

In the case of Jeremiah Reeves, Jr., the accuser claimed 

she was raped on July 28, 1952, by an unknown assailant, On 

November 10, almost four months later, Reeves, a 17-year old youth, 

was arrested and charged with the crime. 

He was taken to the state penitentiary at Kilby, Ala., 

held for three days and not permitted to consult with anyone. He was 

questioned constantly in a room with an electric chair and told that 

if he did confess to the crime he would be saved from the chair, 

otherwise he would die, 

On November 12, he was taken to the county jail in 

Montgomery and placed in a room where his accuser identified him as 

her assailant. He was indicted on November 1), 

At the trial the judge ordered the court cleared with the 

exception of witnesses and court officials, A motion by Reeves! 

lawyer to have a public trial, as required by the federal law, was 

denied, Another motion to have the press and his private stenographer 

be allowed to remain in the courtroom was also denied, 

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During the trial, a number of witnesses corroborated Reeves! 

story as to his whereabouts and also that he was emotionally un- 

balanced. 

Near the close of the trial, it was learned for the first 

time that a member of the jury was the chief of the Montgomery Reserve 

Police Force, organized for the express purpose of tracking down 

“alleged Negro rapists" and had been active in the case. Reeves' 

attorney then asked for a mistrial. The motion was denied, 

Reeves was convicted and sentenced to die. A petition for 

rehearing was filed August 6, 1953, and denied by the Alabama Supreme 

Court November 27. 

In their petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, NAACP Legal 

Defense lawyers ask that the case be reviewed on the grounds that the 

Supreme Court of Alabama erred in affirming the conviction of Reeves, 

whose forced confessions were introduced as evidence. The high court 

was also asked to determine whether the denial of the motion for a 

mistrial and the exclusion of Negroes from the jury constituted a 

violation of the Federal Constitution. 

NAACP attorneys in the case are Thurgood Marshall, Director- 

Counsel of Legal Defense, Robert L,. Carter, assistant and Jack 

Greenberg, David Pinsky and Elwood H. Chisolm, 

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