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"Dates and Attendance of Meetings," Mayor's Committee on Conditions in Harlem: Agendas, Box 32, Folder 6 (Roll 170), Records of Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia, 1934-1945 (New York City Municipal Archives).
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Members of the MCCH (13)
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Most newspapers reported in the same edition both the statement that Mayor La Guardia released on the morning of March 20 and had distributed in Harlem and his afternoon announcement of whom he had appointed to the Commission. Only the appointment of eleven committee members was reported in the Daily News, New York Evening Journal, and Brooklyn Daily Eagle, while their names were included in the Home News, New York World-Telegram, and Atlanta World. The New York Age published the names of only the six Black members, while the Afro-American only identified the office holders, Roberts, Villard, and Carter, and Hays. The names and the occupations provided in the mayor’s press statement were published in the Daily Mirror, New York American, New York Times, Daily Worker, and the New York Amsterdam News. The New York Post and the Norfolk Journal and Guide combined that occupational information with information on the political affiliations of each member. The New York Herald Tribune and New York Sun published more extended biographies of all eleven members.
La Guardia announced the members had been selected “because of their distinct contributions in their several fields,” according to a story in the New York Sun. He would later say that the appointments had been made "by advice,” according to the New York Age. There was no direct evidence of who offered La Guardia that advice. That it had not come from the leaders of Harlem’s social organizations was clear from the pointed request that James Hubert, the executive director of the Urban League, made to the mayor in a letter on March 26, “that in the future you will avail yourself of such assistance as is very easily obtained in Harlem and other Negro sections of the City to the end that whatever is undertaken may be accomplished as I know you desire the work to be done.” Instead, La Guardia appeared to have relied on those with whom he had political ties. Hubert Delany was likely one source of advice. La Guardia, who had appointed him tax commissioner, treated him “as an unofficial ombudsman for the black community” according to historian Thomas Kessner. (Delany was a member of the NAACP). The NAACP did send La Guardia a list of names on March 20 that included three of those appointed — Hays, Ernst, and Carter — but there is no evidence to confirm that the Mayor received that list before announcing the Commission members.Historian Stephen Carter argued that Eunice Hunton Carter may have been appointed in recognition of her willingness to run for a state assembly seat for La Guardia’s Republican-Fusion party the previous year. He noted that the party machine “had a tradition of finding places for candidates willing to run in tough cases against incumbents.” An Associated Negro Press story published in the Norfolk Journal and Guide attributed Carter’s subsequent appointment to Thomas Dewey’s team of special prosecutors going after the Mob to that obligation.
La Guardia subsequently added two additional members, a Black clergyman and a white clergyman. Only the New York Amsterdam News reported those appointments, suggesting that the mayor's office did not announce them in press statements. The appointment of Rev. John W. Robinson, the retired pastor of St. Mark's, the city's largest AME church, was foreshadowed in newspaper stories about the mayor's visit to the Interdenominational Preachers Meeting of Greater New York and Vicinity on March 25. Robinson led that group. After their complainants about La Guardia's failure to appoint a minister, the mayor indicated he would consider appointing a nominee of the meeting. Stories in the Home News, New York Times, and New York World-Telegram and in the New York Amsterdam News and New York Age reported that the meeting chose Robinson. Evidence of an indirect political connection that may have made La Guardia receptive to that suggestion appeared in a New York Amsterdam News story on the couple's wedding: Robinson’s second wife, pharmacist Dr. Julia Coleman, was active in the Republican Party in Harlem.
That La Guardia told the Interdenominational Preachers Meeting that he would also appoint a second clergyman “chosen from a denomination not included in the Alliance” was reported only in the New York Age. It took until April 4, almost a week after Robinson's appointment, for the mayor to finalize that choice: Father McCann of St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Church on West 141st Street. The New York Amsterdam News made McCann's appointment the headline of the story it published on April 6 about the MCCH hearing. McCann had appeared in earlier newspaper stories as a result of a pastoral letter he made public on March 23 blaming Communists for the disorder and calling for a movement to keep them out of Harlem. The priest's anti-communism offered La Guardia a way to address those who had criticized those he had appointed as all liberals. However, La Guardia had clearly also decided the second clergyman on the committee should be Catholic as he had sought the advice of Edmund B. Butler, a prominent Catholic lawyer who was secretary of the city’s Emergency Relief Bureau, about whom to appoint immediately after he met with the Black ministers. Butler wrote to him the next day, to give him McCann’s name, which he had been unable to think of at that time: “He has always been very much interested in Negroes and volunteered for the work….I think that the appointment of him would be excellent.” A note on the letter recorded, “Father McCann is white,” likely another criteria for his selection given that the committee had two more Black members than white members after Robinson’s appointment. Several days later, on April 1, Butler spoke to La Guardia about McCann, after which he told the clergyman that La Guardia was going to appoint him. On April 4, La Guardia wrote to notify Roberts that he had appointed Father McCann. Even after the Communist Party wrote to both the MCCH and the Mayor to complain about McCann's appointment on April 25, the Daily Worker did not report it.
In the historical literature, only Lindsey Lupo identified all thirteen the members of the MCCH, in a chart that described their occupations in two or three words. Cheryl Greenberg named Delaney, Randolph, and, inexplicably, Cullen as examples of the "impressive range of experts" that La Guardia had appointed, also mistakenly including Frazier as a member of the commission. Naison only identified the number of "representative citizens" appointed, which he stated was eleven, neglecting the later appointments of Robinson and McCann. Johnson also mistakenly identified the MCCH as an eleven-member commission, without identifying any of the members. Kessner mentioned only Roberts, the chair, as did Watson.
Information on the attendance of the MCCH members at their meetings and public hearings was collated by their staff. The MCCH included its own appraisal of each members contribution to its work in the foreword of the version of its report it submitted to Mayor La Guardia. Who signed, and thereby endorsed the report of the subcommittee on crime and the MCCH's final report, was documented in the MCCH records.Black members:
Eunice Hunton Carter
- Press statement: “social worker and lawyer"
- New York Herald Tribune: "Lawyer and social worker, holds degrees from Smith College and Columbia and Fordham Universities, Republican-Fusion candidate for Assembly from 19th Manhattan District in 1934"
- New York Post: “lawyer and social worker and Fusion political leader”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a social worker, lawyer and leader in every important progressive movement in the community, who knows Harlem in its gladness and sorrow"
- Meeting Attendance: 17
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 4 (missed May 18)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
Countee Cullen
- Press statement: "author"
- New York Herald Tribune: "poet, graduate of New York University; contributor to magazines and newspapers and winner of several poetry awards"
- New York Post: “the poet”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a young Negro pedagogue and poet, brought to the commission the point of view of the youth"
- Meeting Attendance: 11
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 4 (missed May 18)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
Hubert T. Delany
- Press statement: "Tax Commissioner of the City of New York"
- New York Herald Tribune: "Negro, lawyer, graduate of the College of the City of New York and New York University Law School, Assistant United States Attorney under former United States Attorney Charles H. Tuttle, Republican candidate for House of Representatives from 21st Manhattan District in 1920. Commissioner of Board of Taxes and Assessments by appointment of Mayor LaGuardia in February 1934."
- New York Post: “lawyer and Republican leader"
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "Commissioner of Taxes and Assessments of the City of New York, was well-qualified to anlayze the employment situation in Harlem. Mr Delany, a lawyer and former public official, was well-equipped to analyze the problem of unemployment with as little intellectual bias as anyone in the community."
- Meeting Attendance: 12
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 3 (missed May 4, May 18)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
A. Philip Randolph
- Press statement: "Natl. President, Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters"
- New York Herald Tribune: "general organizer and president of National Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, attended College of City of New York, founder of a magazine, 'The Messenger'"
- New York Post: “president of the National Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a great leader in the labor movement displayed his keen sense of understanding as President of the International Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. Mr Randolph brought to the Commission a greater understanding of labor problems as they affect the Negroes than any other man that could be found in the community. Harlem respects and admires A. Philip Randolph."
- Meeting Attendance: 7
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 5
- Reports signed: MCCH report (not in New York when the Subcommittee report was submitted)
Charles Roberts
- Press statement: "dentist"
- New York Herald Tribune: "Negro, dentist, graduate of Lincoln University, Republican candidate for House of Representatives from 21st District in 1924, member of Board of Aldermen, 1931-1933"
- New York Post: “dentist, Republican leader and former Alderman”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "selected for the reason that he has lived in the community of Harlem for over a quarter of a century. His life has been devoted to the development of the social, economic and cultural advancement of the community, both as a former public official and as a professional man. His unquestioned interest and knowledge of the community needs make him an outstanding representative of Harlem."
- Meeting Attendance: 20
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 5
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
Rev. John Robinson
- No press statement or newspaper stories about his appointment
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a representative of the Interdenominational Ministers Alliance, symbolizes the opinion of Negro clergymen of Harlem. It is useless to state the churches of Harlem exercise the most vitalizing influence that can be found in this area."
- Meeting Attendance: 13
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 5
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
Charles Toney
- Press statement: "Municipal Court"
- New York Herald Tribune: "Justice of Municipal Court; graduate of Syracuse University, Tammany Democrat"
- New York Post: "justice of the Municipal Court and Democratic political leader”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a Justice of the Municipal Court of the City of New York, was of great assistance in that by reason of his experience in what is known as the poor man's court, brought a legal understanding to the commission that was valuable."
- Meeting Attendance: 13
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 1 (missed April 6, April 20, May 4, May 18)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
White members:
Morris L. Ernst
- Press statement: "lawyer;" “writer and publisher” in the Daily Mirror and New York American
- New York Herald Tribune: "lawyer, graduate of Columbia University, member of American Civil Liberties Union, counsel in many liberal causes, represented Mrs. Margaret Sanger, birth-control advocate; mediator in recent taxicab strike by appointment of Mayor LaGuardia"
- New York Post: "of the Civil Liberties Union,” and grouped with Hays
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "an eminent attorney, did yeoman service relative to the housing situation"
- Meeting Attendance: 6
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 2 (missed April 20, May 4, May 18)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime
John J. Grimley
- Press statement: "doctor"
- New York Herald Tribune: "physician, lieutenant-colonel of 369th Infantry, National Guard of New York, crack Negro regiment"
- New York Post: “lieutenant-colonel of the Negro 369th Infantry, National Guard”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "brought to the Commission intimate contact with the manhood of Harlem through his experience as commanding officer of the 369th Infantry. Col. Grimley also rendered technical advice relative to the problem of health, having spent years as superintendent and director of various hospitals."
- Meeting Attendance: 5
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 4 (recorded as missing May 18, but was referred to as present in transcript)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime
Arthur Garfield Hays
- Press statement: "lawyer"
- New York Herald Tribune: "Lawyer, graduate of Columbia University, counsel to American Civil Liberties Union, appeared as defense counsel in many cases involving civil liberties - coal strike in Pennsylvania, 1922; Scopes evolution trial in Tennessee, 1925; Countess Cathcart immigration case; Sacco-Vanzetti case in 1927, and most recently in defense of John Strachey, English lecturer threatened with deportation"
- New York Post: “of the Civil Liberties Union,” and grouped with Ernst
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a champion of civil liberties, conducted with astuteness and patience the public hearings concerning the police and their treatment of Harlem. The information so adduced was of invaluable worth to the study."
- Meeting Attendance: 12
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 5 (chair)
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
Father McCann
- No press statement or newspaper stories about his appointment
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "represented the Catholic opinion of the community"
- Meeting Attendance: 5
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 3 (missed March 30 [not appointed at that time], May 18)
- Reports signed: Neither
William J. Schieffelin
- Press statement: "Trustee of the Tuskegee Institute”
- New York Herald Tribune: "Chemist, graduate of Columbia School of Mines and University of Munich, chairman of Citizens Union, trustee of Hampton Institute and Tuskegee Institute, schools for the education of Negroes"
- New York Post: “chairman of the Citizen's Union and of Tuskegee Institute, the Negro university”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "a trustee of Tuskegee Institute, a contributor and benefactor of the Negro race, a director of the Citizen's Union, and an exponent of social justice, contributed calm understanding of the perplexing problems that this committee dealt with."
- Meeting Attendance: 9
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 3 (missed May 4, May 18)
- Reports signed: MCCH report (not in New York when the subcommittee report was submitted)
Oswald Garrison Villard
- Press statement: "publisher"
- New York Herald Tribune: "owner of 'The Nation'; graduate of Harvard University, liberal crusader, grandson of William Lloyd Garrison, founder of 'The Liberator,' and apostle of abolition of slavery"
- New York Post: “editor of the Nation”
- Foreword to the MCCH report: "former editor and owner of a metropolitan daily, former professor at Harvard University and contributing editor to the Nation, a member of the NAACP, writer and lecturer, a keen student of American social problem, not excepting the oftern referred to Negro problem, brought a wealth of understanding and experience. It has been said of Mr Villard that his merciless scrutiny and analysis make him one of the foremost social philosophers of America."
- Meeting Attendance: 12
- Subcommittee on Crime Hearing Attendance: 5
- Reports signed: Subcommittee on crime; MCCH report
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The public hearing of the MCCH's subcommittee on crime (April 6)
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Twenty witnesses testified at the hearing on April 6, the largest group at any of the hearings. Their testimony covered a wider range of events than the previous week. Three witnesses added to the picture of events in the store. Charles Hurley, one of the Kress staff who grabbed Lino Rivera, testified about both about what happened to the boy and subsequent events in the store. Officer Eldridge, the Crime Prevention Bureau officer summoned to take custody of the boy, testified about how Rivera came to be left with Patrolman Donohue. Patrolman Shannon testified about efforts to disperse the crowds after the boy had been released. Three women staff from the store testified they knew nothing about what had happened to Rivera. Rivera himself testified again in response to persistent questions about whether he was actually the boy who had been in the Kress store. No newspapers covered the testimony in the detail they had the first hearing. The nature of the hearing would have made that difficult as "scores of witnesses presented different angles of the rioting," as the correspondent for the Afro-American described it. Or as the more critical assessment of the New York Herald Tribune journalist put it, "Additional facts as to the actual riot were elicited in a wordy, sometimes redundant question and answer session guided by Arthur Garfield Hays." Several publications devoted as much or more space to the reactions of the audience as to the testimony as Black residents and Communists asserted their view of the events and the situation in Harlem. All the MCCH members other than Judge Toney were in attendance to hear from both the audience and the witnesses, although Morris Ernst and Rev. Robinson were only present in the afternoon as in the morning they presided over a public hearing on housing in a courtroom on another floor.
Hurley’s testimony described the circumstances that led to Rivera being caught. He and the store manager had seen Rivera take a knife, after which he and the store detective grabbed the boy and took him out the front of the store. The store detective then left to get a Crime Prevention Bureau officer to take the boy into custody, which Hurley testified was the store’s practice with shoplifters rather than having them arrested. When Rivera continued to struggle with Hurley, Steve Urban came to help. They were the two men Donohue saw the boy bite. Once Officer Eldridge, the Crime Prevention Bureau officer, arrived, Hurley claimed he went to the back of the store. He insisted that he played no further part in the events in the store, merely observing the exchanges between police and women shoppers. Neither Rivera nor Donohue had mentioned Eldridge’s presence in their testimony the previous week. The officer testified he arrived at the store when the ambulance doctor Donohue had summoned was treating Hurley and Urban for their bite wounds. That Eldridge did not leave with Rivera was due to Hurley wanting him arrested for assault for biting him. It was Hurley later changing his mind that left Donohue having to decide what to do with Rivera. (Hurley himself insisted that it was Urban, not him, who wanted to charge Rivera.) Few journalists saw anything sufficiently new in the details these witnesses provided to make them worth including in their stories. Only the New York Sun and Home News mentioned Hurley’s testimony, reporting just his denials that Rivera had been beaten. The Afro-American listed Hurley and Eldridge among a group of witnesses who “testified to clinch the contention that Rivera is the boy who stole the ten-cent Kress knife,” a question which neither was asked.
Shannon arrived at the Kress store at 4:00 PM, so his testimony filled in what had happened in the store between Donohue’s departure and the arrival of Louise Thompson. Going “from one crowd to another,” the patrolman told the shoppers that there was not a boy in the store basement, “but they would not listen.” Shannon claimed that he formed a committee of three shoppers, two men and one woman, whom he took to the basement to see that Rivera was not there. As he could not identify its members and no other witness mentioned it, that may not have happened. It was his decision to call for additional police at 4:20 PM. Still among the officers in the store trying to “reason” with shoppers when a second group of police reinforcements arrived, Shannon also heard the woman scream and pots and pans hitting the floor that Thompson had described. It was Hays' response to this testimony that attracted the attention of many of the journalists present. He twice suggested that police should have brought Rivera back to the store so that the crowds could see him. “That was up to my superiors,” Shannon replied on both occasions. Hays’ pointed rejoinder to that answer was also quoted in exactly the same language in the Home News, Daily News, New York Sun, New York Herald Tribune, New York Age, and New York Amsterdam News. "'I am not blaming you personally,' Hays said. 'You see this whole thing started from a false rumor, and it could have been stifled at the start, if it had been handled properly by the police.'" That statement was not included in the transcript of the hearing. It continued the criticism of police handling of Rivera’s release targeted at Patrolman Donohue in the previous hearing. The transcript and the press had differed then too about what had been said and by whom, reflecting how the audience inserted their reactions and questions into the MCCH’s agenda. However, given the consistent language of the quotation in white and Black publications, it was clear that Hays had picked up the audience's criticisms and more directly blamed police than he had in the first hearing. That did not mean that the press shared the same sense of the importance of this testimony. No mention of it appeared in New York Times, New York Post, or the Hearst papers the New York American and Daily Mirror. By contrast, the Home News and Daily News made Hays' statement the headline of their stories. The reactions of the Black press spanned the New York Amsterdam News identifying Hays criticism as one of three highlights in the hearing, the New York Age placing it near the end of its story, on an inside page, and the Afro-American not mentioning it (but focusing on criticism of police shooting Lloyd Hobbs).
Testimony about events on West 125th Street outside the store was given by three police officers. The MCCH had requested their presence so they could testify about events that had resulted in arrests, but District Attorney Dodge’s instructions prevented that testimony. Despite that injunction, Hays did question Sergeant Bowe, Patrolman Moran, and Patrolman Eppler about events around the arrests they made. Moran described Daniel Miller’s attempt to speak in front of the Kress store, the store window being broken, and Miller's subsequent arrest, in line with what Louise Thompson had described, and the later arrest of the three Young Liberators for picketing, which Thompson had not mentioned. Moran spent the rest of the evening moving crowds away from the front of the Kress store, in keeping with Thompson’s account. Bowe testified only that he witnessed the arrest of the Young Liberators. Eppler described what he saw on 124th Street, where his emergency truck first arrived to find nothing happening, and then on 125th Street, where he saw crowds and heard windows broken. None of that testimony was reported in the press. The New York Sun did mention Eppler and Moran, but mistakenly reported that “they told of the trouble in the store which preceded the riot." Dodge's restriction on police officers testifying attracted more attention than what those officers said. The New York Sun and New York Post made it the headline of their stories, and it featured prominently in the New York Times, Daily News, New York Age, and New York Amsterdam News, and less so in the New York Herald Tribune and Home News. Rather than elaborating details of the events of the disorder, the public record of the hearing focused on the politics of the investigation.
Details of Patrolman McInerney’s killing of Lloyd Hobbs were provided by eight witnesses. Lawyer, Mary, and Russell Hobbs testified, together with three Black men who had witnessed the shooting, Howard Malloy, Arthur Moore, and Samuel Pitts, Dr. Arthur Logan, one of the physicians who treated Lloyd Hobbs, Detective Thomas McCormick, the police stenographer who had recorded a statement from the boy soon after he arrived at Harlem Hospital, and James Tartar, a Black investigator for the MCCH. Russell's testimony was more in line with his statement than the previous week. Having continued to run up 7th Avenue fearing a beating by police, he had not, however, seen his brother shot. Malloy, Moore, and Pitts all described Hobbs breaking from the crowd to turn on West 128th Street and McInerney firing at him without calling on him to stop. Lawyer and Mary Hobbs testified that in the hospital their son had said “the officer shot me for nothing. I was not doing anything.” According to their testimony, McInerney, guarding the boy, responded, "Why didn't you halt when I told you to?" The boy's statement taken by Detective McCormick echoed what his parents said the Lloyd had told them. Dr. Arthur Logan’s testimony only described the nature of the boy's injuries; Lloyd had not said anything in the doctor's presence and no items had been found in his clothing. Tartar provided details of a report from the precinct commander about the shooting that was at odds with what the testimony of the eyewitnesses. The Afro-American made the killing of Hobbs the focus of its story, but the two New York City Black newspapers gave it less attention. It was the final item in the New York Age story and surprisingly not mentioned at all in the New York Amsterdam News, which had reported it extensively the previous week. While the radical Daily Worker and New Masses gave Hobbs prominence in reporting the hearing, only the New York Times and Home News among the mainstream white press even mentioned his killing.
The only other events in the disorder about which the hearing heard testimony were the deaths of Andrew Lyons, August Miller, and James Thompson. Physicians from Harlem Hospital testified to their injuries and treatment, but offered no information on the circumstances in which they died.
The audience of Black residents and Communists asserted their view of the events and the situation in Harlem and contested the testimony of some witnesses. It was their reactions to the testimony more than the questions asked by Communist lawyers that drew the attention of MCCH members and the press to issues. “Turbulent” was how the white newspapers the Home News, Daily Mirror, New York American, and New York Times described the hearing, with the later straying into racial stereotypes in adding “noisy and emotional.” A fuller picture of the proceedings was offered by the New York Herald Tribune: “persons in the crowded courtroom were asking questions as well as five attorneys representing a variety of Communist associations. The lawyers would quarrel from time to time, and when the din blotted out the shouted replies of witnesses Mr Hays would rap for order.” That story was also the only one to identify the audience, as mostly “Negro and Communistic.” Their boos, cheers, and outbursts highlighted the issues that mattered to them and the testimony which they contested: boos for Dodge’s ban on police testimony (Daily News, Daily Mirror) and the quality of care at Harlem Hospital (New York Herald Tribune, Home News, New York Amsterdam News); cheers for defense of the Communist pamphlets (New York Amsterdam News); accusations that Kress staff had been bribed to testify there had been no beating in the store; and calls for the arrest of Patrolman McInerney (Afro-American).
The audience joined with ILD lawyers to also force Hays to address the question of whether Rivera was the boy who had been in the Kress store, which consequently made its way into stories about the hearing. The New York Times’s reporting most clearly captured that process, with the challenges from the audience when Hays had Rivera testify again included in the narrative: “He’s a paid witness,” some of those in the room shouted. “He wasn’t the only boy in that store.” “The police are covering up,” another exclaimed.” They also booed Rivera, according to the New York Age. The Black press, the New York Age, New York Amsterdam News, and Afro-American, followed the lead of the audience and made debate over Rivera the headline in their stories about the hearing. The reactions would also make an impression on E. Franklin Frazier, the director of the MCCH's survey of Harlem. Although convinced by the evidence that Rivera was the boy in the store, he mentioned the debates in his final report to illustrate the "skeptical mood of the people in the audience who openly expressed a lack of confidence in the police and the representatives of established authority."
By contrast, several white newspapers ignored the audience interventions entirely. The Hearst newspapers, the New York American and the Daily Mirror, put the audience's complaints into the mouths of witnesses in stories devoted to sensationalized claims that another riot was imminent. The Daily Mirror also recast the audience’s concerns in the racial terms in which they portrayed the disorder: "The room was packed with colored people, openly hostile to any effort to justify the white participants in the riot.”
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The public hearing of the MCCH's subcommittee on crime (May 4)
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Three witnesses testified to events on 125th Street at the beginning of the disorder at the hearing on May 4. A slightly smaller group of MCCH members heard the testimony than at the previous hearing, with only Toney (again) and Delany of the Black members absent and Ersnt (again) and Scheiffelin of the white members. Harry Gordon and Daniel Miller, the two white men who tried to speak to crowds outside the Kress store, testified about how they came to be in the area and the circumstances of their arrest. Their account of how they came to be there was new; the details of their arrests fit with testimony the MCCH had heard earlier from Louise Thompson and Patrolman Moran. While only the New York American mentioned Miller’s testimony about being beaten at the police station after his arrest, what Gordon said was more widely reported. Detailed summaries appeared in the New York Times, Home News, New York Age, and Atlanta World, while the New York American and Afro-American mentioned only that he been beaten by police. Reflecting the racial focus of the Hearst press, the New York American highlighted that Gordon and Miller were white in its headline. While Thompson had briefly mentioned Gordon's beating in her earlier testimony, Gordon provided details, and added violence during his time in custody, testimony that attracted the attention of journalists who otherwise showed little interest in details of the events of the disorder. However, stories about the hearing in most white newspapers did not mention the men’s testimony, focusing instead on the behavior of the audience (and the police brutality case that occurred away from the disorder, the killing of Samuel Laurie, about which the MCCH heard testimony).
The third witness, Benjamin Todman, was the driver of the hearse seen outside the store. He testified he had been on his way to a garage where the hearse was parked, on West 124th Street in the block behind the Kress store. Only the New York Evening Journal reported his testimony.
The audience continued to insert their perspectives into the hearing and disrupt the MCCH’s agenda as significantly as they had in the previous hearing, perhaps more so. Certainly a larger number of newspapers made the audience the headline of their stories than had in their stories reporting the previous hearing. The New York Evening Journal and Afro-American, who had used such headlines in their earlier stories, were joined by the New York World-Telegram, New York Post, New York Sun, Daily News, New York Times, and the New York Age. Among the white press only the Home News and New York American, and the Atlanta World among the Black press, opted for headlines about the subject of the testimony, police brutality (this edition of the New York Amsterdam News has not survived). The New York World-Telegram, New York Sun, and Daily News went further, reporting only the audience without mention of the testimony to which they had reacted. Two white publications with different political positions explicitly marginalized the positions taken by the audience, casting them as at odds with or not contributing to the investigation. The Hearst publication the New York Evening Journal reported that “unruly and obstructionist audiences at the hearings virtually prevented the discovery of any facts.” The MCCH “encountered an audience so disorderly that it made little progress in the examination of witnesses,” according to the New York Post, a regular critic of the Hearst press.
What the white press increasingly reported simply as disorder continued to be efforts by the audience to shape the MCCH agenda and highlight the issues in the events of March 19 and 20. The hearing began with a direct challenge to MCCH’s agenda from members of the audience. Welch, Tauber, Ford, Mrs. Burroughs, Vernel Williams of the Harlem Lawyers Association, and Romney himself, pushed Hays to hear testimony on Romney’s allegation that his recent arrest was an effort by police to intimidate him. Hays, anxious to complete a report on the events of the disorder, insisted that testimony about that topic had to be heard first. Neither of the major disruptions later in the hearing related to events of disorder, but both focused on police. An unidentified woman criticized the patrolman who had killed Samuel Laurie, calling out after he had testified that he had been a police officer for three years that “That’s three years too long.” The second disruption was again provoked by Charles Romney, who called for stool pigeons to be removed from the hearing, a reference to Lieutenant Samuel Battle to whom he had already applied that label.
In response to the testimony that was heard, audience members continued to amplify the criticisms of police. While Gordon testified, the audience was “thrown into uproar” (Atlanta World, Home News), heckled and booed (New York World-Telegram), and “voiced its anger” (Afro-American, New York Times). The effect of those reactions was better captured by the descriptions in the New York Age that the audience “interrupted [with] demonstrations against the police” and in the New York Sun that “Jeers, boos and catcalls from the audience punctuated the testimony of witnesses.” The noise was an intervention that emphasized testimony that described police violence. What distinguished this hearing from the last was that these interventions crossed racial lines. An audience reported as being made-up almost entirely of Black men and women was “all with Gordon,” as the Home News put it, a white man, and directed much of its anger toward Lieutenant Samuel Battle, a Black police officer, who had predictably been tasked with representing the police department. Such interracial action would have thrilled the Communist Party members at the hearing, who were working to organize Harlem along those lines. It likely also lay at the root of the increased emphasis in the white press on marginalizing the contribution of the audience to the information being gathered in the hearings.
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2022-11-11T17:12:58+00:00
The public hearing of the MCCH's subcommittee on crime (May 18)
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2023-12-16T20:24:27+00:00
Ten witnesses testified at the hearing on May 18; only four provided evidence about the events of the disorder. Jackson Smith, the manager of the Kress store, testified about events in the store and on 125th Street. The MCCH had been seeking his testimony for two months, but as the last witness to what happened in the store to appear, he had little new to add to what they had already heard. While he saw Rivera take the knife, as Hurley had testified, he had remained in his office so had not seen his staff struggle with the boy. Nor was he involved in Patrolman Donohue’s decision to take Rivera into the basement and release out the store’s rear exit. Smith did make the decision not to charge the boy, but made clear that it was Hurley’s decision about whether to charge him with assault that resulted in Donohue releasing him. The new information Smith provided concerned efforts to calm shoppers and his decisions to summon an increasing police presence and ultimately to have them clear the store once he decided to close. Again, he participated only in the initial efforts to convince shoppers and did not witness how police treated them. He then remained in the store throughout the disorder and witnessed the arrests of Daniel Miller and the three Young Liberators who picketed the store. While most newspaper stories mentioned Smith’s appearance, they did not treat his testimony as adding anything new. The New York Herald Tribune explicitly reported that "all of [the testimony about the events of March 19] had been gone over in previous meetings,” while the New York Sun described Smith as having “once more told” how Rivera had been apprehended. Even the MCCH members had limited interest in his testimony, with Oscar Villard suggesting that Charles Romney “was taking too much tome by going over evidence already covered,” according to the New York Sun. More attention was paid to the Southern accent — the “Dixie drawl” — in which Smith delivered his testimony than its substance. The Home News, New York American, Daily News, New York Times, New York Sun, New York Post, and New York Age all referred to it. The New York World-Telegram mentioned only that he and several clerks had remained in the store throughout the disorder.
The MCCH heard the testimony of three additional eyewitnesses to the killing of Lloyd Hobbs on May 18, as well as further information about the items the boy had allegedly stolen. Marshall Pfifer and Warren Wright testified at the hearing, while Clarence Wilson reported the testimony of John Bennett, who was too sick to attend the hearing. All three men told the same story as Malloy, Moore, and Pitts had in the earlier hearing: Hobbs was not carrying anything and McInerney had not called out for him to stop before shooting him. Pfifer had watched from the same corner as the earlier witnesses, whereas Wright and Bennett saw those events from different perspectives. Wright was at the entrance to the apartments above 2150 7th Avenue, south of the automobile supply store, while Bennett was in 201 West 128th Street, toward which Hobbs was running when McInerney shot him. While their testimony did not include any new information about the killing of Hobbs, it was new evidence that provided a basis for presenting the case to the grand jury again. Detective O’Brien testified for the second time, bringing with him the horn and socket set that police alleged Hobbs had taken from the automobile supply store but which none of the eyewitnesses had seen in his possession. O’Brien repeatedly denied knowledge of when the items were turned over to the property clerk, frustrating Hays’ efforts to elicit testimony that McInerney had them for nineteen days after he arrested Hobbs, which James Tartar, the MCCH investigator, had established. While that long interval gave the patrolman the opportunity to have obtained the items after he arrested the boy to justify the shooting, O’Brien also for the first time reported that McInerney had noted recovered items in the arrest record on March 20. (While that evidence apparently confirmed that the patrolman had not obtained the items later to help justify shooting Hobbs, Tartar would later claim that the record had been altered to add that information.) Black newspapers the New York Age and Afro-American again reported this testimony in more detail than the white press (this issue of the New York Amsterdam News has not survived), but only the New York World-Telegram mentioned all three eyewitnesses. Pfifer also appeared in the New York Age and New York Times, whereas the Home News and the New York Sun mentioned only Wright. Who had possession of the allegedly stolen items was discussed in both Black newspapers, the New York World-Telegram, New York Times, and Home News (without mentioning O’Brien in the Afro-American and New York World-Telegram). Only the New York World-Telegram dramatized that evidence, reporting, “One of the mysteries in the case is the appearance several days ago after Hobbs death of loot of which there had been no record at the time he was shot.” Which MCCH members heard this testimony was not entirely clear. MCCH records identified only Hays, Villard, Roberts, Robinson, and Randolph as being at this hearing, the smallest group to attend the subcommittee on crime’s hearings. An audience member was also recorded in the transcript as identifying Grimley as also present.
The effect of the audience interventions in this hearing are more difficult to determine than in the preceding hearings. The New York Age described the audience as creating “incessant confusion,” suggesting that its journalist no longer perceived the interventions as contributing to what the MCCH learned from the testimony. The New York Herald Tribune also saw less significance in the audience’s behavior, presenting it as just the latest example of the “turbulence at almost every session.” Other white newspapers reported the hearing as similar to those that preceded it without those judgments, “one of the most stormy” according to the New York Post and the “liveliest” in the assessment of the Home News. Charles Romney’s role in disrupting the hearing was also treated as less significant, by the New York Herald Tribune, as what he had done “on several previous occasions.” MCCH members had also heard enough from Romney. Villard’s suggestion that he was taking too much time going over Smith’s testimony about when Rivera was apprehended led to an outburst from Romney attacking the MCCH for protecting witnesses (which was not recorded in the transcript). After a recess, the MCCH members decided that Romney would no longer be allowed to question witnesses, holding to that position over objections from the audience. At the same time, Hays allowed other audience members to question Smith. Just who they were is not always recorded in the transcript or reported in the press, but Fannie Horowitz and Mrs. Burroughs were identified. Rev. Robinson also took up the issue of whether Rivera was the boy who had been in the store that audience members had introduced in the hearings on March 30 and April 6. He questioned Smith about his identification of Rivera for some time before Hays declared the issue resolved. Hays did however have James Tartar, the MCCH investigator, testify that no boy ten years old or younger had been treated for injuries at Harlem Hospital to further confirm the identification of Rivera.
If Hays did not adopt the suspicion of Rivera promoted by audience members, he did take up the critical stance toward Lieutenant Battle that the audience had displayed at the previous hearing. His criticism of Battle for not stopping warrantless searches brought applause from the audience, reported by the Home News and New York Age. Hays also turned to the audience to confirm allegations that police stopped residents on the street and searched them for numbers, slips from the form of gambling prevalent in Harlem. Twenty-five people stood, dramatizing the claims about harassment. Hays challenged Inspector Di Martini and Captain Rothengast about those illegal practices. As a result, criticism of police was again the headline to stories in the New York Times, Home News, New York World-Telegram, Afro-American, and New York Age. Thanks to the reactions of the audience, the role of the police in the events of the disorder would have been at the front of Hays' mind when he turned to drafting the subcommittee’s report immediately after the hearing.