Native Son - Richard Wright [180]
“Your Honor, Bigger Thomas was willing to vote for and follow any man who would have led him out of his morass of pain and hate and fear. If that mob outdoors is afraid of one man, what will it feel if millions rise? How soon will someone speak the word the resentful millions will understand: the word to be, to act, to live? Is this Court so naive as to think that they will not take a chance that is even less risky than that Bigger Thomas took? Let us not concern ourselves with that part of Bigger Thomas’ confession that says he murdered accidentally, that he did not rape the girl. It really does not matter. What does matter is that he was guilty before he killed! That was why his whole life became so quickly and naturally organized, pointed, charged with a new meaning when this thing occurred. Who knows when another ‘accident’ involving millions of men will happen, an ‘accident’ that will be the dreadful day of our doom?
“Lodged in the heart of this moment is the question of power which time will unfold!
“Your Honor, another civil war in these states is not impossible; and if the misunderstanding of what this boy’s life means is an indication of how men of wealth and property are misreading the consciousness of the submerged millions today, one may truly come.
“Listen, I’ve talked with this boy. He has no education. He is poor. He is black. And you know what we have made those things mean in our country. He is young and not yet thoroughly experienced in the ways of life. He is unmarried and does not know the steadying influence of a woman’s love, or what such a love can mean to him. I say I talked with him. Did I find ambition there? Yes. But it was blurred and hazy; with no notion of where it was to find an outlet. He knew he did not have a chance; he believed it. His ambition was chained, held back; a pool of stagnant water. I say I talked with him. Did he have the hope of a better life? Yes. But he kept it down, under rigid control. He moved through our crowded streets, drove our cars for us, waited upon our tables, ran our elevators, holding this thing tightly down in him. In every town and city you see him, laughing because we pay and expect him to laugh. What would happen if he wanted to get what the very atmosphere of our times has taught him as well as us that every man should have if he is able-bodied, of average intelligence, and sane? You know as well as I. There would be riots.
“Your Honor, if ever there was the unpredictable in our midst, this is it!
“I do not propose that we try to solve this entire problem here in this court room today. That is not within the province of our duty, nor even, I think, within the scope of our ability. But our decision as to whether this black boy is to live or die can be made in accordance with what actually exists. It will at least indicate that we see and know! And our seeing and knowing will comprise a consciousness of how inescapably this one man’s life will confront us ten million fold in the days to come.
“I ask that you spare this boy, send him to prison for life. I ask this, not because I want to, but because I feel I must. I speak under the threat of mob-rule and have no desire to intensify the already existing hate.
“What would prison mean to Bigger Thomas? It holds advantages for him that a life of freedom never had. To send him to prison would be more than an act of mercy. You would be for the first time conferring life upon him. He would be brought for the first time within the orbit of our civilization. He would have an identity, even though it be but a number. He would have for the first time an openly designated relationship with the world. The very building in which he would spend the rest of his natural lift would be the best he has ever known. Sending him to prison would be the first recognition of his personality he has ever had. The long black empty years ahead would constitute for his mind and feelings the only certain and durable object around which he could build a meaning for his life. The other inmates would be the first men with whom he could associate on a basis of equality. Steel bars between him and the society he offended would provide a refuge from hate and fear.