To Kill A Mockingbird Influences

How would you feel if you were falsely accused of a terrible crime? That’s right, Ozie Powell and the Scottsboro Boys were accused of rape and sent to jail for many years, a crime of which they didn't even commit. In the case of Scottsboro, Ozie Powell was clearly innocent of rape. Ozie wasn’t on the same car as the woman who accused the boys of raping them, and Ozie didn't even know the other men on the train until the day of the accusations. The woman who accused the boys of the crime were prostitutes, and had had intercourse only a little while before entering the train, explaining why the sperm found in their system was dead.

Each of the trails were staged with insubstantial evidence that any objective jury would be able to see. However, this was not the case in a culture where African Americans have been associated with many negative characteristics. The cases also seem similar to what happen to many freed slaves, when vagrant laws were passed. If African Americas were without any type of work, they were arrested and given a fine. When they were unable to pay, a benevolent white man would come to the rescue and in turn would only ask to repay the debt, a debt that would increase and would make them slaves again.

In Till’s case, the anger came from the senseless killing of a fourteen year old and how, as a result, the murderers got off with almost no trouble. The jury did not even have to think twice about the innocence of the cruel monsters just because they were white and their victim was black. The pigs were even laughing and rejoicing with their wives as if they did not destroy that boy’s family. It was honestly appalling. The Scottsboro Boys’ trial was even more tragic because it actually scarred them and led some of the boys to a path of devastation.

Before we can explain the trials, we need to understand what racism is. Routledge states, “...people sometimes use prejudicial attitudes and discriminatory behavior to boost their own self-esteem.” An example of this at Scottsboro is during the trial, where all the black boys were tried together at the same time. Normally, only one person would

They also think that if they did something wrong they would be less likely to get caught because there are more people doing it. This can also result in individuals feeling less guilt (Edmonds). When a riot gets to a high level, property such as homes and buildings are destroyed or vandalized. Mob mentality can be seen in the novel when at the courthouse when Atticus leaves everyone else stands. Some people don’t really know what is going on so they do what others around them are doing and stand as well.

In the Scottsboro trials after the first retrial, the case was appealed because the jury violated the 6th amendment and the court did not allow due process. The jury book for the town of Scottsboro did not even have the name of an african-american male on it so the jury was very clearly biased before it was even picked (Scottsboro American Tragedy). In both trials, the defendants were set up for conviction by a jury that put aside the evidence and convicted them because of the color of their

When all of sudden two young ladies rush off the train and accused the boys of raping them. When in actuality most of the boys were not even in the same car as the young ladies. They were really accusing the boys of raping because they were prostitutes and they were crossing state line which was illegally, When you are rape there are more than likely some kind of sign of a struggle but when Dr.John Lynch ,and Dr. R.R. Bridges examined victims Ruby Bates and Victoria Price less than two hours after the alleged rapes occurred the two doctors found semen in the vaginas of both women, they found little evidence to support their claims that they had been raped ,so in all reality they had lied to get people over the fact that they were prostitutes. By the end all of the nine boys that were convicted and found guilty and all served at least eighteen years in a Alabama chain gang before being either pardon or

In writing To Kill a Mockingbird the author Harper Lee used real life events as a base for the novel. A few aspects of the book are racism, The Jim Crow Laws, and cases of mob mentality. The first connection to America’s actual history is the presence of the Jim Crow laws in the book. People thought the laws were needed as a way to “Keep the black population in check” (Pilgrim). This image showed racism in the large crowd of people who came to watch a lynching (V.).

“Many Blacks resisted…indignities… and, far too often, they paid for their bravery with their lives” (Pilgrim). The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, utilized many historical events in order to provide life to the narration. There are accounts relating to the Jim Crow laws, mob mentality, and racial dilemmas of the Great Depression Era. To start, one connection of between the novel and American history is the Jim Crow laws. These were a set of rules that limited the respect blacks received in society.

He shows how he feels about the whole case and how the boys were falsely accused. He focused on how the boys’ “innocence never go the attention that their guilt did” (Wilder). These boys were guilty from the very beginning until proven innocent thirteen years after the crime was committed. Usually it’s the other way around and a person is innocent until proven guilty. The public was so caught up in the prejudice of the case and just assumed since there was a high crime rate in black and Hispanic boys that they had to have done it.

After reading and viewing the mob mentality pieces, I conclude that mob mentality led people to do disgusting acts that they would otherwise never do. For instance, in the article What is Mob Mentality, Smith states that mob mentality is the “...unique behavioral characteristics that emerge when people are in large groups”. This shows that people act differently when they are in large groups and do things that they would not be comfortable doing if they were by themselves. Smith goes on to say that people tend to want to be like others and do what others are doing, becuase when they see other people in a group doing something they figure that the person would not be doing it if it wasn't worth it so maybe they should try it.

The murder of Emmett Till was a demonstration that whites who committed the worst crime possible would be given a lenient trial because the victim was an African American. The trial of “The Scottsboro boys” was the worst. Everyone knew that the two girls were lying and one of them even confessed that she lied on the stand but the jury still found the defendants guilty. It is not just African Americans

There are many similarities between the two court cases including the false accusation of rape, the involvement of a lynch mob, the fact that many times they were proven innocent, and that they were all very young. I’ve observed that false accusations of rape was very common in these types of trials, mostly because it was a very serious crime in the southern half of the United States, where racism was very common. Several times after the defendant is proven guilty, someone will come out and say that they were innocent, but often times it is too late for the accused. Most of this type of trial frequent lynch mobs and not just after, but they will try and get to them before they are even tried. Many of these cases are ended by a confession.

Mob mentality is a bizarre and often violent phenomenon. Mob mentality is when people in a group exhibit unique behavior as a whole group(Smith). People would participate in mob mentality because they would be in a group when confusion occurred, inducing the mob mentality mindset. People would also join in on the mobs because they felt less guilty commiting a crime with many other people around. Often times the behaviors would involve people coming from miles around to have a fun time in the mob, while partaking in autrious activities like lynching(“Strange Fruit: Anniversary of a Lynching”).

In Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee presents a large social atmosphere that includes many different cultures and extremes. The story takes place in the southern town of Maycomb, Alabama during the Great Depression. This novel illustrates how the southerners perceived different ideas about each other and social norms. It is told through the eyes of a young girl, Scout Finch, as she is growing up and becoming influenced by societal attitudes. Throughout the course of this book Scout learns many lessons including: how a society functions, why there is conflict between different cultures, and what makes cultures different from each other.