January 22, 2020 TKAM History Research Paper

The history behind To Kill a Mockingbird is what inspired Harper Lee to write a story that would spark anger in her readers at the blatant inequality the black community faced and motivate change. During the time period that the novel was written many important historical events were occurring. The Civil Rights Movement was in full swing, and Lee wanted to empower her readers and help them see the prejudice in their world. The book deals with glaring injustice to highlight the faults with the current social ideals. She drew inspiration from events that would unify people in the fight for equality. In order to portray an accurate representation of racism in the 1930s, Harper Lee drew inspiration from historical events like the Scottsboro Boys

Trials, the attacks by the Klu Klux Klan, and the Emmet Till case.

On March 25, 1931, a fight broke out between a group of white men and a group of black men on a train. The white men alerted officials along the track who stopped the train and forced

9 black men off and imprisoned them. During this time two white women, Victoria Price and

Ruby Bates, came forward and accused the men of rape (Scottsboro Boys Trials par 2). The boys were tried in 1931 on charges of raping the women. (Wilson 5). After being found guilty the first time, the boys began a new trial in 1933 Alabama with a much better lawyer, Samuel Leibowitz.

Leibowitz accused one of the prosecutors, Price, of making false claims to hide from her own illegal activities involving prostitution. (Scottsboro Boys Trials par 5). The similarities between this case and that of Tom Robinson in To Kill a Mockingbird are undeniable. “What did your father see in the window, the crime of rape or the best defense to it? Why don’t you tell the truth, child, didn’t Bob Ewell beat you up?” (Lee 213). Atticus, like Mr. Leibowitz, is a fair and unbiased white lawyer, and like Mayella, Victoria Price accused a black man of raping her just to get out of her own wrong doings. The two men also had very similar closing statements. “I shall appeal to your reason as logical, intelligent human beings, determined to give even this poor scrap of colored humanity a fair and square deal” (Linder par 2). Atticus used a similar strategy, he tried to appeal to the human side of the jury by talking to them casually and making them see the gravity of sending an innocent man to life in jail. “And so a quiet, respectable, humble Negro who had the unmitigated temerity to ‘feel sorry’ for a white woman has had to put his word against two white people” (Lee 232). Both closing statements aim to make the jury feel bad for the defendant and find it in their hearts to vote in his favor. Additionally, Mayella accused Tom of raping her because she didn’t want people to know that she had tried to kiss him or that her dad beat her. Price didn’t want to deal with the consequences of her illegal activity so she accused the Scottsboro boys of raping her. “Putting a man’s life at stake which she has done in an effort to get rid of her own guilt” (Lee 231). Mayella kissed a black man while Price was a prostitute, both women used fake accusations of rape by a black man to hide from their own guilt and wrongdoings. The similarities between the two lawyers and the cases themselves are in abundance, showing that Lee likely based her book off of the Scottsboro trials.

The KKK is a white supremicist group that used violent tactics to intimidate and scare

African Americans and other religious or cultural groups. It did so by burning crosses or lynching those they considered to be threats. With more than 100,000 members the KKK became increasingly powerful and continued violence against certain oppressed groups. (Ku Klux Klan par 6). In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird there is a scene outside of Tom Robinson’s jail cell where Atticus faces a group of men who plan to attack Tom. “You know what we want, '' another man said. ‘Get aside from the door, Mr. Finch.’ You can turn around and go home again, Walter” (Lee 172). Much like the KKK the group in the novel consists of appearingly ordinary townspeople who come together with the intention of promoting white supremacy. This is exactly what Mr. Cunnigham and others were trying to do when they planned to attack Tom

Robinson. The racist group in the novel holds a strong resemblance to the KKK.

“In August 1955, 14-year old Emmet Till was lynched in Money, Mississippi, after allegedly flirting with a white woman. When Emmett’s mother Mamie Till exposed her son’s badly disfigured body to the media, the South’s shame was exposed to the world” (Wilson 4).

The men beat Till badly and shot him in the head. Three days later his body was found in the

Tallahatchie River. (Garrow par 2). This situation bears an uncanny resemblance to the narrowly avoided lynching of Tom Robinson. Like Till was murdered for accusations of flirting with a woman, Robinson was almost attacked because townspeople thought he had raped Mayella

Ewell. Both situations show the terrible and unnecessarily violent situations that black people had to face in the 1930s because of the outrageous inequality.

Literature is a great way to inspire change by reaching a wide audience. Harper Lee based her novel off of real historical events that were occurring at the time in order to motivate her readers by showing them what members of the black community had to deal with. She based the Tom Robinson case and Atticus’s character off of the Scottsboro trials, and violence like the scene outside of the jail cell was inspired by the Emmet Till case and the KKK. Her novel was an important part of history and helped to create change, it will forever be remembered for its impact on both the field of literature and on history.