This system executed Troy Davis—no they murdered him. They delayed his execution a few hours while the Supreme Court considered and rejected a last-minute appeal from Troy's lawyers. The court issued a one-sentence statement explaining why they refused again to reopen his case and look at the mounting evidence of his innocence. It might as well have said Black people have no rights we are bound to respect! The content of what the system has told us in this case, as they told us in the case of Shaka Sankofa eleven years ago, is that innocence is no bar to execution.
The powers that be say this country is the homeland of freedom. They tell the world that they are the greatest defenders of human rights. Then they turn around and railroad Troy Davis to jail on trumped up evidence, refuse to even consider the mounting evidence of his innocence and execute him on the basis of that railroad.
This was a legal lynching, plain and simple. It didn't matter to them that there was no physical evidence to tie Troy to the murder of the cop or that 7 of the 9 witnesses against Troy have come forward and said they lied, several of them claiming they were coerced to lie by cops who were dead set on frying some Black man, any Black man, for the killing of one of their own. No court has even bothered to reopen the case, listen to the witnesses recanting their statements against Troy and consider the police coercion that went into his conviction! What else can we take from that but that they are telling us—"We railroaded him, fair and square, and now we're going to strap him down and fry him."
What can you say about a system that would do all this—railroad a man to death row, ignore mounting evidence of his innocence and go ahead with his execution in the face of widespread international protest? The truth is that it's rotten to the core, and needs to be done away with thru revolution.
And this isn't just about Troy Davis. During the protest in Harlem the night of Troy's execution, a number of people who were hearing of Troy's case for the first time told me, "They do that to Black people all the time." Very true. The legal lynching of Troy Davis concentrates the way this system treats Black people. This system has criminalized our youth, treating them like they're guilty until proven innocent, if they can survive their encounters with cops to prove their innocence, and if they can avoid being framed up in the system's kangaroo courts. Their cops get away with brutalizing and even murdering people all across the country, all the time. This has been going on for too damn long. It is intolerable, and it must be stopped!
The future this system has in store for many of our youth comes down to either crime and punishment or joining their military and killing people to keep their global empire in effect. Again, what can you say about a system like this?
But things don't have to be like this. We could end all the horrors this system inflicts on humanity thru revolution, communist revolution. We could get rid of this rotten system and bring into being a society and a world that serves the interests of the people. And we in the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) are building a movement for revolution to do just that. Get with this movement, sisters and brothers. Join it to help spread revolution everywhere and to mobilize people to "Fight the Power, and Transform the People, For Revolution." There are 2 important things you need to get involved with as part of doing this.
First, get your hands on BAsics, a new book by Bob Avakian, the leader of the RCP. This book concentrates more than three decades of work Avakian has been doing studying the experience of previous revolutionary societies and grappling with everything that stands between humanity and its ultimate emancipation. With this book, we can introduce people to the leader we have for making revolution and bring to a new generation the new and revitalized understanding of how to make revolution and bring into a being a viable and desirable socialist society that Avakian has developed If you want to see an end to legal lynchings like we just witnessed in Troy Davis' case, the way that Black people are beaten down and oppressed and everything else foul this system inflicts on humanity, then you need to get your hands on BAsics. And you need to help spread the word about BAsics and encourage other people to get a copy of it. If you don't know about Avakian, you need to learn about him, and you need to let other people know about him too. You can't change the world if you don't know the BAsics.
And second, Cornel West and I have called for a day of non-violent civil disobedience to Stop "Stop & Frisk." The execution of Troy Davis underscores the need for determined resistance to the way this criminal injustice system mistreats Black people. As the RCP says in its Message and Call, The Revolution We Need … The Leadership We Have, "… The days when this system can just keep on doing what it does to people, here and all over the world…when people are not inspired and organized to stand up against these outrages and to build up the strength to put an end to this madness…those days must be GONE. And they CAN be." We have to unite people from many different backgrounds and of different races and nationalities to stand together and say in a loud powerful voice that we refuse to stand by and let them continue to violate people's rights in the way they've been doing. We have to take this spirit into the continuing protests around the legal lynching of Troy Davis and into Stopping "Stop & Frisk."
To get connected with this important action, go to stopmassincarceration.tumblr.com or call (973) 756-7666.
Go to www.revcom.us for coverage on the execution of Troy Davis and to get more info on everything I've talked about here.
