In Chicago, USA, 124 years ago today (November 11, 1887), four men–George Engel, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer and August Spies–were hanged for a crime they didn’t commit. On the previous day, International Carpenters’ Union leader Louis Lingg committed suicide rather than be hanged alongside his comrades. When sentenced to death in October 1886, he stated the following to the court:
Ah, you laugh! Perhaps you think, “You’ll throw no more bombs”; but let me assure you that I die happy on the gallows, so confident I am that the hundreds and thousands to whom I have spoken will remember my words; and when you shall have hanged us, then, mark my words, they will do the bomb throwing! In this hope I say to you; I despise you! I despise your “order”, your laws, your force-propped authority. Hang me for it!
Today in South Africa, Doreen Lewis will bury her son, 24 year old Leroy Van Wyk, another victim of the medical neglect the poors are subject to the world over. No Land! No House! No Vote! Voices from Symphony Way documents the struggles of their community; sales of the book in Cape Town are providing some financial assistance to Doreen.
