Robert L. Tsai
@robertltsai.bsky.social
Author of DEMAND THE IMPOSSIBLE (@WWNorton.com), amzn.to/45LFzNg | Next: BATTLE FOR THE SOUL OF COAL COUNTRY (NYU) | Prof & Harry Elwood Warren Scholar, Boston U | constitutional law & politics, legal history, democracy | https://linktr.ee/roberttsai .. more
Author of DEMAND THE IMPOSSIBLE (@WWNorton.com), amzn.to/45LFzNg | Next: BATTLE FOR THE SOUL OF COAL COUNTRY (NYU) | Prof & Harry Elwood Warren Scholar, Boston U | constitutional law & politics, legal history, democracy | https://linktr.ee/roberttsai
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Reposted by Robert L. Tsai
Awesome photo!
Reposted by Robert L. Tsai
A wonderful person and one of my heroes. Here she is at the same desk at the ACLU of GA in the summer of 1987 when I was a law student intern working with her and George.
From Morris’ obituary: early on, activists on the ground could see what it would take others decades to admit or document: the death penalty was more likely if the defendant was poor or black and the victim was white; geography also mattered.
Demand the Impossible: One Lawyer's Pursuit of Equal Justice for All
Demand the Impossible: One Lawyer's Pursuit of Equal Justice for All
amzn.to
That trio of lawyers and Patsy Morris stuck with Thomas, who was mentally ill, until the end. They reworked the case from the ground up. I tell the story of the twists and turns in Thomas’s legal battle in @demandtimpossible.bsky.social.
After Thomas was convicted, his lawyer gave a generic argument against the death penalty but presented no evidence to support his plea for mercy. The brief filed in Thomas' appeal was 11-pages long. That was when Morris found Bright, Kendall & Canan to try to rescue him from the electric chair.
Once Thomas proved incapable of assisting in his own defense, his attorney put in little effort. It was as if Thomas had no lawyer at all: his public defender stopped meeting with him, filed no pre-trial motions, and gave a brief opening argument.
It dawned on Bright that the reason there was so little paperwork because Thomas had been quickly tried for an infamous crime and sentenced to death. Thomas rocked back and forth at times and performed a Black Power salute in court.
Bright himself likes to tell the story of how he got involved in death penalty cases by describing his horror at what he saw from the get go. When Thomas’s legal documents showed up at Bright's door, everything fit in a single envelope. He had expected a UHaul with many boxes.
I hope someone writes a full biography of Morris. I was not able to give her life and work as much attention in my book as I would have liked. But the connection that Morris forged when Bright, George Kendall, and Russ Canan agreed to handle Donnie Thomas's case changed legal history.
Morris was unusual in that as a graduate of @vassar.bsky.social and hailing from a privileged background, she threw herself into the major controversies of the day, going where the need was the greatest. This is a recurring theme in the biographies of those who make a mark.
For her work on behalf of poor people facing excecution, Morris was dubbed "Queen of Death Row" by Time Magazine. She passed away in 1997 at the age of 66. There are thousands of people like Morris, unsung volunteers who visit people in prisons and count the costs of mass incarceration.
80% of the condemned during these War on Crime decades could be found in the states that once formed the Confederacy. Additionally, nearly half of those under death sentence across the country were black men--in some states like Texas and Georgia those numbers were more lopsided.
After two years at it, she’d found 86 lawyers for the 89 people on Georgia’s death row. But the volunteer work became exponentially harder. By the end of 1979, the number of people on death row around the country climbed to 570. By 1988, that number swelled to over 2,000.
Patsy vowed to let no more Georgians die in the electric chair. She worked out of two shoe boxes: one contained index cards with the names of all the individuals under death sentence; the other had contact information of attorneys who might be persuaded to take a case pro bono.
A person had a right to a lawyer only for the trial and one appeal. The moment that appeal was denied, Patsy would try to find a lawyer willing to work for free. If no legal proceeding was pending and no stay was in place, a death warrant could be signed at any moment.
In Atlanta, the couple founded the Episcopal Society for Cultural and Racial Unity as well as the Georgia chapter of the @aclu.org. When states resumed inflicting capital punishment, Patsy served as death penalty monitor. Her job was to keep an eye on every person on death row.
Born Harriett Pratt, Patsy was the granddaughter of industrialist Charles Pratt, a co-founder of Standard Oil. When Patsy married a minister, John B. Morris, the two moved to the South, where both played an active role in the struggle against racial segregation.
On one occasion, 21 lawyers in a row declined to take a case pro bono. Morris was the one who convinced Stephen Bright to take his first death penalty cases—including that of Donnie Thomas. Bright had left the Public Defender Service for DC and was teaching in the DC Law Students in Court program.
Few people have heard of Patsy Morris. When the Supreme Court allowed capital punishment to resume in 1976, she kept track of Georgia citizens condemned to death row who desperately needed a lawyer. She called lawyers around the country begging them to take a case. #DemandTheImpossible
The Anti-Immigration Bible
Jeff Sessions is fond of citing the Bible to support the persecution of immigrants, in stark contrast to a long tradition of biblical interpretation.
www.bostonreview.net
Even so, “we can’t really get at the heart of what is at stake unless we are willing to talk openly, and sometimes religiously, about pressing national policies.”
“Anti-immigrant forces have been making the biblically-inspired case for closed borders and callous measures against refugees and immigrants for some time, even if it has gone largely unnoticed until now.”
@bostonreview.bsky.social
@bostonreview.bsky.social
jamelle
@jamellebouie.net
· 3d
ICE detained Arlit Maria Martinez on her way to work. 2 days later, her 15 yo son died of cancer. They wouldn't let her out to say goodbye. The family had planned to move back to Mexico prior to the cancer diagnosis but stayed for his treatment. Now, Mr Martinez has lost his wife to ICE & his son.
Teen dies of cancer days after mother arrested by ICE: ‘She’s never gonna see him’
The mother's family pleaded with federal officers for her release from custody to say her final goodbyes to her son, but their requests went unanswered.
www.wsaz.com
this is all to say that should democrats win the house and senate this november, they should hold similarly dramatic — which is to say televised and highly publicized — hearings on the conduct of ICE and CBP, with testimony from victims. we want as much of *this* as possible in the record. (3/?)
Great to be back! ☺️
Teen dies of cancer days after mother arrested by ICE: ‘She’s never gonna see him’
The mother's family pleaded with federal officers for her release from custody to say her final goodbyes to her son, but their requests went unanswered.
www.wsaz.com
ICE detained Arlit Maria Martinez on her way to work. 2 days later, her 15 yo son died of cancer. They wouldn't let her out to say goodbye. The family had planned to move back to Mexico prior to the cancer diagnosis but stayed for his treatment. Now, Mr Martinez has lost his wife to ICE & his son.
