How The Unfortunate Events Leading Up To Emmett Louis Till's Trial

The unfortunate events leading up to Emmett Louis Till’s death and unfair trial were for one reason only- he was black. “The word is some nigra boy from Chicago made ugly remarks and then whistled to Miz Bryant.’ The deputy chuckled. ‘Fool boy forgot where he was, and it’s a fact somebody’s sure to give that boy a talking to. It’ll do him damn good to learn how things work here in the Delta”(107). Emmetts actions were of course inappropriate, but a reasonable punishment would’ve been something along the lines of what Mr. Chatham stated in his final argument, “if they had any idea in their minds that this boy did anything wrong- was to take a razor strap, turn him over the barrel, and whip him… A man deals with a child accordingly as a child,

Emmett was left mutilated and horrendous looking for all of the world to see when his mother decided to have an open-coffin funeral. News of Emmett’s story spread through the nation like a forest fire, outraging and devastating people all over, saying how brutal the murder was, or how it wasn’t brutal enough. Emmett’s trial took place less than 2 weeks after he’d been killed, and somehow his trial was more unfair than his death. During trial, Mr. Breland harassed Till’s Uncle Mose, “And yet you could see clearly, clearly enough to accuse to white men of murder, to claim that the men on your porch were Mr. Bryant and Mr. Milam over there… No problem with white folks, yet there you sit accusing two of our upstanding white citizens of barging into your home in the middle of the night, pointing a gun and a flashlight in your face, and hauling off your nephew”(170/171). Even though Bryant and Milam both admitted to kidnapping Emmett, the possibility of the two men not even being there to take Emmett is beyond irrational, even when both men stated their names at Moses 's door. With all the evidence given about Emmett’s murder, the verdict from the jury was that Bryant and Milam were not guilty. The jury was unjustified and unfair, and definitely not a jury of any of Till’s peers. But if same actions were have to have taken place, and if Emmett Till was anything but black, he might still be alive