The National Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners (NCDPP) was an organization founded in June 1931 as an accompaniment to the
International Labor Defense
The International Labor Defense (ILD) (1925–1947) was a legal advocacy organization established in 1925 in the United States as the American section of the Comintern's International Red Aid network. The ILD defended Sacco and Vanzetti, was active ...
, led by the
Communist Party of the United States of America. The NCDPP was originally called the Emergency Committee for Southern Political Prisoners (ECSPP).
The Committee aimed to "aid workers
oorganize and defend themselves against terror and suppression",
and was described as an "'invading body' whose mission is to enter the Kentucky coal-fields, 'inform the American public of what is going on' and 'persuade officials ... to a more equitable course of action'."
The organization was influential in defending
civil liberties
Civil liberties are guarantees and freedoms that governments commit not to abridge, either by constitution, legislation, or judicial interpretation, without due process. Though the scope of the term differs between countries, civil liberties of ...
, such as the
Scottsboro Boys in Alabama,
where nine
African American
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
teenagers were wrongly accused of raping a white woman, even in the face of medical evidence to the contrary.
''A Statement of the Purposes of the National Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners'' stated that:
The National Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners has been formed to aid workers to organize and to defend themselves against terror and suppression ... The National Committee recognizes the right of workers to organize, strike and picket, their right to freedom of speech, press and assembly, and it will aid in combating any violation of those rights, through legal means, and above all, by stimulating a wide public interest and protest.
The group was considered one of
eleven "subversive organizations", drawn up on 3 April 1947 at the request of
Tom C. Clark
Thomas Campbell Clark (September 23, 1899June 13, 1977) was an American lawyer who served as the 59th United States Attorney General, United States attorney general from 1945 to 1949 and as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United St ...
.
See also
*
Political prisoners in the United States
References
{{Reflist, 30em
External links
Dreiser Committee "Discovers" Aunt Molly
Civil liberties advocacy groups in the United States
Imprisonment and detention
Organizations established in 1931
1931 establishments in the United States
Communist Party USA mass organizations
Political imprisonment in the United States