RACE RELATIONS: DEATH IN A DESEGREGATED NEIGHBORHOOD

Unrest in a Detroit Neighborhood

In February 1925 Dr. Ossian Sweet, a black physician, moved with his family to a house on Garland Avenue, on the outskirts of a white neighborhood in Detroit, Michigan. Predictably, many of their new neighbors were outraged by the Sweets' presence. When anonymous death threats began, Dr. Sweet hired black bodyguards, who accompanied him everywhere, and announced that he had a formidable arsenal of firearms in his home. Sweet and his friends, all army veterans, were proficient in the use of such weaponry. Initially, white troublemakers confined their activities to throwing rocks at the house and other acts of petty vandalism. Local police did nothing to curtail such actions.

Rioting and Death

On the evening of 9 September several white youths had an altercation with two of Dr. Sweet's brothers on the street. A mob quickly formed, but both Sweets escaped safely into the doctor's house. As the crowd grew, its members began moving toward the front door. Several rioters climbed onto the porch and smashed some windows. All the while, white onlookers chanted racist slogans. Then gunfire suddenly came from inside the house. The Sweets later claimed they had shouted warnings before opening fire.

Murder Charges

After the shooting ended, one rioter, Leo Bremer, was dead, and several others had been wounded. When the police belatedly appeared they arrested all the male Sweets and their bodyguards on the spot. These twelve African Americans were charged with murder and armed assault. Chief Judge Frank Murphy of District Recorder's Court personally supervised their formal arraignments. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) quickly came to the Sweets' defense, calling their prosecution a "judicial hanging." The NAACP successfully raised $75,000 for the defendants' legal expenses. Arthur Garfield Hays and Clarence Darrow were retained to serve as their trial lawyers.

The Trials

During the trial, held in November 1925, Darrow skillfully pointed to contradictory statements made by various white onlookers. He was able to get one female witness to admit that the police had coached her to testify that no violent mob had gathered. Darrow believed that the police had abetted the troublemakers who had created the original confrontation with the two Sweet brothers. The prosecutors were never able to prove their contention that the Sweets and their bodyguards had conducted a premeditated attack on peaceful white pedestrians. The prosecutorial decision to try collectively all eleven defendants proved a mistake. A biracial jury panel could not agree on all the charges, and this hung jury caused a mistrial. Charges were dropped against all the accused except Henry Sweet, Ossian Sweet's youngest brother. Tried separately in April 1926, with Darrow once again serving as his legal counsel, Henry Sweet was acquitted. In a decade when "Jim Crow Justice" was often victorious, the Sweet trials proved exceptions.