“The record of history must finally be corrected to restore Jack Johnson?s good Name”?Harry Reid
Senator Harry Reid (D) is once again pushing for the pardon of John Arthur ?Jack? Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion, and is asking the President to right an injustice that occurred a century ago. Adding bipartisan support in Senator John McCain (R). Calling Jack Johnson a ?barrier- breaking pioneer?, Reid says it?s high time to undo the injustice that was motivated by Jim Crow racism.
Nicknamed the Galveston Giant, Johnson sparked a national and virtually hysterical call for a great ?White Hope? after he stopped Jim Jeffries in the so-called ?Fight of the Century? in Reno on July 4,1910.
Johnson was convicted of violating the Mann Act in 1912 for transporting a white girlfriend across state lines, even though there was an obvious lack of evidence and the charge was largely racially based. He passed away in 1946.
Johnson’s skill as a fighter and the money that it brought made it impossible for him to be ignored by the establishment. Hopefully, he can no longer be ignored .posthumously, but seeing is believing.
