Several media outlets recently reported that records pertaining to the case of Emmett Louis Till are being released. The move coincides with the 70th anniversary of the teen’s brutal lynching death in August 1955.
According to the Associated Press, “The records in the National Archives, released by the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Review Board, detail how the Justice Department, the FBI, and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights responded to the 1955 killing of 14-year-old Till. The records were released in accordance with the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Collection Act of 2018.”
The story is well-known. Emmett, from Chicago, was visiting relatives in Money, Mississippi, when he was falsely accused of whistling at a White woman at a store.
While at his great-uncle’s home, Emmett was kidnapped by the husband of the woman, his half-brother and others. These White men tortured and eventually killed him in a barn in a nearby county, and his body was found three days later in the Tallahatchie River.
Emmett’s mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, insisted on an open casket funeral to show the world the brutality of what happened to her son. Though the two White men were charged in Emmett’s death, they were acquitted by an all-White jury. They both later confessed to the crime. The White woman who made the false allegations was never charged.
The records reportedly include reports, telegrams, case files, correspondence and documents from the NAACP, the White House, and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and can be viewed online.
So, while the release of these files may shed light on some information in the case, it is also a reminder of a glaring reality that remains relevant seven decades after the death of Emmitt Till.
This reality is stated in plain language in the Teachings of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad: Our open enemy is disagreeable to live with in peace and as a result, separation is the best and only solution for the Black man and woman.
In our more than 400-year sojourn in America, our people have been subjected to slavery, suffering and death. The book, “Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America,” chronicles just a snapshot of some of the brutality our people have endured at the hands of our enemy.
What Emmett Till and his family suffered should never be forgotten. Neither should what happened to James Byrd Jr., Trayvon Martin, Sandra Bland, Eric Gardner, Eleanor Bumpurs, Ahmaud Arbery and countless other Black men, women and children ever be forgotten.
Black people have tried to work with, worship with, befriend and marry White people for acceptance. But the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad made it plain. In His book, “Message To The Blackman in America,” on page 129 in the chapter titled, “Not Your Brother,” the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad reminds us:
“If you understood that which you are seeking to be accepted into and if you understood the nature of those whom you are seeking to integrate with you would, instead, be seeking your own people’s society or building one of your own on some land or territory separate from the American Whites.
“We need land wherein we can build our own society free from the tension, hatred and violence that have accompanied our race relationship with the White race of America.
When you learn that the White man is not your brother, you will readily begin to see and accept the Divine Plan that Almighty Allah (God) has in the working for our people. Who has been our aggressors and murderers ever since we have been in America? Who, by nature, was made quick to shed blood—even his own?”
The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan said it best in a message he delivered in 2005 at Mosque Maryam in Chicago titled, “The Judgment of Allah (God) Has Entered America.”
“The Honorable Elijah Muhammad, for 40 years, talked to us about separation. He knew that no matter how much we tried, we would never be able to get along in peace with our former slave-masters and their children,” Minister Farrakhan said.
“The God of Judgment and Justice raised the Honorable Elijah Muhammad to separate us from White America. If God’s Judgment is coming down on White America, why are they holding Black people?
They really have let us go but, in another sense, they are holding on to us. You are a hostage now because the enemy knows that we are the people of God. We are the people of God’s choice to bring in a world of righteousness and justice,” Minister Farrakhan added.
Brothers and sisters, the time is now to understand the truth and reality taught by the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan and for us to recognize that integration has been and is a hypocritical trick. No matter how desperately you may desire it, our enemy will never be our friend.