‘Unforgivable’ Not to Forgive Johnson
L.A.
Daily News, January 16, 2005
By Tom Hoffarth, Columnist
Pardon us if this is old news, but if Jack Johnson
doesn’t receive a posthumous presidential pardon sooner rather than later,
it’d be another low blow to his larger-than-life legacy.
The intriguing, controversial saga of the first black
heavyweight boxing champ won’t be going away anytime soon, even if his
exploits are nearly a century old. Heavyweight documentarian Ken Burns has
produced a masterful two-part, four-hour special on Johnson’s life called
“Unforgivable Blackness,” which PBS stations will air Monday and Tuesday
nights. Later this year, ESPN has plans of using Johnson as the foundation for
another made-for-TV movie.
\The reasons are more than just presenting a compelling
story in the name of TV ratings. Legal and social injustice brought upon by
Jim Crow-era laws after the abolishment of slavery collide with this
fabulously famous and notorious athlete who challenged everyone’s beliefs at
the time about racial equality and the right to live a free, American
lifestyle.
In the end, Johnson was TKO’d. He chose to live in
exile after he was found guilty of breaking a law that his own government
twisted to use against him. It was all in retaliation for the way he prevailed
in Reno, Nev., over Burbank native Jim Jeffries, the retired heavyweight champ
and so-called “Great White Hope,” on the Fourth of July in 1910 in what
was called “The Fight of the Century.”
Although known worldwide for his pugilism, Johnson found
some of his early success in Los Angeles. On May 16, 1902, just five months
after the first Rose Bowl was played, he put himself on the map by knocking
out Jack Jeffries—Jim Jeffries’ little brother. Less than a year later,
Johnson won a 20-round decision over Denver Ed Martin here to claim what was
recognized as the black heavyweight championship.
But while living at the time in Bakersfield, Johnson
endured bigotry and resentment for living flamboyantly with a white woman. It
only foreshadowed what would come later. The 1910 Mann Act, imposed to stop
“white slavery,” or the smuggling of women into the U.S. for prostitution,
eventually was used against Johnson in 1912 after the mother of a white woman
he was dating became upset and demanded justice. Johnson, who married the
woman, Lucile Cameron, in December 1912, was convicted of the charge in
Chicago by a white jury in June 1913. His sentence: a year and a day in
prison, plus a $1,000 fine. Prosecutors said in the trial that he committed a
“crime against nature.”
While waiting for an appeal, he and Lucile escaped to
Canada. He toured the world defending his title before he lost it in 1915 in a
26-round bout against Jess Willard in Havana. Rumor was that Johnson was told
that by losing, he could return to the U.S. It wasn’t so.
It wasn’t until 1920 that he decided to return and
surrender, serving his time in a Kansas prison. When Johnson got out at age 43
and wanted to challenge Jack Dempsey for the title, he was denied.
Right up to his death, caused by a traffic accident in
1946, Johnson never saw judicial redemption. Defiant but courageous, outspoken
yet charming and always a lightning rod for racial strife—much like Muhammad
Ali in the 1960s and ‘70s—Johnson told a young reporter shortly before the
end of his life: “Just remember, whatever you write about me, that I was a
man.”
As he worked on the “Unforgivable Blackness” project
last summer, Burns hired a law firm and filed a petition with the Department
of Justice demanding that the wrong be righted. Burns received support from
Sen. John McCain and Sen. Ted Kennedy, boxing giants Sugar Ray Leonard and
Bernard Hopkins, rapper Chuck D, actor Samuel L. Jackson and boxing historian
Bert Sugar. The Senate endorsed the resolution in October. Posthumous pardons
for noncapital cases are somewhat rare. And so far, President Bush, who
publicly honored the Galveston, Texas, native when he was Texas’ governor,
hasn’t pushed through the paperwork. So not only was Burns denied a nice way
of ending his documentary, but Johnson’s rap sheet remains corruptly
stained.
It would even have been something if this all could have
been wrapped up this weekend, when this country celebrates Martin Luther King
Day.
So, again, pardon us for butting in. But if Johnson’s
ghost has to wait await another couple of decades for the commander in chief
to tie up some unfinished business with a simple pardon, then someone just
doesn’t know Jack.
Tom Hoffarth can be reached at thomas.hoffarth@dailynews.com
and (818) 713-3661.
[Home] [Editorials] [USA]
