Many articles were published across the nation and around the world that emphasized the lack of justice for blacks in the United States. Many people around the country were outraged by the decision not to charge Milam and Bryant. The Emmett Till murder trial brought to light the brutality of Jim Crow segregation in the South and was an early incentive of the African American civil rights movement (The death of Emmett Till).
On September 15, Jet magazine, the nationwide black magazine owned by Chicago-based Johnson Publications, published photographs of Till's mutilated corpse, shocking and outraging African Americans from coast to coast. A black newspaper, The Chicago Defender, also published photographs of Till's corpse (Vox).
In Belgium, the newspaper Le Drapeau Rouge (the Red Flag), published a brief article entitled: "Racism in the USA: A young black is lynched in Mississippi." Two left-wing newspapers publish articles on the acquittal Le Peuple, the daily Belgian Socialist newspaper, calls the acquittal, "a judicial scandal in the United States." Le Drapeau Rouge (the Red Flag) publishes: "Killing a black person isn't a crime in the home of the Yankees: The white killers of young Emmett Till are acquitted!"
In Germany, the newspaper Freies Volk publishes: "The Life of a Negro Isn't Worth a Whistle"(The Muder of Emmett Till).
In France the L'Aurore newspaper publishes: "The Scandalous Acquittal in Sumner" and the daily newspaper Le Figaro adds: "The Shame of the Sumner Jury." The French daily newspaper Le Monde runs an article: "The Sumner Trial Marks, Perhaps, an Opening of Consciousness." The French Communist Party newspaper L'Humanité writes: "After the Mockery of Justice in Mississippi: Emotion in Paris"(The Murder of Emmett Till).
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On October 22, the American Jewish Committee in New York released a report urging Congress to boost Federal civil rights legislation in light of the Till case. Their report included quotes from newspapers in six European countries expressing shock and outrage after the Till verdict. Amazingly, the Mississippi Governor Hugh L. White was angered by the murder and sent notice to the NAACP that a full investigation was to take place (the Murder of Emmett Till).
Till’s murder helped push along the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1957, which allowed the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate in local matters (The Murder of Emmett Till).
The kidnapping and murder of Emmett Till remains as one of Black America’s most-sorrowful moments. After the Emmett till case, the African American Community as well as many others were outraged and spurred into action. Thousands of letters protesting the Mississippi verdict poured into the White House. Mamie took her fight to the people and gave speeches to overflowing crowds across the country. Blacks were galvanized. Membership in the NAACP soared. African Americans were angered by Emmett's killing and the injustice, and moved by the loss of an only child to a young mother. Those in the trenches of the civil rights movement realized they had to move their fight boldly to the front lines (The Murder of Emmett Till). In December 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a Montgomery city bus and was arrested for violating Alabama's bus segregation laws. Soon after, a 26-year-old minister, Martin Luther King Jr., called for a city-wide bus boycott. The civil rights movement was officially born (Vox).
No one even did time for the killing of the fourteen black boy from Chicago. But his murder and the trial and acquittal of his killers sent a powerful message: If change was going to occur people would have to put their lives on the line. Contributions to Civil rights groups soured. “ When people saw what had happened to my son men stood up who had never stood up before, People became vocal who had never vocalized before, Emmett’s death was the opening of the Civil rights movement was the sacrificial lamb of the civil rights movement" - Mamie Till (The Murder of Emmett Till).