Political Quotes

“we are talking about the subject of justice, and I thought it would be appropriate to take a couple of minutes here, before we get ready to vote, to signify a unique injustice that occurred in the State of Florida 70 years ago. In July of 1949, a White couple was driving their truck when it broke down on a rural road near Groveland, FL. Two Black men, Walter Irvin and Samuel Shepherd, stopped to help the couple. What would follow would be a horrifying injustice that haunts Florida and truly the Nation to this day. Norma Padgett was the White woman in that truck. She was 17 years old. She told police she was abducted and raped by four Black men. Many locals at the time doubted her story. Her estranged husband was known to be a drinker and to become violent with her. Many suspected she made up these accusations to cover up for his abuse. The sheriff's office, nevertheless, detained three men for this alleged crime. Walter Irvin and Samuel Shepherd, the two men who stopped to help the couple, were both World War II veterans. They both denied abducting or raping the woman. Nevertheless, they were detained, and they were brutally beaten in the basement of the sheriff's office, in the jail, until they confessed to a crime they did not commit. A few days later, Mr. Shepherd's family home was burned to the ground.…”