In the Black community there are legends, living and dead. The case of the Scottsboro Boys started in 1932 when nine young men (Charlie Weems, Ozie Powell, Clarence Norris, Olen Montgomery, Willie Roberson, Haywood Patterson, Andy and Roy Wright and Eugene Williams) tried fleeing from poverty on a freight train. With only their youth and dreams they set out to find a better life and found only a cruel system that turned on them.

The nine boys were charged with the rape of two white women. One woman was an admitted prostitute and the other's claim to virtue was questionable. They were tried without adequate counsel, and hastily convicted on the basis of shallow evidence. All but one was sentenced to death. The International Labor Defense was unable to win the defendants' unconditional release, but the case had political implications.

On appeal in 1935, the US Supreme Court ruled that the defendants' constitutional rights were violated because Blacks were systematically excluded from jury rolls. But it wasn't until 1976 that the last of the Scottsboro boys, Clarence Norris, was finally pardoned.