Viewing page 12 of 18

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

[[italicised]]American wrote that he and other Negro Communists like him were moved by "a common revulsion to race prejudice and a militant drive to do something about it." [[/italicised]] Winston's goal, the Afro-American indicated, is "complete integration."

"Complete integration!" [[/italicised]] Was it this that the Federal prison authorities, with their Jimcrow prison system, held against him? Was he victimized because he was a symbol, to them, of the dignity and equality that they felt impelled to degrade and destroy?

On the day that Henry Winston went to prison he gave the world an article he had written. It was entitled "Gradualism and Negro Freedom."

In this prophetic writing of four years ago Henry Winston foresaw and proclaimed the heroic struggle of the Negro youth in the South, that had then not yet come to the surface of history, and he hailed with full confidence the rising of the Negro people for full citizenship, with full and equal rights.

"The Negro people are united as never before," he wrote, "around a program of democratic rights and are militantly advancing the struggle for their own liberation... They refuse to continue to live as second-class citizens."

"Conditions are changing in the South," he wrote "These changes have been developing ever since the '30's. They are continuing to grow. The most impressive example of this vital fact is that it is no longer possible to speak of the Solid South." In doing this, he went on, the Negro people of the South are fighting "for the future of a democratic South."

Henry Winston then quoted from Walter White's [[italicised]] How Far Promised Land?: [[/italicised]] "The Negro knows the tide of world history is moving in his direction."

It has come to pass as he had written.

Lying on his prison cot, unable to see even the night stars between the prison bars, is Henry Winston thinking tonight of "How Far Promised Land?"; "How Far My Free-

[[end page]]
[[start page]]

dom?"; "How Far My Home?"; "How Far My Family?"; "How Far My Children Are From My Bedside Tonight?"

What does Henry Winston think about at night in prison? For him night has become eternal darkness enshrouding his every hour. But in his wakeful moments he thinks of you, of the future of our country, of the happiness of mankind.

What will you think about when you lie in your bed tonight. Will you think of him? His future depends upon your sense of justice and fair play.