What's Happening in Harlem? (1949)

kind lied about this is our home over half a million of us live here Negroes Puerto Ricans colored from all over the world and in our midst the cops everywhere mounted and on foot like an army like an army of occupation in the midst of our city like conquerors or troops of empire in a colony [Music] why why are there more here than anywhere in New York than anywhere in America why they are here to protect not life not Liberty not the pursuit of happiness no they are here to protect a $6 billion investment in bad housing in slums $6 billion invested by banks in a gym Crow ghetto [Music] they are here to prevent us from protesting to intimidate us when we try to do something about these shambles that pass for homes to shut us up when we speak out that the warnack triplets Monica Roberta Valerie have a right to live in something better than one room with seven others 10 people in one crowded apartment with the welfare allotment discontinued [Music] the cops want to force us meekly to accept five in a bed 10 in a room a TB rate seven times that of whites more negro infants die than live the first year of [Music] life to keep us silent their cops strut rents 15 for a kitchenet three sunless rooms at $60 built 75 100 years ago these houses were paid off by us principle and interest long ago the Banker's gravy train 6% guaranteed if a 100 died by fire last year that doesn't matter it's the 6% to the banks that [Music] matters and when they build new homes Banks the Rockefellers and their Metropolitan Life to make sure it will not disturb the sacred 6% the sacred six billions invested in Jim Crow slums they keep us out this is their [Music] studied this is one reason why all the cops in Harlem and there are other reasons too they try to make us swallow other things ungraded meat sold at prices higher than grade a meat downtown the castoff food the rotten food unsellable elsewhere is dumped for us a 75 cent meal downtown is 95 cents [Music] Uptown to keep us quiet about this robbery their boys in blue tell us don't stand here break it up Move Along we are the reservoir of cheap labor they keep us unemployed to drive wages down last to be hired first to be fired menial jobs only Porter domestic Works dors to unload Asphalt in the 30s they forced us onto the long bread lines now they force us onto relief give us checks and starve us a relief check will buy you 70% of the food you need to live on and always 2% to cash it [Music] the banks and their boys in blue it's not safe for you here ma'am they try to make the world believe that lie and you will find them here too among the Puerto Rican people in Harlem their cars parked on each Corner trying to intimidate us for Harlem is from from Puerto Rico Jamaica from Latin America and because we have found oppression here as well we fight back we March negro and white Puerto Rican amican and negro americ United don't buy in this store it's anti-negro anti-p Puerto Rican united we have won many battles negro drivers on Fifth Avenue buses Negroes and Puerto Ricans hired on 125th Street so they try to break our Unity the cops watch our picket lines and ride their horses specially trained for anti-pick duty but they do more than stand and twirl their clubs and ride [Music] a br Mr bernus Barber was in the neighborhood of 122nd Street in Lexington Avenue he had had apparently been robbed he was running away from his attackers and ran into a delicatess store on 122nd Street in Lexington he had no shoes on his hat had been lost and other articles of clothing had been removed two cops drove by in a squad car and they saw Mr Barber running into the store without asking any questions whatsoever they jumped out of their squad car opened fire on Mr Barber with a volley of 15 shots six of which hit him and killed him instantly in the store Mrs stoud Mr Berber was your nephew would you tell us how you feel about this brutal killing well he was a hardworking boy he sent money down south to his family to support his mother so I hope something be dead about it because the other young boys coming up like my nephew so they going to have the same thing happen to them the Widow and children of Richard T Brown murdered by a cop my name is Joseph AAR on July the 20th at 6:30 p.m. I was sitting on the ice door and this ice man said to me he said you can't sit there you have to move so I didn't move fast enough so he pushed me I said don't push me fella and he stuck me with a ice Pig then me and him got into a fight and I knocked him out and I was standing on the curve and a cop came up and hit me my name is Joe Jackson I saw the whole thing cop came up in his car jumped out ran across struck Joe across the head without knowing what it was all about the blood came gushing out the people demanded that the cop shouldn't hit Joe again I'm Joe wife I was there toop hit him in the head and I yelled for him not to hit him again why he was [Music] here police brutality is part of the plan of the banks the government and big business like the Nazis they want to create a master race to prove Negroes are inferior this is why they beat us Lynch us Northern style and go unpunished and we know who stand behind the cops the bankers 6 billion invested in a Jim Crow ghetto the profiteers the gravy boys a 75 cent meal downtown cost 95 cents Uptown the Jim Crow landlords they too are behind the cops protect the sacred 6% for Metropolitan Life whites only the Jim Crow boss who hates all labor and tries to break our [Music] unity and the clan in New York pregnant women beaten children made because we're negro behind the cops the politicians and their Stooges like Earl Brown who have sold out themselves and their people for a price Banker lyncher profiteer Clansman cup United against the people but we don't just take it we're hardworking people who love life love a ball game love kids we're people who love laughter and hate oppression we've fought them before the bankers and their cops and one and we fight them