Rape as Racial Injustice

Abstract

This chapter examines activists in the black freedom movement who politicized the connection between rape and racism in their fight for justice. These activists argued that rape law and the entire legal system served to uphold white supremacy. Black men almost exclusively faced the death penalty for interracial rape, and black women victims saw little to no justice in the aftermath of white male sexual violence against them. In response, activists launched local campaigns nationwide in defense of black women victims, demanding justice. Likewise, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund pursued the abolition of the death penalty in their defense of convicted black rapists. In calling attention to the injustices faced by black men, some lawyers and activists also engaged the trope of the lying white woman. This was one of the strategies employed in Maryland’s infamous Giles v. Johnson case. In defending both black victims and accused black assailants, lawyers and activists exposed the racial injustices embedded in rape laws and their application. However, activists’ formulation of rape as racist oppression failed to engage a politics of rape that included black female victims of intraracial rape. This ultimately limited the scope of the movement.