We Charge Genocide: The Historic Petition to the United Nations for Relief From a Crime of the United States Government Against the Negro People

This new edition contains the historic petition first presented to the United Nations in 1951 by its author, William L. Patterson and Paul Robeson in support of the charge that the racism of Government and its agencies was a crime punishable under the UN Genocide Convention. The petition presented specific, documented evidence of inhuman and racist practices in the United States. The innumerable beatings, frame-ups, arrests and murders of black Americans continued unabated but no adequate remedial measures were taken by government authorities.In 1970 an Emergency Conference Committee, co-chaired by Ossie Davis again presented the petition to the UN, with a preface by Ossie Davis himself and a new foreword by William L. Patterson.As we know, systematic racism continues and feeds individual racist acts; all of which function to weaken the essential unity of the working people and add to the power and profit of “the 1%”. This is the third edition of the petition, with a prologue by Jarvis Tyner – a lifelong fighter for black liberation, workers’ rights, peace and a socialist future. Tyner was the vice- presidential candidate of the Communist Party, USA in 1972 and 1976 and today is an active leader of the CPUSA in New York and nationally. May this new edition add strength and clarity to the demands of today’s movements for full equality, economic rights and world peace. Read more