FREE THE WILMINGTON 10. RALLY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE U.S.A. Featuring Angela Davis, Co-Chairperson – National Alliance Against Racist And Political Repression, Friday July 8, 1977 [poster] -

Milwaukee: Milwaukee Alliance Against Racial and Political Repression, 1977. Original, unbacked poster, 11 x 17.” Staple holes in corners with a tiny tear to upper left corner where staple was removed. Horizontal fold line, else near fine. Signed by the collector, J. W. Miller; from his collection of about 100 posters collected in the 1970s around the University of Wisconsin, Madison. The Wilmington Ten were nine young men and a woman, who were convicted in 1971 in Wilmington, North Carolina of arson and conspiracy, and served nearly a decade in jail. The case became an international cause in which many critics of the city's actions characterized the activists as political prisoners.In 1980 in Chavis v. State of North Carolina, (4th Cir., 1980), the convictions were overturned by the federal appeals court, on the grounds that the prosecutor and the trial judge had both violated the defendants' constitutional rights. In May 2012, Benjamin Chavis and six surviving members of the group petitioned North Carolina governor Beverly Perdue for a pardon. The NAACP was supporting the pardon, as well as compensation to be paid to the men and their survivors for their years in jail. On December 22, 2012 The New York Times published an editorial titled, "Pardons for the Wilmington Ten" that urged Governor Perdue to "finally pardon" the group of civil rights activists. Perdue granted a pardon of innocence on December 31, 2012, which qualified each of the ten to state compensation of $50,000 per year of incarceration. None in commerce (2013); no locations in OCLC.