The Sacco-Vanzetti Case.

Birmingham, Alabama:: Notable Trials Library, 1990.. Facsimile Edition.. Hardbound . BINDING/CONDITION: from a series with semi-uniform bindings; brown with gilt decorations; leather at the spine; raised spine bands; all edges gilt; ribbon place marker; bookplate is not affixed -- just laid in; Fine condition.. 8vo (9.5 inches tall) . Index. Marbled endpapers. Description: The publisher's bookplate shows this to be copy number 9484. (This bookplate is imprinted with the name of the owner.) This is a volume from the Notable Trials Library under the general editorship of Alan M Dershowitz who wrote a special introduction for this facsimile edition. This work was originally published by Alfred A Knopf in 1931. This edition includes the few black and white illustrations from that original edition. Book design by Daniel B Bianchi and Selma Ordewer. From the introduction: ''The case of Sacco and Vanzetti is a murder mystery -- with political and ethnic overtones -- that has never been solved. The evidence against Sacco and Vanzetti was disputed from the very beginning. The jury was instructed on the evidence by a Brahmin bigot, Judge Webster Thayer, who could barely conceal his contempt for the Italian troublemakers. The trial was unjust, in the sense that the evidentiary rulings and instructions were one-sidedly favorable to the prosecution. Following the conviction, and a worldwide outcry against Massachusetts justice, Governor Alvan Fuller appointed an independent commission to advise him concerning the fairness of the trial. But the commission's chairman and moving force was also an anti-Italian bigot and an avowed racist and was anything but objective. His report, which was forcefully criticized by Professor Felix Frankfurter and others, was whitewash of Judge Thayer and the prosecutor and Governor Fuller refused to commute the sentence. Seven years after the robbery and murder, Sacco and Vanzetti were executed. But the controversy did not die with them''