one of my favourite songs, a great protest song…<\/p>\n
pistol shots ring out in the barroom night
\nenter patty valentine from the upper hall.
\nshe sees the bartender in a pool of blood,
\ncries out, “my God, they killed them all!”
\nhere comes the story of the hurricane,
\nthe man the authorities came to blame
\nfor somethin’ that he never done.
\nput in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
\nthe champion of the world.<\/p>\n
three bodies lyin’ there does patty see
\nand another man named bello, movin’ around mysteriously.
\n“i didn’t do it,” he says, and he throws up his hands
\n“i was only robbin’ the register, i hope you understand.
\ni saw them leavin’,” he says, and he stops
\n“one of us had better call up the cops.”
\nand so patty calls the cops
\nand they arrive on the scene with their red lights flashin’
\nin the hot new jersey night.<\/p>\n
meanwhile, far away in another part of town
\nrubin carter and a couple of friends are drivin’ around.
\nnumber one contender for the middleweight crown
\nhad no idea what kinda sh*t was about to go down
\nwhen a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
\njust like the time before and the time before that.
\nIn paterson that’s just the way things go.
\nif you’re black you might as well not show up on the street
\n‘less you wanna draw the heat.<\/p>\n
alfred bello had a partner and he had a rap for the cops.
\nhim and arthur dexter bradley were just out prowlin’ around
\nhe said, “i saw two men runnin’ out, they looked like middleweights
\nthey jumped into a white car with out-of-state plates.”
\nAnd miss patty valentine just nodded her head.
\ncop said, “wait a minute, boys, this one’s not dead”
\nso they took him to the infirmary
\nand though this man could hardly see
\nthey told him that he could identify the guilty men.<\/p>\n
four in the mornin’ and they haul rubin in,
\ntake him to the hospital and they bring him upstairs.
\nthe wounded man looks up through his one dyin’ eye
\nsays, “wha’d you bring him in here for? he ain’t the guy!”
\nyes, here’s the story of the hurricane,
\nthe man the authorities came to blame
\nfor somethin’ that he never done.
\nput in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
\nthe champion of the world.<\/p>\n
four months later, the ghettos are in flame,
\nrubin’s in south america, fightin’ for his name
\nwhile arthur dexter bradley’s still in the robbery game
\nand the cops are puttin’ the screws to him, lookin’ for somebody to blame.
\n“remember that murder that happened in a bar?”
\n“remember you said you saw the getaway car?”
\n“you think you’d like to play ball with the law?”
\n“think it might-a been that fighter that you saw runnin’ that night?”
\n“don’t forget that you are white.”<\/p>\n
arthur dexter bradley said, “i’m really not sure.”
\ncops said, “a poor boy like you could use a break
\nwe got you for the motel job and we’re talkin’ to your friend bello
\nnow you don’t wanta have to go back to jail, be a nice fellow.
\nyou’ll be doin’ society a favor.
\nthat son of a b*tch is brave and gettin’ braver.
\nwe want to put his ass in stir
\nwe want to pin this triple murder on him
\nhe ain’t no gentleman jim.”<\/p>\n
rubin could take a man out with just one punch
\nbut he never did like to talk about it all that much.
\nit’s my work, he’d say, and i do it for pay
\nand when it’s over i’d just as soon go on my way
\nup to some paradise
\nwhere the trout streams flow and the air is nice
\nand ride a horse along a trail.
\nbut then they took him to the jailhouse
\nwhere they try to turn a man into a mouse.<\/p>\n
all of rubin’s cards were marked in advance
\nthe trial was a pig-circus, he never had a chance.
\nthe judge made rubin’s witnesses drunkards from the slums
\nto the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
\nand to the black folks he was just a crazy n*gger.
\nno one doubted that he pulled the trigger.
\nand though they could not produce the gun,
\nthe d.a. said he was the one who did the deed
\nand the all-white jury agreed.<\/p>\n
rubin carter was falsely tried.
\nthe crime was murder “one,” guess who testified?
\nbello and bradley and they both baldly lied
\nand the newspapers, they all went along for the ride.
\nhow can the life of such a man
\nbe in the palm of some fool’s hand?
\nto see him obviously framed
\ncouldn’t help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
\nwhere justice is a game.<\/p>\n
now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
\nare free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
\nwhile rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
\nan innocent man in a living hell.
\nthat’s the story of the hurricane,
\nbut it won’t be over till they clear his name
\nand give him back the time he’s done.
\nput in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been
\nthe champion of the world.<\/b><\/p>\n
– bob dylan<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
one of my favourite songs, a great protest song… pistol shots ring out in the barroom night enter patty valentine from the upper hall. she sees the bartender in a pool of blood, cries out, “my God, they killed them all!” here comes the story of the hurricane, the man the authorities came to blame […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=53"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=53"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=53"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nomes.malcolm-x.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=53"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}