McCain Asks Obama to Pardon Boxer Jack Johnson

Image by cliff1066™ via Flickr

It's Amazing to me how years and year after event, the present can still be affected by that event. I had known about Jack Johnson, the first black heavy-weight champion Boxer ever. Without him, no Muhammad Ali, no Evander Hollyfield, no Mike Tyson, no XMA, no nothing. I've even posted about him on this blog before. I had heard that the fact that he liked white woman caused him a great deal of problems because society around him would not accept mutual and voluntary interracial relationships. I didn't realize that he had been convicted of driving his own wife across state lines. Further I didn't know the conviction was still on the books.

I don't think that Johnson would like to see his case used as club to hammer the first Black president of the United States. SI am amazed to see that Senator McCain is introducing this idea to pardon Johnson after all this time. I agree Johnson deserves a pardon...it is clearly an injustice done to the man and i don't care that Johnson has long been dead. He should be pardoned. I just don't think McCain is being altruistic in his motives. I don't trust "that one". He says that it's not meant to cause Obama any problems or to criticize him because the President is busy,, but it still seems like to me a ploy.

This article mentions a Kenneth Burns documentary on Jack Johnson's life. I've embedded it below

The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson Episode 1 @ Yahoo! Video

The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson Episode 2 @ Yahoo! Video

McCain Asks Obama to Pardon Boxer Jack Johnson