As the first African-American athlete in Major League Baseball’s history, Jackie Robinson fought for six All-Star appearances, a 1955 World Series ring and a legacy of integration in professional sports. But until now, the story of one of Robinson’s most infamous battles has gone largely untold — and it happened not on the field, but in the courtroom.
“I always knew that Jackie had testified against [Paul] Robeson. What I didn’t know was how he got there,” said Howard Bryant, author of “Kings and Pawns: Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson in America.”
Harkening back to a society dominated by anti-communism sentiment, “Kings and Pawns” explores the factors leading to the career death of Paul Robeson, who revolutionized college football, helped desegregate Broadway, and lit up stage and screen as an iconic singer and film actor. While Bryant says Robeson was once “the most famous Black man in the world,” he was disillusioned by post-WWII America’s treatment of Black veterans and turned his support toward the United States’ Cold War adversary.
“For Robeson, he was purely, as an artist, connected to the Soviet Union,” said Bryant. “He believed in the Soviet experiment. And one of the reasons he believed so deeply in the Soviet experiment was because of its supposed commitment to racial integration and racial equality.”
By 1949, Robeson had come under intense scrutiny from the House Un-American Activities Commission, a far-right congressional committee seeking to stamp out domestic communist sentiment. In need of another prominent Black voice to counter Robeson’s influence, Brooklyn Dodgers owner Branch Rickey, and ardent anti-communist, turned to Robinson.
“Jackie felt a sense of responsibility,” Bryant said. “He felt that he had a responsibility to Black people that, if the country believed African-Americans were disloyal, it would make civil rights domestically even more difficult.”
In pitting one prominent Black man against another, the U.S. government blackballed Robeson from future career opportunities while further demonizing liberal politics as “un-American.” Even though Robinson was largely hailed as a hero for his testimony, Bryant believes his action set the civil rights movement back “a decade,” as it caused organizations like the NAACP and the Urban League to “pull back” and tone down their fight for equal liberties.
It was this distrust of Black Americans that Bryant, in writing “Kings and Pawns,” hopes to convey to readers as a reflection of current times.
“It was fascinating doing this research,” Bryant said. “When you look at the number of times Donald Trump is talking about or closing the borders to everybody — you know, to predominantly non-white countries … this is all the same Cold War playbook.”
Guest
- Howard Bryant, writer, documentary producer, former ESPN broadcaster, NPR Weekend Edition sports analyst and author of “Kings and Pawns: Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson in America”
