Mode of Program Participation
Academic Scholarship
Participation Type
Paper
Presentation #1 Title
From Sellins to Barcoski: Police Brutality and the Suspension of Civil Liberties in Pittsburgh, 1919-1929
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
In 1919, Fannie Mae Sellins, a Gold-Star mother and nationally known labor activist was murdered by a Sherriff’s Deputy at a coal camp just outside of Pittsburgh. Ten years later, an obscure Polish immigrant miner named John Barcoski was beaten to death by two coal and iron policemen at their barracks located at Imperial, Pennsylvania, which was also one of Pittsburgh’s satellite communities. In both cases, there was enough evidence in place to make a credible charge of first degree murder, and in both cases, the perpetrators were acquitted. Although the men involved with the Barcoski slaying were eventually convicted of manslaughter, this happened only when the Allegheny County District attorney sought a change of venue, and retried them in Franklin, Pennsylvania, well north of Pittsburgh. Clearly, something was wrong. Pittsburgh, and by extension the rest of south-western Pennsylvania, during the 1920s amounted to nothing more or less than a miniature police state, with local authorities having a “flexible” attitude regarding Constitutional guarantees and due process. This essay explores those issues, and offers some possible explanations why this happened, as well as their implications for current society.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
Richard P. Mulcahy is Professor of History and Political Science with the University of Pittsburgh's Titusville Regional Campus. He is a Fellow of the Center for Northern Appalachian Studies at St. Vincent College in Latrobe, PA, and the author of A Social Contract for the Coal Fields.
From Sellins to Barcoski: Police Brutality and the Suspension of Civil Liberties in Pittsburgh, 1919-1929
In 1919, Fannie Mae Sellins, a Gold-Star mother and nationally known labor activist was murdered by a Sherriff’s Deputy at a coal camp just outside of Pittsburgh. Ten years later, an obscure Polish immigrant miner named John Barcoski was beaten to death by two coal and iron policemen at their barracks located at Imperial, Pennsylvania, which was also one of Pittsburgh’s satellite communities. In both cases, there was enough evidence in place to make a credible charge of first degree murder, and in both cases, the perpetrators were acquitted. Although the men involved with the Barcoski slaying were eventually convicted of manslaughter, this happened only when the Allegheny County District attorney sought a change of venue, and retried them in Franklin, Pennsylvania, well north of Pittsburgh. Clearly, something was wrong. Pittsburgh, and by extension the rest of south-western Pennsylvania, during the 1920s amounted to nothing more or less than a miniature police state, with local authorities having a “flexible” attitude regarding Constitutional guarantees and due process. This essay explores those issues, and offers some possible explanations why this happened, as well as their implications for current society.
