Sacco and Vanzetti
Controversial 1920s execution
Sacco and Vanzetti were two Italian-American anarchists executed in Massachusetts in 1927 for murder, after a trial widely seen as prejudiced against them for their radical politics and immigrant status.
Their case became an international cause célèbre, and their names remain shorthand for politically motivated injustice: It was a Sacco and Vanzetti situation—the verdict was decided before the trial began.
- anarchistsOpponents of state authority
- anarchist movementPolitical effort opposing hierarchy
- executionCompleting a planned task
- death penaltyLegal execution for crimes
- MassachusettsNortheastern colonial state
1920s · injustice · trial · immigrants · Italian immigrants · electric chair · radicals · innocent · martyrs · protest · labor · labor movement · Italian · wrongful conviction · Red Scare · Boston · clemency · prejudice
Sacco and VanzettiTed Bundy
Timothy McVeigh · guilty as charged · caught red-handed · Al Capone
Sacco and VanzettiBenito Mussolini