July 1932

In July 1932, the U.S. Public Health Service began a study in Macon County, Alabama enrolling 399 Black men with latent syphilis and 201 controls. Subjects were told they were being treated for 'bad blood' but were deliberately given placebos while researchers observed the disease's natural progression. When penicillin became standard treatment in 1947, it was withheld from participants. The study ran until a whistleblower exposed it in 1972. At least 28 men died directly of syphilis; 100 died of related complications; 40 wives were infected; 19 children were born with congenital syphilis.

The US Public Health Service began its 'Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male' in 1932 in Macon County, Alabama. 399 Black men with syphilis and 201 controls were enrolled without informed consent and told they were being treated for 'bad blood.' They were deliberately denied treatment — including penicillin after it became the standard of care in 1947 — so researchers could observe the disease's full progression. The study continued until 1972, when a whistleblower exposed it. At least 28 men died directly from syphilis, 100 died from complications, 40 wives were infected, and 19 children were born with congenital syphilis. (Note: begins 1932, but context established in 1900s-1910s medical racism.)

Angelo Herndon, a 19-year-old Black Communist organizer, led a 1,000-person integrated march on Atlanta's Fulton County relief office in July 1932 protesting Depression-era cuts. He was arrested and charged under an 1861 Georgia slave insurrection statute — a law explicitly designed to suppress enslaved resistance. Herndon was convicted and sentenced to 18–20 years on a chain gang. The ACLU and ILD appealed. In Herndon v. Lowry (1937), the Supreme Court reversed his conviction 5–4 as a violation of free speech. Herndon served five years before his release.

Black Communist organizer Angelo Herndon was arrested in Atlanta for leading an interracial hunger march. Georgia charged him under an 1861 statute written to suppress slave uprisings. He was convicted and sentenced to 18–20 years on a chain gang. His case drew international protest.