Speaker 1: Novel. Before we begin, a content warning the following episode
Speaker 1: contains difficult themes and violence. In twenty fourteen, there was
Speaker 1: a show running on HBO called Boardwalk Empire. Boardwalk Empire
Speaker 1: takes place in nineteen twenties New Jersey during Prohibition. It
Speaker 1: follows the life of corrupt politician Nukie Thompson, whose underworld
Speaker 1: connections to some of the country's most notorious gangsters help
Speaker 1: his bloody rise to the top. Steve Buscemi plays Nuckie Thompson,
Speaker 1: who's based on Enoch Johnson, a real life New Jersey
Speaker 1: politician and crime boss. The second to last episode is
Speaker 1: called Friendless Child and is set in the early nineteen thirties.
Speaker 1: Will Thompson, Nukie's nephew, is working as an assistant district attorney.
Speaker 1: His boss, a black woman, tells him to pull all
Speaker 1: the prostitution cases north of one hundred and tenth Street.
Speaker 2: You need me too, mister Hodge does.
Speaker 1: Will resent the instructions, and the unnamed black woman becomes conciliatory.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, okay, I don't make the assignments.
Speaker 3: Would be any different if you did.
Speaker 1: Yes, it's not a big role, but it's based on Unis,
Speaker 1: and from what I've learned about Unis so far, watching
Speaker 1: that scene made me almost angry at this portrayal of her.
Speaker 2: I know you're good at your job.
Speaker 1: Mister Hodge does too. I doubt Unics would have tried
Speaker 1: to sue the sensitive male ego in such a simpering way.
Speaker 1: The character is named in the credits as Beatrice Carson.
Speaker 1: That's similar enough to Unice Carter. Right when it aired
Speaker 1: in twenty fourteen, many people thought it was totally and
Speaker 1: utterly ridiculous, unrealistic, but not because of the simpering.
Speaker 2: They were like, oh, this is made up. You're just
Speaker 2: inserting black people into places where they weren't. But the
Speaker 2: thing is, there was a black woman prosecutor. And it's
Speaker 2: not even just that not everyone remembers Unice, but that
Speaker 2: people don't even believe she could have existed. The idea
Speaker 2: that she could have existed seems like a fantasy to people.
Speaker 1: When I first learned about Unice Carter, I was so
Speaker 1: excited to find out about her life. The more I read,
Speaker 1: the more I alternated between being sad, frustrated, and angry.
Speaker 1: Unice was a well known woman of her time, a
Speaker 1: published writer, a socialite, daughter of a well known trailblazing
Speaker 1: couple a prosecutor. She is the reason one of the
Speaker 1: most notorious mobsters of all time was sent to jail.
Speaker 1: Unis had so many recorded accomplishments and yet still manages
Speaker 1: to be an obscure character in American history. You could
Speaker 1: have a string of first after your name and still
Speaker 1: be forgotten. How much does a black woman have to
Speaker 1: do in order to stay bold faced throughout history.
Speaker 2: I think it's really fascinating that she was so prominent
Speaker 2: at the time. I think I knew a little bit
Speaker 2: about the things she had done, but I actually didn't
Speaker 2: know that she had achieved notoriety for them at the time.
Speaker 2: I think when it comes to black history in the
Speaker 2: US specifically, often we remember people because their legacy can
Speaker 2: be used to serve a particular narrative. And I sort
Speaker 2: of wonder if, for Unis, she just never really fit
Speaker 2: neatly into any particular narrative. Which is not to say
Speaker 2: she's not remember at all, but she's not as much
Speaker 2: of a household name as she could be, given the
Speaker 2: things she accomplished and how well known she was in
Speaker 2: her heyday. I think also there has been a real
Speaker 2: erasure in US history of Black people who were movers
Speaker 2: and shakers or who had access to power in their time.
Speaker 2: I think that it speaks to who gets remembered and
Speaker 2: who doesn't.
Speaker 1: But it's clear that Eunice, perhaps more than anything, wanted
Speaker 1: to be remembered. She had a certain type of ambition.
Speaker 1: She wanted to move in certain circles and to be
Speaker 1: recognized in the world in a certain way. She wanted
Speaker 1: people to know that she was smart, that she was accomplished.
Speaker 1: She wanted to have some proximity to power. She wanted
Speaker 1: to be a judge. That was ultimately what she felt
Speaker 1: she wanted to do. The things Eunice Carter did were
Speaker 1: seen as so out of the ordinary for a black
Speaker 1: woman at the time that when she appeared a character
Speaker 1: in a television show many decades later, viewers didn't think
Speaker 1: she could have even existed. Why.
Speaker 2: I suspect she would think it's because she didn't get
Speaker 2: to achieve everything she wanted to achieve.
Speaker 1: From the teams at iHeartRadio and novel. I'm Nicole Perkins
Speaker 1: and this is the final episode of The Godmother, Episode eight,
Speaker 1: Finding Unice. On November seventeenth, nineteen forty two, Eunice writes
Speaker 1: Dewey a letter. Six years have passed since the Lucky
Speaker 1: Luciano trial. Her handwriting is sure and strong, no splotches,
Speaker 1: no words crossed out to fix any mistakes. At the time,
Speaker 1: she's still working in the Prosecutor's office, but she's in
Speaker 1: a new role now, one that Dewey promoted her to
Speaker 1: just a couple of years earlier. The letter opens with
Speaker 1: dear Boss, handwritten on what looks like quality paper, but
Speaker 1: Dewey has left the Prosecutor's office by the time of writing.
Speaker 1: In nineteen forty two, Eunice is congratulating him for recently
Speaker 1: winning the election for governor.
Speaker 4: After the case things changed. Dewe became very well known.
Speaker 4: He was a big crime buster national reputation.
Speaker 1: And Dewey uses that popularity to launch a successful political career.
Speaker 5: He was Governor of New York from nineteen forty three
Speaker 5: until nineteen fifty four.
Speaker 1: As governor, Dewey signed into law the ives Quinn Act,
Speaker 1: which made New York the first state to ban job
Speaker 1: discrimination based on race, religion, or creed. He increased unemployment
Speaker 1: and disability benefits, and helped create the state university system,
Speaker 1: plus many other accomplishments that helped make the Republican Party
Speaker 1: more progressive than it had been before. But there's one
Speaker 1: big twist of his career that must have chafed His
Speaker 1: new life in politics puts him in a position where
Speaker 1: he has to undo one of the biggest triumphs of
Speaker 1: his career. During World War Two, New York's government finds
Speaker 1: themselves in need of a very particular kind of deal broker.
Speaker 1: At that time, New York's waterfront had less of a
Speaker 1: touristy vibe than it does these days. It was run
Speaker 1: by the mob.
Speaker 4: The waterfront was the Fulton Fish Mawaukeet, and fish was
Speaker 4: a big racket.
Speaker 1: But World War Two is underway and the US Navy
Speaker 1: sees that it's imperative new York's port is protected.
Speaker 6: New York was a huge port, even bigger than in
Speaker 6: many ways than it is today.
Speaker 1: The US Navy needs someone to persuade the mob controlling
Speaker 1: the port that they should work with authorities to keep
Speaker 1: New York safe. Someone the mob will trust, and who
Speaker 1: better than the former boss of bosses who's been languishing
Speaker 1: in prison for the last decade, Lucky Luciano himself.
Speaker 6: He uses his connections within Italy and his connections through
Speaker 6: organized crime groups across New York to make sure that
Speaker 6: the ports remain free, safe and open during World War Two.
Speaker 4: If you see anything suspicious, you have to pass the
Speaker 4: word along.
Speaker 1: Because of his operation, Lucky gets himself a deal.
Speaker 4: Jay ed go over later, so sarcastically remarked that they
Speaker 4: did everything but give Luciano the Naval Cross.
Speaker 1: He's pardoned, and not just any pardon, but a pardon
Speaker 1: from the Governor of New York himself, which by nineteen
Speaker 1: forty six is of course Thomas E. Dewey that had
Speaker 1: to hurt.
Speaker 5: Luciano was released from prison in forty six and goes
Speaker 5: off to Italy.
Speaker 1: Lucky remains active in organized crime, silently financing ventures in
Speaker 1: New York, Las Vegas, Cuba for the most part from
Speaker 1: across the ocean, until he dies of a heart attack
Speaker 1: at Naples International Airport in nineteen sixty two. His body
Speaker 1: is buried in a cemetery in Queens. His path and
Speaker 1: Dewey's are finally unspoiled, which leaves Dewey and Unice.
Speaker 4: I have no doubt that Dewey respected Unice and Eunice
Speaker 4: I think respected him she actually campaigned for him.
Speaker 1: But governor of New York is no small feat. He
Speaker 1: doesn't just have pardoning power as governor, he can also
Speaker 1: appoint every election Eunice is by Dewey's side. Dewey even
Speaker 1: makes a bid for the White House in nineteen forty
Speaker 1: four and forty eight, unsuccessfully, of course, although it was close.
Speaker 1: At any moment in that eleven year reign, Dewey could
Speaker 1: have helped Unice achieve her own career ambitions.
Speaker 6: He was very comfortable singing her praises as far as
Speaker 6: the role that she'd played, but he never reached the
Speaker 6: point where he was comfortable giving her a public face.
Speaker 4: It was kind of a point of controversy that he
Speaker 4: could have appointed her as a judge. He never appointed her.
Speaker 4: I don't think you can look up and go. He
Speaker 4: just never had the opportunity. Why didn't he appoint here?
Speaker 4: He knew she was very confident, She was very devoted
Speaker 4: to him.
Speaker 1: Dewey was progressive enough to appoint Unice to his team
Speaker 1: and express admiration for all of her hard work. But
Speaker 1: why was it so hard for him to help her
Speaker 1: move to the bench. It's clear she was a star
Speaker 1: on the rise. But her career seemed to plateau while
Speaker 1: the men in the good old boys network surrounding her
Speaker 1: kept climbing to success. I honestly can't say I'm surprised
Speaker 1: that Dewey had no problem taking advantage of Unice's support
Speaker 1: and expertise without letting it pay.
Speaker 2: Off for her.
Speaker 1: But why was unus so loyal to Dewey when he
Speaker 1: didn't seem interested in helping her without benefit to himself.
Speaker 1: It all seems to follow that old axum. Black people
Speaker 1: have to work twice as hard to get half, and
Speaker 1: that's not accounting for the unique challenges of being a
Speaker 1: black woman. Unis may have felt that a judgeship could
Speaker 1: have created a legacy for her, would have written her
Speaker 1: more firmly than anything else could have into the pages
Speaker 1: of American history, but it didn't happen. That's not to
Speaker 1: say she didn't make an impact. Unice's work with Dewey
Speaker 1: did leave a precedent of sorts that continues to influence
Speaker 1: the modern justice system. Unice didn't pioneer these things, but
Speaker 1: she was part of a pivot in the American legal system.
Speaker 1: Like Dewey's joinder law used so effectively to convict Lucky
Speaker 1: Luciano in association with his co defendants. Modern iterations of
Speaker 1: that law are still in use to this day, sometimes
Speaker 1: in ways that UNICE would have supported.
Speaker 7: It's actually what groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center
Speaker 7: used to bankrupt the Ku Kuk Klan in certain cities.
Speaker 1: But in the criminal world, laws like the Joinder law
Speaker 1: have often been used in ways that are heavily racialized,
Speaker 1: like targeting gang violence in la and New York.
Speaker 7: Those investigations are often heavily raced based. They're looking for
Speaker 7: young black men who have certain associations, who wear certain
Speaker 7: kinds of clothing, and really sweep in large numbers of
Speaker 7: people in the community in the effort to try to
Speaker 7: turn back gun violence in a particular area.
Speaker 1: We've even seen it used against protest movements.
Speaker 7: We've seen that in the state of Georgia, where the
Speaker 7: governor has gone after activists attempting to stop the creation
Speaker 7: of a large training facility near Atlanta called cop City.
Speaker 1: None of these were inventions of UNISES, and she's not
Speaker 1: responsible for the way they've evolved into their current forms.
Speaker 1: But I do wonder whether history would have remembered units
Speaker 1: better if she'd worked against the system as it was then,
Speaker 1: instead of from within it, whether or not she yearned
Speaker 1: to dismantle it change it. With her very presence in
Speaker 1: those rooms of power, history has seemed to remember the
Speaker 1: radicals and the protesters a little more clearly. I think
Speaker 1: back to her essay breaking Through that road map of
Speaker 1: sorts she wrote for her own career trajectory, but also
Speaker 1: of the people of Harlem trapped in the modern ghetto.
Speaker 1: Could she have imagined that nearly a century after she
Speaker 1: wrote those words, thirty eight percent of those imprisoned in
Speaker 1: the US are black, despite being only thirteen percent of
Speaker 1: the country's population, removed from their communities in service to
Speaker 1: a sprawling brand of law enforcement that her own work
Speaker 1: helped lay down in history.
Speaker 7: A problem with situations like Unice Carter is if you
Speaker 7: are the one person, if you are one of few people,
Speaker 7: and you don't have meaningful access to power in that office,
Speaker 7: and you don't have a meaningful voice in that office,
Speaker 7: it too easily devolves into tokenism. Right, It's too easily
Speaker 7: transformed into Now the institution is using you to validate
Speaker 7: itself because it's gone out and created a more diverse workforce,
Speaker 7: and you yourself find that two years, three years in,
Speaker 7: you really haven't been able to shift the institution.
Speaker 1: Unice, perhaps sinsing that the judgeship was never going to happen,
Speaker 1: quits the world of law for good in the early
Speaker 1: nineteen fifties.
Speaker 7: If you are somebody who is trying to rock the boat,
Speaker 7: you are always subject to the status quo rocking it
Speaker 7: right back. And that applies for anyone rocking the boat,
Speaker 7: but I think it applies with special force to black
Speaker 7: people who are trying to do that.
Speaker 1: Unice's guiding belief has always been help me further my
Speaker 1: career and I'll be loyal to you. But the flip
Speaker 1: side of that coin is the toll it ends up
Speaker 1: taking on Unice's personal life, because when those dreams don't
Speaker 1: come to fruition, she looks for someone to blame and
Speaker 1: finds him a little closer to home.
Speaker 2: She was never made a judge, but I think she
Speaker 2: always felt that it was because of Alvius' politics.
Speaker 1: As in Eunice's younger brother Addie and William's only son
Speaker 1: Alfaeus hunting. When there's anything going on in my life,
Speaker 1: good or bad, I turned to the group chats, A
Speaker 1: bad date, a single thumbs down, emoji a good date,
Speaker 1: thumbs up A very very good date. Well that gets
Speaker 1: full sentences.
Speaker 2: My impression of Unice is not that she was someone
Speaker 2: who had a lot of close girlfriends or friends who
Speaker 2: she really talked to about everything that was going on
Speaker 2: with her internally, people who she hung out with and
Speaker 2: gossiped with and confided in.
Speaker 1: The picture I see of Unice in her later years
Speaker 1: is a lonely one. I find myself yearning still to
Speaker 1: know what kind of friend Unice was, Who does she
Speaker 1: share secrets with, share her dreams with? But there doesn't
Speaker 1: seem to be any of that in Unice's life. For
Speaker 1: a while, Unis has one friend, Mary McLeod Bethune.
Speaker 2: Bethoon was that person, even though they had kind of
Speaker 2: a mentor mentee relationship, but you know, they were also close.
Speaker 1: Mary McLeod Bethune is a civil rights activist and educator.
Speaker 1: Unice met through her mother, Addie Hunton, but they eventually
Speaker 1: have a major falling out over something that seems kind
Speaker 1: of trivial looking back. Unice is hoping to be chosen
Speaker 1: to represent the National Council of Negro Women at a
Speaker 1: major event, but she isn't and for some reason or
Speaker 1: another she blames Mary for the fact that she was overlooked.
Speaker 2: That was just a sad thing. You know, when you
Speaker 2: watch two friends break up, and it's just depressing. I
Speaker 2: think sometimes her personal relationships they weren't always great.
Speaker 1: There's another anecdote about Unice that also speaks to me
Speaker 1: about her loneliness. It's a memory of Lyle Carter Junior's,
Speaker 1: Unice's only child. He lived most of his childhood away
Speaker 1: from his parents, often on long stays with extended family
Speaker 1: and Barbados. But on one occasion, when Lyle Junior is
Speaker 1: around eleven or twelve, he finds himself alone with his
Speaker 1: mother and Eunice asks Lyle Junior for advice. Does he
Speaker 1: think she should get a divorce from her husband? His father.
Speaker 1: There have been rumors of affairs throughout Unice's marriage to
Speaker 1: Lyle Carter sor her dentist husband, but there's something tragic
Speaker 1: about the idea of Unice asking her pre adolescent son
Speaker 1: for advice. She could have used a girlfriend at that moment.
Speaker 2: Her marriage, from what we can tell, wasn't the happiest.
Speaker 2: I can't say for sure why that was, and I
Speaker 2: certainly am not influenced to blame it on her ambition,
Speaker 2: just doing my personal principles. But yeah, but I reading
Speaker 2: the correspondence with Bathoon, I can see how her attitude
Speaker 2: would make personal relationships difficult for her.
Speaker 1: Sometimes she could have used even a sibling to turn
Speaker 1: to at that moment, But Eunice's path and the path
Speaker 1: her younger brother Alfaeus took they went in totally different directions.
Speaker 1: Alfaus Hunting was a scholar and an activist who was
Speaker 1: a tall, slim man with a thick mustache and eyebrows.
Speaker 1: Possibly Alfaus had been her companion during the riots in
Speaker 1: Atlanta and their mother's adventures in Germany. Like Eunice in adulthood,
Speaker 1: Alfaus is committed to the project of racial uplift.
Speaker 3: Not only African American people, but all people of color
Speaker 3: and fighting for working class rights, fighting for unions, fighting
Speaker 3: for national liberation against colonialism.
Speaker 1: Also, like his sister, he works with some major leading
Speaker 1: figures like Paul Robeson and W. E. B. Du Boyce.
Speaker 1: But unlike Unics, who remains in the Republican Party her
Speaker 1: entire life, Alphaeus takes a sharp political left turn.
Speaker 2: Alpheus was a communist, like a real communist.
Speaker 1: The same year that the Trial of the Century unfolds,
Speaker 1: Alpheus makes a career choice of a very different kind.
Speaker 3: In nineteen thirty six, al Faeus officially joined the Communist Party.
Speaker 2: He was active with a lot of left wing organizations.
Speaker 2: He was a supporter of Mao and Stalin. He was,
Speaker 2: you know, the real deal.
Speaker 3: I think that was the beginning of the troubles for Alphaeus.
Speaker 1: It's fascinating to think of Alphaeus finding his way to communism.
Speaker 1: My siblings and I are all very different from each other.
Speaker 1: But my older sister, the firstborn, is the golden child
Speaker 1: of the Fa family. She always does the right thing
Speaker 1: and is the kind of person who waves as strangers
Speaker 1: like they're best friends. She also keeps the peace. My
Speaker 1: mother says, I'm her rebel, but I tend to set
Speaker 1: up tougher boundaries than my sister and my brother. Plus
Speaker 1: I'm the middle child, It's my birthright to cause a
Speaker 1: little havoc. Alphaeus is the baby brother, the only boy.
Speaker 1: I wonder if part of the reason these two siblings
Speaker 1: are so different is so that they can stand out
Speaker 1: from each other. Like Uni studies at Smith, a predominantly
Speaker 1: white private women's college, with her fees paid for by
Speaker 1: a wealthy friend of their mother. Alphaeus, on the other hand,
Speaker 1: works as a railway porter at a train station through
Speaker 1: his college years at Howard University, a historically black school.
Speaker 2: I'm not saying he became a communist because he was
Speaker 2: frustrated that his sister's college was paid for and his wasn't,
Speaker 2: But he would have been hanging out with pullman porters
Speaker 2: and getting exposed to the labor movement. He did have
Speaker 2: very different experiences.
Speaker 1: In nineteen forty one, as Unice is playing the perfect
Speaker 1: respectable Republican, the FBI is creating a file on her
Speaker 1: younger brother. One day in May, Alfaz is reading a
Speaker 1: newspaper when he comes across his own name. It's in
Speaker 1: an article which states that the House of Unamerican Activities Committee,
Speaker 1: created to examine any behavior considered to be a threat
Speaker 1: to the public like communist thought, has branded him a communist.
Speaker 3: He actually read in the newspaper the charges against him
Speaker 3: before he was informed by the committee that he was
Speaker 3: even being charged.
Speaker 1: He writes to the committee demanding the right to testify,
Speaker 1: but it's not until the following year that he receives
Speaker 1: a letter from the FBI exonerating him of all charges.
Speaker 1: But as the years progressed, his file grows thicker notes
Speaker 1: reports associations.
Speaker 3: Presumably al Faeus saw in socialism and communism the path
Speaker 3: for African American equality and black liberation. I think Unice
Speaker 3: saw a different path.
Speaker 1: As their paths diverge, Eunice and al Faus clashed publicly
Speaker 1: with each other.
Speaker 2: Not directly, but they were ideologically opposed on a lot
Speaker 2: of things. For example, when Thomas Dewey was running for President,
Speaker 2: ALTHEUS was calling him a reactionary in the press, which
Speaker 2: I'm sure she didn't like very much.
Speaker 1: By the early nineteen fifties, Unice has given up Act
Speaker 1: of Law and is working with a few prominent black
Speaker 1: women's associations on their domestic and international efforts.
Speaker 2: She was at the founding of the United Nations, I
Speaker 2: think on behalf of the National Council of Negro Women.
Speaker 2: After World War Two there was a lot going on.
Speaker 1: One of those things is the UN Convention on Genocide Postwar.
Speaker 1: The Convention aims to define genocide so it can be
Speaker 1: considered an international crime.
Speaker 2: And in the early fifties there was a movement to
Speaker 2: get the United States to ratify the Convention.
Speaker 1: Unice wants to get the US on board, and for
Speaker 1: a while it's a family affair because so doaes alphaeis.
Speaker 2: Eunice testified before the Senate in favor of for ratification.
Speaker 2: She was actually the only black person to testify for it.
Speaker 1: But there are significant levels of pushback against the idea
Speaker 1: of ratification in America. One in particular, becomes a sticking point.
Speaker 2: One of the arguments against the US's ratification of the
Speaker 2: Convention was that the US itself was in violation of
Speaker 2: the Convention. The number one concern was because of the
Speaker 2: prevalence of lynching and overall because of the treatment of
Speaker 2: black Americans.
Speaker 1: Imagine Units going to the podium wearing one of her
Speaker 1: white lace collars is the nineteen fifties, sir hat and
Speaker 1: gloves probably would have been on points. She's standing in
Speaker 1: front of a panel of senators, a room full of
Speaker 1: people behind her. She speaks some of the few words
Speaker 1: we have of hers that have lasted through the years
Speaker 1: to be brushed off and examined again in the harsh
Speaker 1: light of present day.
Speaker 8: The situation of the Negro people in this country is
Speaker 8: in no way involved the lynching of an individual or
Speaker 8: of several individuals has no relation to the extinction of
Speaker 8: masses of people because of race, religion, or political belief.
Speaker 1: Over seventy percent of people lynched in America were black.
Speaker 1: That's at least three thousand, four hundred and forty six
Speaker 1: Black Americans. Up until nineteen sixty eight that we know of,
Speaker 1: lynching was off in a form of vigilante justice, with
Speaker 1: white people hanging and mutilating black people accused of any
Speaker 1: number of crimes from loitering to making eye contact to
Speaker 1: sexual assault without any formal charges, a way of eradicating
Speaker 1: black life based on race. It was absolutely a form
Speaker 1: of genocide. So we don't know whether UNUS really believed
Speaker 1: this or not, but I think she felt we want
Speaker 1: to get it ratified. We need to convince people that
Speaker 1: it's not going to cause problems for the US, and
Speaker 1: so this is what I'm going to say. It's hard
Speaker 1: to remember our icons could have been as flawed as
Speaker 1: the rest of us, especially when you have to follow
Speaker 1: certain cultural moras. Don't speak ill of the dead, don't
Speaker 1: disrespect your elders, don't share family business with outsiders. We
Speaker 1: see it when it comes to looking beyond Martin Luther
Speaker 1: King Junior's legacy to see him as a human being
Speaker 1: who may have made mistakes in his marriage. He became
Speaker 1: a martyr of civil rights movement, and to speak beyond
Speaker 1: his accomplishments is to be disrespectful. It's disappointing that Unus
Speaker 1: would argue that lynching should not be a part of
Speaker 1: this basic human rights consideration. But if that is how
Speaker 1: Unus feels, her brother Alphaeus does not agree.
Speaker 2: Alpheus was not willing to make that concession. An organization
Speaker 2: that he worked with, called the Civil Rights Congress, drafted
Speaker 2: a document called we Charge Genocide, which was submitted to
Speaker 2: the UN, essentially saying yes, the situation in the US
Speaker 2: is exactly the type of thing that the Genocide Convention
Speaker 2: speaks to, and Alpheus was involved in drafting it and
Speaker 2: was also a signatory to the document.
Speaker 1: I wonder if Unus was angry with her brother for
Speaker 1: being at such cross purposes. It probably caused a lot
Speaker 1: of tongue wagging for this brother and sister to be
Speaker 1: so at odds. Did Unis take Alphaeus's stance as a
Speaker 1: personal attack against her.
Speaker 2: I don't think he was doing it personally. It wasn't
Speaker 2: about her, but I think Unis probably, both in that
Speaker 2: situation and in the Thomas Dewey situation, felt very undermined
Speaker 2: by him. She probably felt frustrated that he was taking
Speaker 2: public positions. She probably took his politics a little personally.
Speaker 3: I think that she took the wrong stance. I think
Speaker 3: because of her background in law enforcement, she knew it
Speaker 3: was the wrong stance. I think that it was either
Speaker 3: incredibly naive or disingenuous for her to blame her brother
Speaker 3: for the limitations that were placed on her in a
Speaker 3: Jim Crow racist, sexist society.
Speaker 1: It's a rift they never come to rectify. In the
Speaker 1: year that followed Unis testifying, in nineteen fifty one, Alphaeus
Speaker 1: stood before the House of Unamerican Activities Committee time in person.
Speaker 1: He refuses to give up the names of those who'd
Speaker 1: contributed to a civil rights fund which had come under
Speaker 1: the scrutiny of the committee.
Speaker 3: And because al Fais took the principled stand that he
Speaker 3: would not divulge their names, he was sentenced to six
Speaker 3: months in prison.
Speaker 2: He had a vision of what he thought was best
Speaker 2: for the world, and he was willing to sacrifice a
Speaker 2: lot personally for it.
Speaker 1: After that prison stint, was over, Alfaus finds it difficult
Speaker 1: to get a foot back on the ladder of politics
Speaker 1: in America.
Speaker 2: A lot of the organizations that he had worked with
Speaker 2: sort of fell apart. He basically couldn't find work in
Speaker 2: the US, and he ended up spending most of the
Speaker 2: rest of his life in Africa.
Speaker 1: For the rest of her life, Unice will blame her
Speaker 1: failure to see of a judge ship on Alpheus's communist misadventures.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was easier to point the finger at someone
Speaker 1: she felt had betrayed her than to confront the fact
Speaker 1: that Dewey, someone she'd been loyal to, had let her down.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was easier to blame her brother, a black man,
Speaker 1: than it was to point the finger at Dewey, a
Speaker 1: white man with power. Whatever the reason, as Unice aged,
Speaker 1: she'd broken off her relationships with her brother, was living
Speaker 1: in a rocky marriage, had strained her relationship with her son,
Speaker 1: and had lost her only friend. When people looked at
Speaker 1: Unice as she moved into later life, what did they see.
Speaker 2: When I was growing up? The image I had was
Speaker 2: more just a stern faced woman with like a fur coat.
Speaker 2: I think I had this idea that she were for
Speaker 2: a goat?
Speaker 1: Is that from some pictures that you saw now?
Speaker 2: I think it came from just the way my dad
Speaker 2: talked about her.
Speaker 1: Leah Carter is the great granddaughter of Eunice Hunt and Carter.
Speaker 1: Leah's voice has been featured throughout the series. Her contributions
Speaker 1: have been some of the only direct contact I found
Speaker 1: with Unice when searching for a sense of who she was,
Speaker 1: above and beyond her historical record. As well as being
Speaker 1: Unus's great granddaughter, Leah has spent time carrying out meticulous
Speaker 1: research for her father's book. Her father is Stephen L. Carter,
Speaker 1: a lawyer, professor, and author and Eunice Carter's grandson.
Speaker 2: She was apparently always very glamorously dressed and put together.
Speaker 1: Before Leah spent her days going through archives, letters, journals.
Speaker 1: There were the bright yet hazy details passed down to
Speaker 1: her from the childhood memories of her own father.
Speaker 2: I knew a few things that my dad had told
Speaker 2: stories about her, just as his grandmother. I can't remember
Speaker 2: if he said that she wore her coats or I
Speaker 2: just ad lipped that in my mind, but that was
Speaker 2: sort of my childhood image for her.
Speaker 1: Leah's father remembers unus as a stern grandmother and an
Speaker 1: imposing presence. The grandchildren were all a little scared of her.
Speaker 2: She would correct his grammar, and he always said she
Speaker 2: used the type of person who would correct to the
Speaker 2: way that they were using their silverware at dinner.
Speaker 1: That makes sense to me. Eunice in her life always
Speaker 1: had to be pristine. She was detail oriented, and she
Speaker 1: was often in the kinds of spaces that were full
Speaker 1: of white people who probably looked for the slightest flaw
Speaker 1: on how she carried herself or communicated. She probably tried
Speaker 1: to train her grandchildren for the harsh world she'd experienced.
Speaker 2: She traveled a lot in her life. Her life went
Speaker 2: on a lot of cruises, and I don't know if
Speaker 2: that sort of added to their image of her as
Speaker 2: like kind of an imposing, faraway figure.
Speaker 1: What stands out to me is how Eunice's accomplishments always
Speaker 1: seemed to keep her on the edges of time, from
Speaker 1: the Luciano trial to her own family law.
Speaker 2: When I was younger, she was just this figurehead of
Speaker 2: here's the type of thing you're supposed to be achieving.
Speaker 2: Not that anyone ever told me that you too should
Speaker 2: be accomplished as Unis, but just I think that's probably
Speaker 2: what I would have felt like her father and her
Speaker 2: father's father and Eunice herself. Leo became a lawyer, but
Speaker 2: it was only when researching her great grandmother that Leah
Speaker 2: discovered the earlier parts of Unice's professional life, including one
Speaker 2: aspect that overlapped with a writer who reminds me of
Speaker 2: Unis in many ways. I thought about this way back
Speaker 2: in episode two. I didn't know that she had been
Speaker 2: a writer. One of my favorite facts was she was
Speaker 2: inducted into the Harlem Writers Guild along with Zorn Neil Hurston,
Speaker 2: which was so amazing to me. I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: my gosh, that's my great grandma. Hey, I was Sara
Speaker 2: in Hurston really overwhelmed by that.
Speaker 1: Unice achieved a lot of recognition in her own time,
Speaker 1: especially in the black press. It's no exaggeration to say
Speaker 1: she was famous all over America, but her current day
Speaker 1: legacy seems to be fading in real time. That's a
Speaker 1: big part of why I decided to do this podcast.
Speaker 2: I could go on about this for a while, about
Speaker 2: the way that we talk about or don't talk about
Speaker 2: black history in this country, the way that we treat
Speaker 2: black history as separate from history. I certainly felt, especially
Speaker 2: when I was very young, what we were taught about
Speaker 2: black people was that nobody had really done anything until
Speaker 2: quite recently. That there was slavery, and then everyone was
Speaker 2: a sharecropper for a while, and then the civil rights
Speaker 2: movement happened, and now everything's great. And I'm not saying
Speaker 2: we shouldn't talk about slavery or sharecropping. Obviously those things
Speaker 2: are really important, But there are so many things that
Speaker 2: black people have done that have been forgotten or kind
Speaker 2: of just buried, and that is very frustrating.
Speaker 1: Eunice Hunting Carter is responsible for the most sensational trial
Speaker 1: in the history of American organized crime. Why does her
Speaker 1: legacy only seem to survive in the realm of hazy
Speaker 1: childhood memories of a stern, older woman in a fur
Speaker 1: coat correcting grammar. She was a legend in the making
Speaker 1: long before the Lucky Luciano trial.
Speaker 2: Obviously she intimidated her grandkids, but I think she intimidated
Speaker 2: a lot of people in real life. She was just
Speaker 2: kind of a fierce person.
Speaker 1: It's hard to know what kept Unis from her judgeship
Speaker 1: or why someone with such an outstanding work ethic and
Speaker 1: influential connections did not go further in her career. Is
Speaker 1: it just enough to point the finger at racism and misogyny?
Speaker 1: Was she too dedicated to her ambitions? Her years as
Speaker 1: a Harlem socialite proved she knew how to let her
Speaker 1: hair down and shake a tail feather. What exactly was
Speaker 1: the secret password that would have opened up her career
Speaker 1: and made her a household name. I wish I had
Speaker 1: that time machine so I could go back and ask
Speaker 1: Thomas E doing look here, fella, what gives? He'd probably
Speaker 1: have me sent away and lobotomized. But I still try
Speaker 1: to fight for my girl. Unis would she had fought
Speaker 1: for me? I can relate in many ways to Unis,
Speaker 1: the pressure of navigating predominantly white spaces while they constantly
Speaker 1: in your right to be there, having a strong idea
Speaker 1: of how you see your career going, and trying to
Speaker 1: be a team player while others take credit for your work.
Speaker 1: I know what it's like to be too direct with
Speaker 1: firm boundaries, or to be called unlikable as shorthand for
Speaker 1: she won't let me bully her. I even know what
Speaker 1: it means to stay in an unhappy relationship for security
Speaker 1: and status. But I've never been good at brown nosing
Speaker 1: or staying loyal to someone who doesn't seem to support
Speaker 1: my growth. I also wouldn't sacrifice my community for the
Speaker 1: sake of a greater good that doesn't take my people
Speaker 1: into consideration. If Unison I met today, she'd probably be
Speaker 1: aghast at the lack of structure in my working life,
Speaker 1: but maybe she'd secretly admire the freedom of my dating life.
Speaker 1: I'd let her read my memoir and poetry. I think
Speaker 1: she'd be proud to see me making a living out
Speaker 1: of my createsivity and disappointed that the only dining silverware
Speaker 1: etiquette I know is outside in and looking for Unice's story.
Speaker 1: I am reminded of all the other black women in
Speaker 1: America who have had their stories buried or forgotten.
Speaker 2: If you do something valuable with your life, it's still
Speaker 2: valuable even if people don't remember it. The influence that
Speaker 2: you have while you're alive matters, even if after you're
Speaker 2: gone everyone forgets about you. Even though that's frustrating, but
Speaker 2: I think it doesn't mean that it was all for nothing.
Speaker 1: Legacy is important to me. I understand Unice's desire to
Speaker 1: leave her mark on history. Time has worn it down,
Speaker 1: but if you know where to look, you can still
Speaker 1: make it out. I have a fear of being forgotten,
Speaker 1: that my life, my art, my work will disappear, and
Speaker 1: I don't even have a fourth of Unice's accomplishments. But
Speaker 1: as I've learned about Unice Hunting Carter, I know that
Speaker 1: someone somewhere down the line will find a faint marking
Speaker 1: of me. And even if it's only one person who
Speaker 1: tries to track down the history of me, that will
Speaker 1: be enough. As a child free woman, I don't have
Speaker 1: children who will bless me with grandkids and great grandkids
Speaker 1: who might one day research and write a book about me.
Speaker 1: Fortunately Unice Hunting Carter does, and now we can see
Speaker 1: that she was a complicated, fascinating, perhaps unlikable, definitely beloved
Speaker 1: and smart woman whose tenacity took down New York's most
Speaker 1: notorious gangster amid the racism and sexism of nineteen thirties America,
Speaker 1: and who fought just as fiercely for herself. And one
Speaker 1: of those great grandchildren has some advice for you.
Speaker 2: Find these stories, dig them up if they've been buried.
Speaker 1: You've been listening to the Godmother.
Speaker 2: My name's Leah Carter. I am Eunis Carter's great granddaughter.
Speaker 2: My dad, Stephen Carter, wrote the book Invisible, the Forgotten
Speaker 2: story of the black woman lawyer who took down America's
Speaker 2: most famous mobster, and I did a lot of the
Speaker 2: research for that book.
Speaker 4: I'm Marilyn Greenwald. I'm a professor of of journalism at
Speaker 4: Ohio University, and I'm the author of five biographies, including
Speaker 4: one of Eunice Hunting Carter.
Speaker 5: My name is Robert Whalan and I'm an emerathus Professor
Speaker 5: of history at Queen's University of Charlotte here in Charlotte,
Speaker 5: North Carolina.
Speaker 2: Hi, my name is Ellen Paulson.
Speaker 5: I research and I write books about women who were
Speaker 5: involved with notorious gangsters and desperadoes.
Speaker 6: I am Claire White and I am the director of
Speaker 6: education at the Mob Museum in downtown Las Vegas.
Speaker 7: My name is Brandon Busky and I am the director
Speaker 7: of the Criminal Law Reform Project at the ACLU.
Speaker 3: My name is Tony Passanowski and I am a independent
Speaker 3: historian and author. Aside from Dorothy Hunton's biography of her
Speaker 3: husband Alveus, my book is the only standalone biography of
Speaker 3: Alfaus Hunting.
Speaker 1: The Godmother is produced by Novel for iHeartRadio. For more
Speaker 1: from Novel, visit novel dot Audio. The Godmother is hosted
Speaker 1: and written by me Nicole Perkins. Our producer is Leona Hamid.
Speaker 1: Additional production from Ajuajima Broumpong, Ronald Young Junior and Zianna Yusuf.
Speaker 1: Our editor is Ajua Jima Broompong. Additional story editing from
Speaker 1: Max O'Brien and Mitha Lee Raw and our researcher is
Speaker 1: Zaiana Yusuf. Additional research from Mohammed Ahmed. David Waters is
Speaker 1: our executive producer. Field production by Tnito Romani and Pallas Shaw,
Speaker 1: Sound design, mixing and scoring by Daniel Kempsen. Our score
Speaker 1: was written, performed and recorded by Jeff Parker. Music supervision
Speaker 1: by Nicholas Alexander and David Waters. Production management and endless
Speaker 1: patients from Sharie Houston, Sarah Tobin and Charlotte Wolfe. Fact
Speaker 1: checking by Fendell Fulton and Donia Suleiman. Story development by
Speaker 1: Madeline Parr, Jess Swinburne, Esseiana Yusuf. Willard Foxton is our
Speaker 1: creative director of Development. Special thanks to Leah Carter, Stephen Carter,
Speaker 1: Angela J. Davis, Andrew Fernley, Marilyn Greenwald, Sondra Lebedy, Katherine Godfrey,
Speaker 1: Nadia Maidie, Amalia Sortland, Sean Glenn, Neil Krishnan, Julia Bromberg,
Speaker 1: Katrina Norvelle, Carly Frankel, and all the team at w
Speaker 1: Emmy
Speaker 2: Novel