How America Co-Wrote the Tragedy of Billie Holiday
The film ‘The United States vs. Billie Holiday’ illuminates Lady Day as an activist the U.S. government was determined to silence
Many would find it difficult to believe that it was necessary for an Emmett Till anti-lynching bill to be presented to the U.S. Senate in 2020. The bill, which came 83 years after the introduction of the first bill intended to ban lynching, has yet to be passed. The first legislation proposed to outlaw lynching was written during the peak of the Jim Crow era — that post-slavery period when White people demeaned, oppressed, tortured, and killed Blacks whenever inclined. Their go-to method of murder was hanging by noose — at times, above of an audience of men, women, and children. This all too common atrocity inspired songwriter Abel Meeropol to pen the poem “Bitter Fruit” in 1937, the same year the anti-lynching bill was proposed. The piece used a poignant metaphor to paint visions of Black lynching victims dangling from trees.
Two years later, Billie Holiday recorded the lyrics, birthing the all-consuming “Strange Fruit.” Never before had a song thrown the country’s hate and bloodlust under such a grand spotlight—and its national success did not please the U.S. government. This history set the table for Lee Daniels’…
