Jackson Free Press

Cheers to The Clarion-Ledger for going back on its statements that Edgar Ray Killen—and then James Ford Seale—were going to be the end of the line for investigating old civil rights murders. We'd heard that Jerry Mitchell was back in Neshoba County looking at Billy Wayne Posey's role in the 1964 murders of Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, and we applaud him for doing it. The Clarion-Ledger, and Mitchell, have spent way too much time in recent years saying that the investigations of old cases were "over," as we've pointed out numerous times. That newspaper has been sitting on files for years in these cold cases; it's time that they put a lot of energy into bringing more information forward. It should not be up to The Clarion-Ledger decide when it's "over"; as long as one civil rights murderer is still alive, it should not be over. For more info on the "last" case rhetoric, Dredging Up the Past: Why Mississippians Must Tell Our Own Stories.