Minnesota Board Grants Historic Posthumous Pardon for Black Man Wrongly Convicted in 1920 Duluth Rape

DULUTH, Minn. (FOX 9) – The Minnesota Board of Pardons posthumously pardoned a man who was convicted in a 1920 rape case, which sparked the Duluth lynchings.

The three-person pardon board, which includes Attorney General Keith Ellison and Gov. Tim Walz, voted unanimously Friday to pardon Max Mason.

Mason was one of six black circus workers arrested for the alleged rape of a white woman in Duluth. A mob stormed the jail, dragged three of the men from their jail cell and lynched them in the streets in front of a crowd of 10,000 people.

Elmer Jackson, Isaac McGhie, and Elias Clayton were killed in the incident. No one was ever convicted for those killings.

Mason was tried and convicted for the alleged rape and was sentenced to 30 years in jail, although key legal officials later said there was little evidence linking him to the crime.

Mason was granted parole in 1925. He moved to Alabama where he raised a family and died at age 46, according to Ellison.

In December, the pardon board voted unanimously to reconsider Mason’s 1924 pardon denial.

“Justice delayed is justice denied. One hundred years late, justice has been done,” Attorney General Ellison said. “The Duluth lynchings are a dark stain on our history. A century later, the last few weeks have shown us that in Minnesota, we still have a need for a better quality of justice. This pardon for Max Mason is another long-delayed step toward it.”

Mason’s pardon is Minnesota’s first posthumous pardon.