Page "Jack Johnson (boxer)" Paragraph 58

On October 18, 1912, Johnson was arrested on the grounds that his relationship with Lucille Cameron violated the Mann Act against " transporting women across state lines for immoral purposes " due to her being an alleged prostitute and due to Johnson being black.

Cameron, soon to become his second wife, refused to cooperate and the case fell apart.

Less than a month later, Johnson was arrested again on similar charges.

This time, the woman, another alleged prostitute named Belle Schreiber, with whom he had been involved in 1909 and 1910, testified against him.

In the courtroom of Kenesaw Mountain Landis, the future Commissioner of Baseball who perpetuated the baseball color line until his death, Johnson was convicted by an all-white jury in June 1913, despite the fact that the incidents used to convict him took place prior to passage of the Mann Act.

He was sentenced to a year and a day in prison.