The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-08-06
TIE 1HEoRY or LYNCH Law.

II is interesting TO note the comments
made by Northern men upon the hanging Of
six notorious criminals by vigilance COM
mittee, near Seymour, Indiana Heretofore
the press Of the whole country has been in
the habit of speaking Of lynch law as an
institution peculiar 20 border settlements or
disorgsnized communities where, in the
nature of things, the administration of ordi-
nary law is impossible. But this theory is
not adequate to explain the instance Of lynch
ing referred to in Indiana, which is rela-
lively, an old State, is in the heart of the
Union, thicbly populated, and possessing
apparently, all the conditions requisite to the
regular and efficient enforcement Of a GRIM
inal code for the protection Of life and pro-
perty. These facts are very puZzling 10
newspaper commentators, and especially
those in the Eastern States who oscillate
between unqualified reprobation of lynch law
and qualified approval of the application of
it in this particular case. Noting this dubita-
tive and self-eontradictory tendency, the New
York Evening Mail sppositely remarks:
1t is all very well for Us Eastern people to draw
law" When men find that this sanctty does not
protect their lives their property they prefer a
law which does protect them, even il il has no
ssnctity to recommend il. We had thought that
Indiana had passed thst state Of pioneer civiliza-
lion IN which the purifying processes of lynch Law
prepare the way for genuine written Law. We
were mistaken. One portion Of Indiana, at least,
is still apparently In the transition state. The re-
cent lynehings BY which six men have been hung
have no resemblance to those violent demonstra-
tions by which irritsted mobs IN the East now and
then anticipate a trial or the hourso execution.
Those who have hung the six men appear TO be
stsid, determined citizens, intent only on the public
security. Indiana is still q very "Western"
riate-more western, perhaps, than several States
nearer the setting sun. We may be surprised at
the condition Of society and the laws, which has
permitted gang Of notorious cut-thrOats to exist
IN the heart Of the State. This being the fact
however, We can hardly wonder at the sudden
resort 70 lynch law, and il is not for rs to preach
legal theories to those who participate as judges
and executiOners.
If, as is stated those who executed the six
men were " staid, determined citizens, in
tent only on the public security" and acting
under an overpowering sense of social ne
cessity, then the case reveals a possibility
which is confined to no one State or section.
and conveys warning for the people in every
part of the country. 1t is possible, for ex-
ample, that in one of the oldest communities,
statutory law may fail as utterly to protect
the peaceable and honest mass of citizens
against criminal aggressions as it did at a
memorable period in California 1t is hardly
too much to say that in California, at that
period, the lawless class had both the making
and the execution of the law. Legislators,
judges, sheriffs constables, policemen, were
scarcely other than criminal conspiracy
against good citizenship and legitimate in
dustry. The classes thus asssiled had, ap-
parently, no alternative bnt to abandon the
State to social and material ruin, or to i'm
provise such an organization as would enable
them to take, temporarily, the law as well as
the execution Of it in their own hands. Ex-
perience teaches that not in new and
border settlements alone may similar ex.
igency arise-that it is possible elsewhere
than in California that, by some calamitous |
of circumstances, both the max |
ing ana the execution OF law may UvvvuIe |
the monopoly of the lawless class