Eureka daily sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1871-1887, 1884-01-05
An INVESTIGATION NEEDED.

Saturday night a man named William
Richardson was lynched, near Ferndale,
Humboldt county, and the circumstances
are such as to leave great doubt OF his
guilt of any crime. He was accused oil
an Infamous outrage on his own daughter,
but he had been tried, and ten OF the
jury voted for acquittal. This is con-
elusive evidence that the proof of his
guilt was not clear, for, in a case OF this
nature, jurors are never weakly inclined
to leniency; a natural feeling of indigna-
ton impels them to convict II the evil
dence will warrant it. 1t is stated there
will be no difficulty in identifying the
perpetrators, and if so, they should be
%sternly dealt with. There may be some
who feel no STRINGS of indignation at
such outrages as this-who are inditfer-
ent enough to be willing to assume
Richardson's guilt, in spite OF facts point.
ing to his innocence, or who think 1T
really does not matter much whether he
was guilty or not, since the work cannot
be undone. But such persons are not to
be enyied their total lack of the senti-
ment of justice and humanity. A mob
murder like this is ten times more abhor-
rent to persons of right feeling than the
crime of the solitary assassin who kills to
rob, because in the former case there is,
not only the great wrong to the man,
whose life is taken, but also an Infamous
travesty on Justice, in whose name the
deed falsely assumes to be committed
San Francisco Alta.
Very we'll said. The facts of the case
make it extremely probable that Richard
son was not guilty.
The thought of an innocent man thus
perishing by violence is horrible and dis
tressing. To men generally life is
precious. It's sacrifice may be required
for the preservation of law and order.
but the world is divided even on the
policy of taking life under the law for
the safety Of society. There are millions
of people to whom human existence APP
pears as such o boon that to them any
punishment beyond solitary imprison-
ment for life is repugnant and horrible.
When the solemn notion of death comes
home to us land who is there without his
skeleton and self-admissions of dis
honor? p all the world besides is ~insigniii.
cant as compared with the blessing of
ones own life. That some persons MUIR
der themselves goes only to intensity the
truth that to most men life is of a value
altogether inestimable. While, then, Of
tenders must be punished in order to
check crime, how v~igilant, also, for the
same, but not so clearly apparent, reason.
should society be, through it's laws and
by force of it's moral sentiment, to pro-
tect its members against the outrage of
the mob!
We have, during the year lately gone,
suffered the shame, in the United States,
of a great many lynchings, too many to
be named without a painful sense of ma
tional disgrace.
What does this series of horrors sug-
gest?
1t suggests that this country is less
governed by a code of criminal law than
any other civilized nation in the world.
Men seize their ~neighbors and hang them
to q handy tree or crossbeam on the pre-
sumption that the un~fortunates are
guilty--thus reversing the universal and
wholesome axiom of law, that a man
is presumed to be innocent until the con-
trary is proved. A crowd of towards
thus make murderers of themselves
with absolute IMMUNITY in order to avenge
themselves upon one helpless neighbor
whom they PREJUDICE in bias and con-
denim to a horrid and disgusting death.
These men who go in a mob to out
rage humanity and law snap their fin
gers at judge and jury. Richardson's
murderers have no fear of punishment.
Not n of them will ever suffer ade-
quately for the vile act.
Who is to blame for this more than
barbarous condition of affairs? The
whole people. Any community in which
a lynching occurs is responsible for it
positively and directly. The community
is in completely with the criminals. The
community furnishes the judge and the
jury. The community after thus going
through a form recognizes it as empty
and takes the law in it's W hands.
There is little confidence in this coun.
try in the administration of justice and
that confidence is always growing less.
No thoughtful person who watches cur
rent courthouse events can fail to dis
Germ the source of the evil. This evil is
not local; it is national. 1t degrades
and demoralizes the American people
and brings us into contempt abroad.
Those persons who lave undertaken to
investigate and punish the frauds COM
mitted by INSCRIPTIONS pension agents
upon their clients should not let the SUBJ