The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1885-07-18
Lxnching Of Howard COOPER.

Howard Cooper, the eolored brutal assailant
Of Miss Kate Gray, of Baltimore county, was
lynched at Towson on Sunday night last.
The citizens Of that county allowed the law
to take its course. His trial was removed to
Baltimore city, and he was duly adjudged
guilty. The attorneys for the defense took
the case to the Court Of Appeals, and that
tribunal sustained the court below. Cooper
was then sentenced, and the day of his execu-
ton was fixed for July Slst He would have
been permitted to remain there and been
iudicially hung, but for the efforts of the
colored people, at the instance Of his lawyers,
to collect funds TO appeal to the United States
Supreme Court, because colored men were
not put upon the jury. That court could not,
at the most in his behalf, have done more than
toorder new trial, and the victim Of Cooper's
brutal assault would have again been sub
iscted to the humiliation of detailing anew
the circumstances of the outrage, which was
one of the most revolving of such crimes.
Miss Grays friends and others would submit
no longer to legal quibbling. Their patience
had been exhausted, and they resolved to
take matters in their own hands.
On Tuesday night the colored people Of
Hagerstown held an indignation meeting and
resolved that the time has not only come,
but fully come, when the colored people of
this State should assemble for the purpose of
taking into consideration whatever means
are necessary for their protection and promo
ton. They also declared ''that the great
number Of coIored men accused as criminals
who have been lawlessly slain in this State
within the last few years is a stigma upon the
fair name of Maryland.
The colored people Of this State have all
the rights and privileges under the laws as
are accorded to the white race; but they are
so prejudiced against the white people that
every act of justice through the courts toward
colored people who break the law is regarded
as an oppression. When one is arrested he
is regarded as a martyr, and when he returns
home after serving term in the peniten-
tiary, lie is lonized by his friends as though
he had had some great honor conferred upon
him. There is no disgrace attached to con-
viction for crime; the rather, it is regarded
as a persecution by the white race, and the
convicted is considerably elevated in the csti-
nation Of his fellows.
What the colored people should do is to
divest themselves of this prejudice. They
should learn that the rights and privileges of
all, regardless of color, are the same under
the law, both State and National. They
should protect and elevate themselves by
ostracising the vicious, the brutal and the
wicked, and demand the punishment Of all
who violate the laws. Let them refuse to
recognize, as respectable, the thief who serves
term in penitentiary, the worthless lounger,
the debauched and the vicious.
The crime for which Cooper was convicted
is the most revolving, and is punishable by
death. Murder is punishable by death also;
but it is rare that the people visit vengeance
upon murderer In ninety-nine cases out
of a hundred the law is allowed to take its
course 1t is often permitted to do so in
crimes for which Cooper suffered death; but
thosesof that character have been so numer-
Gus in this State the past three or four months
that summary punishment was deemed neces-
sary. When Townsend Cook assaulted Mrs
Knott, in this county, his was the seventh or
eighth that had been committed in this State
within two months. hepeople were prompted
to violence in his case because of the fire.
quency Of the crime and the delay in the
Cooper trial. Since Cook was swung up no
further assaults by colored men on white
women have occurred in Maryland. The
fate of Cooper will have still further infid
ence to protect the women Of this State.
Lawyers, too, had better note the fact that
legal quibbling and delays in such cases may
result in injury to themselves Much con-
demnation has been heaped upon Cooper
attorneys, and had they been at hand on the
night of the lynching, they, also, might have
suffered some violence.