The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-08-25


for days. The Maryland sheriff respected
his trust and was ready to defend 1t to the
last, and the mob knew he was made OF
true metal and were not disposed 70 she'll
the cat" in order that the mobocratic rats
might have their way. The example OF
such sheriff is contagious for good. The
ordinary resort to Judge Lynch Is utterly
without excuse. 1t is generally nothing
more than a brutal, bloody desire on the
part of ruffians usually foremost IN crime
themselves, and such lyDchings succeed
only because of the shameful indifference
of people who know better, and utter lack
of official honor and courage on the part Of
sheriffs. The theory Of the right Of the
'people" to execute the death sentence by
the popular vote of mob will not endure
examination for moment. The sovereign
will of the people is registered in Constitu-
tions, on which rest laws which create
courts to administer justice.
When the people retake unto them
selves their delegated authority, even
when it has been abused, the process to be
lawful must retrace the successive steps by
which the authority was delegated. No
fraction of the people, no ''mob" mas
querading as the people, can assume to
reverse the judgments of the courts in re-
gard TO property without being guilty of
the crime of robbery; or the judgments Of
the courts in regard to life and death with
out being guilty of the crime of murder. 1t
is characteristic of mob rule that it is not
discriminating and cannot be held within
limits, and an illustration of this was fur
nished last February, when a Colorado
mob lynched an innocent man named
Kelley. The fact that the verdicts of
juries in determining the degree of the
prisoners guilt are not satisfactory
is not an extenuation Of lynch law,
for society agrees when it surrenders
these powers of life and death to Judge and
jury to abide by the decision; it is bound
to take its chance of the honest fallibility
of both court and jury, and even when
courts and juries are captured or corrupted
by the criminal class, when the ballots
that make judges and sheriffs have been
manipulated to create a fraudulent major
ity for the slaves and tools of the criminal
class, even then, when the right of self
preservation in this desperate extrem-
ity must be vindicated by tran
sient resumption of the delegated powers
of life and death by the people, not by the
mob, such resumption should never be ex-
ecuted with pas sionate vindictiveness but
with solemnity and dehberation, in the
spirit of sorrowful social necessity rather
than that of brutal passion.
The orderly proceedings of the San
Francisco Vigilance Committee of 1856
lacked nothing of the dignity, decorum
and deliberation Of the regular courts of
law. The prisoners were carefully tried,
given counsel, ample opportunity to sum-
mon witnesses, and nothing was begun in
passion to end in barbarous, irrespon sible
murder by a mob. The people of San
Francisco, not its mob, declared that there
was no other resource for San Francisco
but to defend society against the riding or
stuffing Of the ballot box and the abuse of
the judicial machinery by both the judges
and sheriHs to whom society had en-
trusted it. The corrupt bench rested upon
a debauched and dismanted ballot box,
and the people knew it was farce to go
TO the ballot box to reform and recast
the bench and farce to appeal to the
bench TO protect the ballot box and pun
ish its burglars, so 5000 Of the best citizens
of San Francisco calmly, carefully and de-
liberately, without passion or excitement,
organized movement in this desperate
extremity to recover for society the great
self-protective powers of life and death
from the trustees who had undeniably.
with corrupt intent and act, abused their
administration. This Vigilance Commit
tee was the people; not mob, and be-
haved with proper reverence for the awful
responsibility forced upon them, but the
| reasoning which could justify the San
Francisco people of 1856 and the Montana
trials does not justify or palliate the pas
sionate, vindictive uprising of deprayed
mob, who secure of their prisoner, secure
of speedy justice, erect the gallows of
! Judge Lynch on the ruins of true, legit-
! innate and upright court.
| Instances are very rare where any resort
| to lynch law is excusable. much less nee
essary for the vindication of public safety
| and justice. On mere suspicion no court
| should be overturned. If the courts, or
sheriff. or juries have clearly been cor
rupt. there is the ballot box from which to
reorganize the judicial machinery; there
are legal means of furnishing delinquent
| juries, and sheriffs and courts; if the bal
| lot box is in the hands of the criminals
and the corrupt court, then retake the
delegated powers with all due respect for
the forms of law and courts; with
respect for the deep responsibility as
sumed of life and death; let it be fair
trial by an intelligent, popular tribunal;
not horrid, cowardly murder by an ignor-
ant, cowardly, passionate, brutal crazy
mob. There is as much difference be-
tween the popular tribunal of San Fran
cisco in 1856, its methods and the circun-
stances which justified its organization
and an ordinary case of lynch law, as there
is between the battle Of Lexington and a
reckless, causeless street riot.