The critic. (Washington, D.C.) 1890-1891, 1891-03-16
THE NEW ORLEANS EXECUTIONS.


THE NEW ORLEANS EXECUTIONS.
Those who condemn the action of the
citizens of New orleans last Saturday in
putting to death the assassins of Chief of
Police HENNEssEy together with the ai1erg
and abcttors Of that foul and dastardly
crime. appear to forget that Judge Lynch,
though not named in the statute books,
is, nevertheless, recognized member of
The American judicial system. He is not
hampercd by technicalities, and lie brooks
no delay. His decisions are quickly ar
rived at and speedily carried out.
When san Francisco, away back in the
iifties, was overrun by thieves, gamblers,
thugs and murderers and the courts and
officers of the law belonged to the same
class or sympathized with it the honest
citizens organized, took the law in their
own hands and put to death some of the
worst of the criminals who fell into their
hands and drove the rest into exile. At
the head of this movement was WILLIAM
TELL COLEMAN, then and now a leading
citizen OF the Pacific Coast. SO high
sioes he stand in the community where
he lives and with the business world gener-
ally THAT he has been urged by
aleading New York newspaper as n proper
and available man for the Democratic
Tarty to nominate for the Presidency.
The action taken by him and those who
acted with him in purging San Francisco
of the evil elements of its carly popula-
tion saved the city that sits by the Golden
Gate to civilization.
Again, in the Territory of Montana the
evil elements obtained possession of the
machinery of the law and used ii to further
their robberics and assassinations. The
honest citizens of that primitive COM
munity rose under the lead of one of the
first lawyers of the Territory and hanged
and exiled the murderers and thieves, and
by this drastic course enabled honest men
to live in that region free from the hourly
fear Of robbery or assassination. The
leader Of the Montanans of that day,
WnnEE +. SANDERS, is now Republican
United States Senator from the State of
Montana.
Nor should II be forgotten that no less a
ierson than HORACE GREELEY, in the edi-
tnrial columns of the great daily he
founded at the time New York was being
robbed right and left by the TWEED gang
and the courts had become the corrupt
and subservicnt tools Of the ring, recalled
the excellent work done by the vigilance
committee Of san Francisco and suggested
that perhaps Judge Lynch was the only
tribunal before which the robbers could
he arraiened with prospect of justice be.
ing meted ont to them.
II was not mob which assembled at
the Clay statue on Canal street last Satur-
day and moved on the parish prison. II
was the people of New Orleans, risen in
their sovereign capacity to avenge the out
ragged laws of God and man. The ordinary
processes of the law had failed and the
people, from whom the State derives ii:
power, resumed for the time being Their
sovereignty. That the people are justi-
lied in so doing when the State fails them
is as certain and clear as the right of re
sistance to bad government by force Of
--.-s,a- at ans' .i.ssn- '----
The citizens of New Orleans did not use
violence against Italians generally, as die
the New York mob of 1868 against the
negroes. They did not destroy public
buildings, as did the Cincinnati mob oil
1884. They did not burn private build
ings, as did the anti. Catholic mobs oi
Boston half century ego. The cause oi
their uprising was the miscarriage of pub.
iic justice and not the outcome of pri-
vate quarrel, as was the case in the Aston
Place riot of New York, which grew out
of the rivalry of an American and III
English actor FoRREsr and MAcREADy.
The adverse comments Of able editor.
who know no more of the circumstance.
leading to the uprising of the people oi
New Orleans than they do of the Mound
Builders, are idle and mischicvous. They
declare that the Flaw" has been outraged
hut when the law is disloyal to itself II
cannot be expected that the people, who
In this country are the source of all law,
shall blindly submit TO the corrupt de-
crees of corrupt and incompetent agents
Of the law. And that the jury that ac-
quilted HENNEssEy's assassins was corrupt
and corrupted is well established.
II was the people of New Orleans who
acted. The people are sovereign in this
country. 1t is legal maxim that the
sovereign can do no wrong.