The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1893-09-20

Wet him. There is no Southern
community in which The courts are so
VIGOROUSLY corrupt that they cannot be
trusted. No negro in the South has per
senally any influence to bias court in
his favor, but on the other hand the race
to which he belongs is almost certain to
bias it against him. No one can pretend
that the negro is summarily hanged by
the mob in the South because of a fear
that the courts cannot be trusted to mete
out to him his deserts. Negro lynchings
cannot be extenuated on any such theory
as as that.
Neither can it be pretended with any
show of reason that these negro lynch
ings are the result of violent and I'M
controllable hatred of crime. 1t some
times happens that the feelings of COM
munity are SO wrought up by heinous
crime that they become incapable of
calm reasoning, and hang the culprit in
a moment of intense passion II it was
uncomfortable hatred of crime that
prompted these Southern lynch
ings no distinction would be
made between the black man
and the white m an. But it is very rarely
that any body but black man is sum-
marily hanged, though there are plenty
of white criminals. The white man as
rule is punished by due process of law.
The black man as rule is summary
hanged to the nearest tree. Furthermore
almost all these lynchings are delibe rate
acts They are frequently planned days
beforehand, and therefore are not the re-
suit of a sudden outburst of passion.
Still further no pains are taken to
determine whether the man suspected is
really guilty or not The other day a
coroner's jury ntone of the Southern
States investigated case of murder and
found SO little evidence against two ne
groes who had been arrested on suspicion
that they were discharged. A mob
Immediately seized them and hanged
them to tree. The Louisiana lynchers
took no pains to inquire if the brothers
of. the murderer whom they were in search
of knew his whereabouts or not. AS they
did not upon their demand reveal
his hiding place-whether because they
would not or could not mattered not
they strung all three up.
The conclusions which one inevitably
arrives at who studies these South
ern lynchings are that they are not in
spired by any fear that justice will mis-
carry if left to the courts; that they are
not the result of the hatred of crime
but that they are the result of hatred
of the negro and cheap estimate of
him. Any excuse for hanging him is
welcome. Probably the best people of
the South do not actually participate in
these executions, yet they are very
largely responsible for them They
looked on for years with approval while
the redshirted gangs were riding
about at midnight burning negro cabins
torturing their inmates, and finally
shooting them down at the polls if they
attempted to exercise the rights guaran-
teed them by the constitution. They in
culcated the idea that the negro had no
rights which the white man was bound
to respect and that to- shoot one of his
race was to confer benefit upon the COM
munity which entitled the assassin to
reward of merit. Possibly sometime the
negro will become courageous, possibly
continued injustice may drive him to
retaliation, possibly sometime the white
people of the South may find when it is
too late that they have sown to the wind
to reap the whirlwind.