The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1897-08-19
LYNCHING UNSUITABLE.
BILL ARP THINKS II IS UNDER CERTAIN
PROVOCATIONS.

At Any Rate He Does Not Find 1t In
His Heart to Condemn Men Who
Put to Death Semi-Savage Brutes
Who Rape Helpless and innocent
Women and Children.
had not intended to write any
thing more upon lynch law, but recent
utteranCes from the press and the
pulpit provoke me TO say that the
people Of Georgia do not deserve the
condemnation of friends or foes for
their consent to lynchings when the
crime is one that is nameless. Our
people are as humane and aw-abiding
to-day as they were thirty, forty or
fifty years ago, and the records OF the
courts prove it. In 1861 there were
2I6 white convicts in the penitentiary;
now there are but I96, and we have a
greater population. There is 50 per
cent. less of felonies in Georgia than
in New York or Massachusetts,, accord
ing to population. OF course, | mean
among the whites. Now set that
down.
An Ohio paper has recently investi
gated the record of that nameless
crime for the past ten years in that
State and gives the figures which show
324 cases, and the negro criminals out
number the whites six to one in pro-
portion to population. In Georgia
they out2umber the whites sixty to one
and it is because of our scattered and
unprotected population in the rural
districts. Before the war that crime
was unknown and almost unheard Of
in the South. never heard of a case
in North Georgia. In 1862 | had
occasion to visit Cedar Bluff in Ala
bama and my companion, Judge
Underwood, stopped the horse to
show me pile Of stones that was
heaped up around dead and blasted
tree. "These stones," said he, "mark
the place where a negro brute was
burned two years ago and also mark
the place where he committed the
crime and then murdered his victim"
That was the only case that came to
my knowledge. During the war, when
in hundreds of families the only pro-
tectors of women and children were
negroes, not deed of violence or
betrayal of trust was heard of from the
Potomac to the Rio Grande; and
General Henry R. Jackson eloquently
said Of them, "They deserve monu-
ment that would reach the stars"
How is it now? Nearly 5000
colored convicts in the chaingangs
and less than 200 whites. and the
nameless crime is committed by
negroes somewhere every day in the
year. What is the cause of this
alarming degeneracy of the negro? |
heard preacher say the other day
that lynching for this crime or any
other was the evidence of a depraved
and lawless public sentiment. He is
mistaken. 1t is rather the evidence
of minds charged, perhaps overcharged,
with love and respect for wives and
daughters, and no man who has neither
is fit juror to try the case. He is
incapable Of understanding or appre
clatlng the common peril that, like a
shadow, hangs over the farmers home,
be it ever so humble Parental love
is nearly all tha, these people have TO
give to their children and they give
that and cherish them and Will defend
them as tigress defends her whelps.
What is the majesty of the law worth
to man whose child has fallen victim
TO brute? What is it to his nelghbor
who all these years has been from time
to time experimenting similar vista
tion2 What does young man,
whether preacher or editor or lawyer,
know about it? Jean Inglelow God
bless her sweet memory!) makes the
old fisherman to say: 81 feel Tor
mariners of stormy nights and feel for
wives that watch ashore" Who knows
the perils of the deep like fishermen?
Some Of those learned judges and
lawyers and preachers of Atlanta have
given vent to language that is bitter
and malignant against lynchings for
any crime, but it is to be noted that
they have long lived in call of the
police by night and by day and within
brick walls and with neighbors at
hand on every side What can they
know of the peril of the farmer whose
vile visits a neighbor, or whose chill
dren have to 60 mile away to school,
Perhaps some inqu ring mind will
ask what do | know about i,2 Twenty
years ago moved from the city to
the country al d farmed there for ten
years, and all that time the apprrhen-
sion grew greater and stronger, for
there were negroes all around me on
the farms, and more negroes no, far
away working in the mines. | never
expressed my fears, not even to my
wife, bu, when our boys all left the
farm for other avocations, and | had
to be away most Of the time, my wife
became alarmed, and | Immediately
left the farm and moved TO town for
security. So did every neighbor that
| | had, and our school was broken up
| and the whole settlement abandoned
| and turned over 10 negro tenants.
| The school house was a mile away,
ard | used to look with parent al
eagerness for the first appearance ol
the chldren's hats as they rose into
view over the distant hill. Until then
| | never realized the common peril
that environs the country people.
have poor opinion Of opinions unless
they come from those who are compe-
tent to judge. "Great men are not
always wise," saith the scriptures. The
nearer the press is TO the people, the