The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-05-19
THREE NORTHERN VIEWS or
CRIME AND PUNISHmE NT.

lOilin6 80 OIlSn TO the really mOSC
prominent topic now-the treatment of
negroes who commit rape. IL they
could see all of the Messengers ex-
changes they would know how general
is the discussion. The northern pa
pers, with but few intelligent excep-
tions, write with great pretention of
| wisdom but reveal only unfairness,
| prejudice and finding stupidity. Even
great papers" ~so-called, are possibly
| as infatuated and dense in their blind
ness as the smaller and less influential
opponents of northern sentiment. Even
Harper's Weekly-never friendly to the
south-admits a communication in
which it is rightly insisted that "one
thing he should always bear in mind,
that there is no vital difference between
the whit man in the south and the
white man in the north, and that what
white men do in Georgia white men
from New York, or Massachusetts, or
Minnesota would probably do in Geor-
gia under similar circumstance" Yes
men are alike. If as cruel, as debased,
as brutal a villain as Sam Hose is now
known to have been, (and remember
| the public prints have not given the
most damning part Of his crime and
| brutality could be found in New YorR
| city, and he were to enter one of the
houses Of one of the nabobs, and repeat
| exactly all that the devil Hose perpe-
trated in the desolate and forever dark
ened home in Georgia, you would wit
ness barbaric punishment upon the
| voting as those visited by the crowd
in Georgia who exactly understood
what had happened (Which to this hour
the great public does not understand),
and when maddened almost tic all loss
of feeling. Hoses crime is by odds
the most purely diabolical of which We
have ever read. We have read in two
Or three years w new works on Africa
and many magazine articles and news
| paper articles, and have read of the
native African man eaters, their orgies
and vices, but have seen nothing SO aw-
ful, so Economical, so hellish as the
| crime of Hose. If you knew it all you
would 81 think too. A Georgian woman
wrote to Harper's Weekly telling of
Hoses crime so far as a woman might
write, but she could not tell it all. The
writer in the Weekly says that n
man who believed what this woman
believes and has written about Hose
| and Strickland and negroes of their
class in the south would be surprised
at anything that might follow such a
crime as Hose committed. 1t may be
that nothing can justify such an orgy
as was held over Hose, but there is
plenty that can explain it. The men
n women of the south believe that
certain unruly negroes can only be re-
strained from horrible crimes against
white women by swift and terrible pun
ishment. We of the north have little
experience of these crimes, but our
blood c%irculates, and we know what
sort of dispositions such crimes arouse
To read the story of Sam Hoses crime
as our Georgia correspondent has writ
ten it begets absolute Indifference to
that negro's sufferings or fate. 1t fills
the mind with horror, and makes one
feel that any means that is effectual to
prevent such crimes is justified. Mark
you, the most revolving, the most hor-
rible part is unreported, imprinted and
unread. You can only get the facts
from gentlemen who have visited
Georgia. Northern men have been
there, have seen, heard and reported
the facts in the enormous brutalities
of the vile negro Hose.
There are people in the north of
sense, of fairness, of candor who ap-
| preciate, in part at least, the real sit
| uation in the south. One Of these is
Rev. A. d. Carlisle, of Pennsylvania
and a Presbyterian. The Messenger
| printed what he said. The Albany IN.
| " Argus is manly and emphatic.
Noticing Mr.. Carlisle's view of lynch
ing it says this:
THE Rev. A. d. Carlisle, a Pennsyl-
vania Presbyterian, declares that lynch
ing under certain conditions is justif-
able, and that under certain circum-
stances he would cheerfully pull the
rope. Spoken like a man, who is not
afraid to speak %candidly. Under GER
tain circumstances-namely, the crime
against woman-what man with a
spark of manhood in his heart would
hesitate to avenge by summary means
the honor and safety of his house
hold?'
Put yourself in his place" is a very
| good motto under which to consider
and act. Whatever sentimentalists