The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1899-05-01
NOT SETTLED.
John ]. Ingalls, Says Lincoln's
Proclamation Failed.
The Negro Wears Heavier
Chains Than Before.
WORSE THAN A CRIME.
Political EnfranchiSement a
Curse.
Race Problem a Menace to Civil
WORSE THAN A CRIME.
Race Problem a Menace to Civil
iZatiOn.

a signed contribution to the Journal
says:
1t is evident that the abolition of
slavery has not settled the negro ques-
ton
Lincoln's emancipation proclamation
did not free the slave He wears heav-
ier chains in liberty than those he wore
in servitude- Enfranchisement was one
OF those political blunders that is worse
than a crime. 1t has been a curse IN
stead of a blessing, and, after thirty
years of bloody tumult, the race prob
lem remains the most portentous me-
mace of our civilization
The horrible tragedy at Newman
shocks the conscience of mankind but
up to a certain point the action of the
mob is Ineligible. There are some
crimes for which statutory penalties.
the verdicts of juries, the sentences of
judges, are inadequate
The violation of women is one OF
them.
1t is worse than murder, because the
victim is condemned to living death
It destroys the family and the home,
which are the foundation of the state
The law fines and imprisons the adul-
terer, the seducer, the ravisher, but
public opinion condemns him to death
IfGhe husband, the father, the brother,
slays the invader of the home, though
it is theoretically murder. the jury
acquits and the people say amen"
Whoever shot Saxton in Canton. the
deserts.
This is the unwritten law of the
AnglO-Saxon race, to which we belong
La ROchefOucauld, the French mOralist,
says. with equal truth and eynicisn,
that it is easy to endure the misfortunes
of our friends with fOrtftude-
We condemn the faults and sins of
others with the same equanimity and
cOmpOsure-
1t is not difficult to denounce the
butchery of Sam Hose as a htdeous
inns a in hITT init n frCr
and sickening atrocity, a disgrace to
American civfIiza ton.
THE HOSE LYNCHING.
No condemnation can be too severe
But no judgment of the people of
Georgia is just that neglects to confess
that there are many northern cornmuni-
ties where similar crimes have been and
would be similarly avenged, less the
barbarfc details, or that omits to take
into consideration the environment, or
which forgets that Massa chusetts and
New York are equally responsible with
Georgia and South Carolina for the
presence of the African race and the
existence of human slavery on this
continent
Lynch law, from the humanitarian
point of view, which admits neither of
defense nor apology. but civilization is
largely to blame for it's DEGREES Justice
is tardy. In 1896 there were 10 653 homi-
cides in the United States, and 122 legal
executions.
Communities become fatfgued with
crime triumphant through the laws de-
lay, the obstacles interposed by knavish
attorneys. the escape of notorious feIons
by trivial technicalitieS- Then society
becomes elemental and mObS and Wig
ilance committees enact the rude equity
OF the moose. the bullet, the fagot and
the stake
Thus. California, Montana and other
regions have taken the law into their
own hands and executed ruffians male
factors, gamblers and murderers who
threaten social disorder
of
which is natures first law. Mobs sell
dom make mistakes. They generally
burn or hang the right man. That Sam
Hose, having split the head of his en-
plOyer with an axe, ravished the wife
by the side of her dying husband
should be killed by the neighbors in a
sudden frenzy for revenge, is easily un-
derstood- What is inexplicable is the
brutal, fendish turbulence and ferocity
of the incident; the mutiIatiOn of the
wretched victim and the partition of the
carcass into treasured souvenirs. North
ern and southern notions about curios.
bric-a-brac and bijouterie materially
differ. But. after all, there is room for
the suspicion that with the best of US
civilization is superhcial-Iike beauty,
only skin deep.
CIVILIZATION SKIN DEEP.
Napoleon said that if the epfdermis
of a Russian were scratched, under
meath was a Tartar So, somewhere be-
meath the cuticIe of the scholar and the
gentleman, will be found the impulses
ana passions OF the savage and the
brute-the tigers claws and the beak
of the vulture-
The killing of Hose seems like retri-
button For centuries the misera BILE
victims of slavery were subjected to the
passions of their masters. The hour of
vengeance has come. 1t is an iIIustra-
ton of the inexOrable law of nature and
of morals that whatsoever a man
soweth that also shall he reap
DeDlOrabIe as are the murders and
Iynchings of the blacks in the south
they bring US face to face with the fact
that there is no future for the negro in
this country except political subjection
and social ostracism-
Booker T. Washington, one of the
ablest of his blood, writes that the cure
cation This is a patent medicine. not
the prescription of a physician Fred
Douglass. who was great because he
had white father rather than because
he had a black mother, believed that
the races would ultimately blend and
coaIesce. and that thus the conflict
would disappear.
This impossible remedy would be
worse than the disease. for the strong
race imparts to the weaker race only it's
defects and its vices. So far as edJica-
ton goes, Mr. Washington knows better
than anyone else that no coIored man
in the south can be educated enough or
made rich enough or respectable enough
cept on the kitchen porch or in the
barnyard-
Our black Samson is in the hands of
the Philistines, but some day the cords
upon his arms will be as flax that is
burned with fire and with the jawbone