The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-05-29
A Curious Metamorphosis.
saN Telegraph


 Connellsville, Pa. The night before
 William Fairfax, a negro, murdered Assistant Yardmaster William Moore,
 a white man, and this event was fol-
 lowed by a continual battle until Z:SO
 Sunday morning between the enraged
 citizens and the authorities for the
 possession of the murderer. It appears that the authorities cor:rlved 70 snatcn the negro up and spirit him away even after the walls of his cell had been
 battered down over his head.
 During the heat of tae lombard
 ment with the battering ram," reads
 the account in The Philad elphia Rec-
 ord, "t.ie officers, finding tha. the ram
 was going to tear dowi the door, trisd to rem ,, the prisoner to another eel,
 but the bars were then so twisted that the lock could not be opened, and the
 policemen were compelled to let the prisoner remain under fire until the door of the cell had been knocked
 down. Thousands of people have today Sunday viewed the scene
 about the battered building, the town
 hall, the lock-up and the destroyed cell in which the negro was kept.
 It seems almost a miracle that the mob should have torn down the build ings about the prisoner, almost suffo- eating the officers penned up with him and yet failed to get the man.
 All day the heavy rope, dextrously looped with a slip-knot Gangled from the sill of an upper story in the public building, directly over the Iock-up door. as a warning to the colored element. It seems that in answer 10 an Gd- vertisement for 800 workmen. the good citizens of Connellsvllle are expecting
 "a great throng of colored men from Roanoke. Va, and are as much con- cerned as if they had received notice of the coming of a plague. The Iiec- ord's correspondent tells us that 'trou- ble of the worst sort is expected" and that the apprehensive citizens "are do- ing everything in their power to let the incomers know that pea ;e must be ob- served, even at the cost of extreme measures for the protection Of the
 whites" We are also informed that
 the question of managing such large
 importation of colored men" Is one
 which causes much uneasiness." 1n-
 deed, "it is the common opinion of the
 citizens that every white male in the
 town will constitute himself a deputy
 for the next six months"
 The curious part of all this is the amazing metambrphosis the 800 negroes have undergone since they began their march from Roanoke Va. to Connells- vile Pa. Had they not left Roanoke, in the estimation of the good citizens of Connellsville, they would have re- mained the same saintly, down-trodden and defrauded "colored voters" that they have been for thirty years. But
 now, after trying very hard to lynch one of the advance guard (who, 1t must
 be admitted. offended most grievously) the good citizens, of Connellsville talk about the remainder of the army of 800
 as if they were beasts of prey. It is worthy of note that on the same
 day when the story of the Connellsville
 rioting was published The Philadelphia
 Press worked itself up into a great state of righteous indignation over the Alabama Constitutional Convention which assembled in Montgomery on
 Monday, and called attention to the shameless public statement of Senator | Morgan that "the Convention meets to relieve the State of an incubus of ignor- | ance and vice; to eliminate an element | composed of men who have neither
 character. intelligence, capacity, sense | of responsibility, patriotism, n0r loy- | atty to any obligation. The action of
 the Convention must accord with the
 requirements of the fourteenth and J fifteenth amendments to. the Federal | Constitution, or, at least, avoid com ing in conflict with them; but this in | cubus, this corpse, must be shaken from our back. and I believe it will
 be done with wisdom and justice to tine State. 1 believe that majority or
 the people of the United States will
 sympathize with and approve of what l the State has done when 1t is accomp- | lished."
 The people of a Pennsylvania town
 may tear down public buildings in or- der to seize negro criminal, they may
 keep 8 rope looped with slip-knot | dangling from the "lock-up" all day | Sunday "as a warning to the colored
 clement" and "every white male" may constitute himself deputy for the
 next six months;" but the people of Alabama have no right to provide franchise restrictions in order to pro- tect themselves from negro illiterates.
 Such is the logic of words and deeds in Pennsylvania.