The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1902-01-21

Every year the Chicago Tribune pub
fishes a list OF crimes, including lynch
fngs, committed during the year. The
trouble with its figures is that they are
imperfect and misleading. 1t tells OF
121 lynchings, but says that but nine
teen are on account OF rape. hat Is no
doubt a false statement. When north
ern papers seek TO defame the south by
saying that the plea OF the whites is
false that they lynch because their
homes are not safe. they are doing a
selves-they are lying and deceiving.
The New York Press. a rabid repubr-
a sheet, says:
"Of 121 lynchings only nineteen were
for the offense Of criminal assault Yet
~the defense of our homes" will. We
presume, continue to be offered as the
southern whites excuse for every out
rage upon the southern black, from
burning at the stake to d~isfranchise-
ment by educational test. And the
northern doughface will continue to a.
cept the excuse, murmuring, as the py-
res blaze and the victims yell, that our
"stormy-browed sisters" are working
out their problem in their own way"
1t is well known that there are com
munities in the south in which it has
proved very unsafe to "a white wo-
men and children alone and unprotect-
ed. Look at that cruel, awful outrage
lately reported at L~ynchburg, Va. A
lady of character, a native North Caro-
linian, is murderously assaulted; first
raped, then dragged and beaten and fin
ally with throat cut. If this crime can
be perpetrated in a flourishing town Of
10000 people, how great the danger in
the outlying district, in the sparsely
populated country?
The southern whites seriously and
sadly deplore tn, great crimes and the
~punishments that follow. But human
nature is far from perfect in any sec
ton, and particularly in New Yor city.
When a ~virtuous, true woman is saw
agely assaulted by a brute of any ace
or complexion, the indignation is in
tense, the passions sweep over an out
ragged community and the villain when
caught is made to pay a swift. certain
penalty.
The courts are shamefully defective.
The laws, the technicalities all lean to-
wards the devil %incarnate in heart.
The juries are extremely uncertain and
imperfect. The law compelling twelve
men to agree is an a~bsurdity and opens
the way for bribery and a miscarriage
of justice. The criminal avs need
overhauling. Then there is the inter-
vening one-man power. So long as
murderers Inc villains go "unwhipped
Of justice" and courts are made some
thing of a burleque the work OF Judge
Lynch will certainly continue, and the
trial in the woods" will to some extent
supplant the regular judicial investiga-
tons. The very fact that the governor
is constantly p~ardoning criminals shows
the imprefection and uncertainty of
jury trials. The Atlanta Constitution
made an excellent reply to the SANDER
u New York paper, The following
from its editorial will be read with sat
isfaction:
Our governors have denounced mob
executions in their messages and en-
ployed the militia without stint to pre-
vent such violations of law whenever
possible. Our legislatures have applied
what preventiveS were in their power
n sheriffs in notable instances have
repuised mobs with tragic results to
the would-be lynchers. To say that the
representative people of the south ap-
prove the application of lynch law to
persons charged with crime is to ipdict
this people in a spirit OF reckless men,
daeity n senseless hatred.
1.-The south is not a section Of ideal
conditions, We confess. We have not
yet reached hat stolid paralysis of
that can classify rape in the
same category with an ordinary assault
and battery. We have not come TO that
commercial idea of the value of virtue
that manifests itself in an eager suit
for pecuniary damages. We have not
brought ourselves quite to the notion
that the i~nviolability of property is a
more precious principle than the iuvio-
liability of the persons of our women"