The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1903-08-21
A FRIEND OF THE MOB.
Did Graves Mean What he Said In
Chautauqua Address:

the draft rioters in this city as my
friends he not only hurt himself ter
ribly, but ,-.2de the task Of restoring
order so much the more difficult. MI
Graves. of Georgia. in openly striking !
hands with lynchers n clarifying
the mob. as he did at Chautauqua yes
terday, certainly hurt himself, but we
think that, unwittingly, his words Will
help rather than hinder the creation
Of a better public sentiment 1t Is
something to LAY a horrible example;
and, to our mind, nothing about
l~ynching is more horrible than the
way in which it perverts the reason
ing powers and dulls the moral per-
ception of educated gentlemen like
Mr.. Graves. If the mania IS going to
seize upon such as he, if men Of APP
parently sound and trained mind are
to fall a-shrieking with the mob. the
peril of anarchy is more acutely inn
pending than We had thought. and the
duty Of society to front ii, ty argu-
ment and persuasion where possible,
by the cleaning sword of justice
where necessary, becomes more SOL
| EMMY imperative than ever.
| Mr.. Graves, it must be confessed
| vas not happy in the he chose
| for his apologize for lynching. If he
| had known that his address was TO
| fall but two days after the preSl-
| dents letter had set public sentiment
in quite another direction. he probably
would have desired to avoid so I'M
lucky an anti-climax. AS it is, his
views necessarily appear as if strug-
Cling to escape from under the presi-
Dental ex%tinguisher, and the wide
spread approval of Mr.. RooSeVeltS
] sentiments involves the Reputation or
Mr.. Graves. We look to see the IN
t~elligence of the south disown its as
Sumed spokesman. Certainly those
southern and public meE
that lave so handsomely endorsed thu
president, cannot in consistency have
anything but condemnation Tor the
doctrines of Mr.. Graves.
Amazing and atrocious as these
seem to be, they are of value as re-
vealing a state of mind. This is an
important part of our problem. Mr..
Graves, we have no doubt, feels as
many do in the southland apparently
in some parts of the north-who have
not the courage to utter their senti-
ments in public. There is such a
thing as the psychology Of lynchlns'
which is most important for those to
understand who would combat the
devil. This mental attitude. Mr..
Graves illustrates perfectly. We see
in him those evidences of obsess:on, OF
intellect submerged in feeling, of un-
reasoning dread, and Of reaching out
| after impossible remedies which are
displayed so clearly in the commune
ties where lynching is common. and
which seem to call for the aid of the
| alienist almost as much as for the in
t~ervention of the educator n the
| statesman.
Not how Mr.. Graves impatiently
sweeps away all experience in peno-
logy as we'll as the facts in the case.
For him, Romilly never lived; and the
classical experiments in reducing
crime by making it's punishment less
terrible but more certain V took
place. Nothing but lynching can stop
rape, he maintains; and then admits
in the same breath that not ever
lynching, in it's most fearful and bar
t barrie FORMS, does actually stop it. And
not a word has he to say about the
statistics referred to by the president
: showing that more thai three-fourths
of recent lynchings were not for rape
{ at all. To all these teachings of the
past, n these t~ell-tale facts OF the
l present, Mr.. Graves seems perfectly
, Indifferent. That merely shows no"
] deeply he is imbued with the almos'
e pathological condition of mind which
l alone makes it possible to excuse
4 lynching.
g But even this imprisoned champion
l Of the mob as 1.-The sternest, thu
i strongest and the most effective re
[ straint hat the age holds for the con
: troll of rape" has to confess his RENE
dy by l%ynching a failure. He woult
: have lynch law written in the statut
books. He urges that lynching b
: made statutory. This is wild enough
n To legalize anarchy in respect to on
d crime would only set it bowling TO
Il IL --l ~,-~~xr 10Y whom he mo
did not fancy. Mr.. Graves woul
d plunge us all back into savagerya AN
then have a legal tag fastened upo
us saying that we were foremost l
the files Of time. But this madness h
presently drops for a new one. Eve
his authorized mob of l%ynchers, +
~ contends cannot save the south, sine
l. it is only a ''temporizing ~expedient,
'r while 1.-The logical, the inevitable, tn
lie only solution of this great problem {
q; the races desperation!
% Thus does Mr.. Graves put h1mse
ie out of the court of reason. Separatro
d of the negroes from the whites, eithe
e. by segregating the former someWhe'
d in this country. or by shipping the
{ to Africa, is the craziest notion out
.r the asylum. The colored populate
4 do not want it, and cannot be force
~ to it: nor do the white people want !
-, Let Mr., Graves ask the southerne
- to give up all their black workmel
~ and see what would happen! The
10 might be tempted to apply his do
-. trine of the mob in a way highly IL
convenient to him. No, our help dot
not lie in a revival of colonization, M
in any other far-away or fantast
= remedy ALI that we have to do is
put in force the ordinary principles
< ordinary justice and humanity. Tre'
ne all mriminals according to crime, n
color. Make the ministers Of tn la
n swift and terrible. But let them mo'
as promptly against the lyncher
IT against his victim Give goVerno
and sherifs and police captains
mandate to lay down their lives rath
than let the mob usurp one funcu6
of the courts. And let US talk sem
Is look at all the facts, and be fair. y
Us never let us abate our
a. to rescue the land from the blood