The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-10-11
The New Negro Crime.
(Harper's Weekly.)

Since we suggested that the preparation
| of assaults by colored men upon white
women might fairly be described as "the
! new negro crime" and that the cause OF
| the phenomenon seemed to require inves-
/ tigation, the question has received a good
| deal of discussion in all sections of the
country. That the premise is sound there
seems to be an agreement of opin on. The
only person disposed to dispute it's
soundness has asserted that he has found
| two examples of the crime under the
slavery regime during the two or more
centuries that preceded the civil war.
Even if conclusive proofs of the anthem
ITCHY of the two instances alleged had
been produced, which is not the case, it
is plain enough that they would not have
sufficed to impugn our aVerment that the
crime was practically unknown in slavery
times, either at the South or at the
North. We now purpose to make another
averment, as to which, also, we challenge
contradiction. Not only was the particu-
lar crime, of which we are speaking, prac-
tically unknown in the South under the
slavery regime, but it continued to be
unknown there until about twenty years
until a generation had grown up which
lacked the respect for white women which
had been ingrained in the blacks of the
preceding generation. We desire to sub
NIT a third assertion, namely, that the
crime which we call new did not exist in
the Northern States either, until very re-
Gently, although for many generations the
negro there had borne something like the
same numerical proportion to the whites
that he bears now. We would make still
further additions to our original premise.
What we have termed the new negro
crime seems to be confined to the United
States At all events, we seldom, if ever,
hear of it in the British West Indies
except, of course, during the frightful up
rising of the blacks against the whites in
Haiti-or in the Spanish or Portuguese
speaking countries of Control or South
America If it be true, as we allege, that
the crime is practically unknown in the
other American countries just named, the
query will at once suggest itself, Does the
crime there fail to exist because in those
countries internarriage between whites
and blacks, or, in word, amalgamation,
is allowed by law?
of all of them be conceded; if it be ac
knowledged that the crime which we are
discussing is, not only modern, but also
local. in the sense of being confined to
the United States, it obviously follows
that it must be the outcome of conditions
peculiar to our own country, and to con-
ditions. moreover, affecting the present,
hut no previous generation of negroes in
the Tinted States. What are those pc
culiar conditions? We have been able to
discover only single cause for the
phenomena. The cause may be thus
stated. The whole system of reconstruc-
ton devised by Thaddeus Stevens (who
carried out his principles in private life)
| and nv other leaders of the Radicals, who
dominated Congress under the Johnson
administration-the system embodied in
the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amend
ments of the Federal Constitution, and in
the Congressional and State legislation
growing out of them-was based on the
fundamental idea of absolute equality, So
ciaI as we'll as political, between the white
and the black races. Following the lines
| Of tbe Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amend
ments of the Federal Constitution, and, in
some cases perhaps, preceding the definite
adoption of the last-named amendment
number of socalled civil rights acts
were passed by Congress. The recon
struction or "carpet-bag" Supreme Court
Of Alahama decided that one of these
| civil rights laws. the validity of which
was disputed, dominated arr N~"4ated a
state law forbidding the intermarriage of
| wb;tes and blacks. The reconstruction
Judges assumed, and they were undoubt-
cal, oorrect IN the assumption, that the
! tbeorv ON which their Radical masters at
washington bad proceeded was favorable
70 amaIga nation. Upon no other theory