The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-08-12
How to Crush the Crime
Causing Lynchings.
ADDRESS BY A GEORGIAN
Jchn Temple Graves Declares at the Mob Con-
ference TT at There Mus! be Sepafa-
lion Of The White and Black
Races.
(By the Associated Press.)

Chautauqua, N Y, Aug. 11.-Unique
among all summer gatherings IS the MOB
conference now in progress here. The
increase of mob spirit shown by feuds,
lynchings, riots, assassinations and other
lawless happenings gives great Importance
to this conference. Among today 5
speakers was John Temple Graves, Of
Atlanta, Ga.
Mr.. Graves spoke on 'the mob spirit
of the South He defended lynch law
as a remedy for the crime of rape, hold
ing that though lynching Is crime 1T IS
justified by the crime which provokes 1t
and will never be discontinued until that
crime is eliminated. The remedy Tor
lynching must be the elimination of the
crime of rape and this, he maintains,
could be done only by the separation cf
the two races in the United States.
THE problem OF the hour Is not how
to prevent lynching in the South, but
the larger question: How snail we de-
stroy the crime which always has and
always will provoke lynching?' The an
swer which the mob returns to this vital
question is already known. TIE mob an
swers it with the rope, the bullet and
some times, God save Us, with the torch.
And the mob is practical, its theory is
effective to a large degree; the mob is
today the sternest, the strongest and
the most effective restraint that the age
hclds for he control of rape.
The lyncher does no. exterminate the
rapist, Mr.. Grave contenied, bat ne holds
him Nightly III check. As sheer, cold,
patent fact, he said, the mob stands to
day as the most potential buiwark be-
tween the women of the South and such
a carnival of crime as would infuriate
the world and precipitate the annihilation
of the negro race. The masses of the
negro, he held, are not afraid q death
coming in a regular way. They love
display and the spectacular element OF
trial and execution appeal to their
imaginations.
Expediting the processes of the law
would not be adequate to eliminate lynch
ing The repeal of the amendments and
the establishment of the negroes infe-
riority in law and society, said Mr.. Graves,
though desirable, are not sufhcicnt, for
the negro he added sis thing of the
senses and with this race and with all
similar races the desire of the senses
must be restrained by the terror of the
senses. if possible, under the law
No influence of suppression sd mighty
and effective could be brought to bear
as a law-making amputetion the penalty
for the crime OF rape. But this, like cur
few edic,s, separate laws, for white and
black or the treatment of the crime of
rape as separate and of all other codes
are but expedients he maintained; there
Is no real remedy but one. statute
will permanently solve this problem. Re
hgion does not solve it. Education COM
plicates it. Politics complicates it. 1.-The
truth which lies beyond and above all
those temporizing expedients," he con-
eluded, lis that separation is the logical,
the inevitable, the only solution of this
great problem of the races"
Discussing the subject of mental and
moral contagion'' DR.. ]. NJ. Buckley, of
New York, after speaking at some length
of the various transient and permanent
changes that take place under different
physical and mental influences in human
took UP the question OF crime