The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1904-09-02
HEARSTS BRAVE RINGING WORDS

fairness-the burning alive of two
negroes in Georgia. Many in the north,
filed with a sense Of their own virtue
and comfortably free from any negro
problem. denounce as beasts and wild
men their feIlow-citizens in the south
ern states. Others in the south apOl
ogize too sweepingly for those i'm
plicated in the burning, exculPating
them too readily.
The matter Il seriOus--seriOUs IN
the north a. in the south. For this
every intelligent man must know
what a man in the south viii do
man in the north will do under similar
provocations. We have not one breed
of Americans in the north and an
other in the south. The same human
nature controls Us all.
Victor Hugo said he never heard Of
"a crime but he realized that he might
have been capable of committing it at
come moment in his life. The self
righteous men OF the north should
look carefully into their own temper
auc-r- before condemning tAe south
smers iu 800 superior fashion
CAN anything be said 70 excuse the
bru.az alive Of those two negro
criminals AZ .tatesboro? ~. But,
while we may not excuse it, we must
investigate the reasons for it dispas-
sionately.
We must remember that the men in
the crowd surrounding the burning
negroes were average men-any crowd
anywhere in the United States would
duplicate them. We must realize that
there are still within Us horrible pos
sibilities of brutal cruelty. We know
that only disuse and long freedom
from violence through many genera
tons will wipe out this innate brutal
Is. We must see to it that the brutal
savage deep down within Us Is not
called 10 the surface. We must not
Judge too haughily those men in the
south that struggle to suppress the
causes behind the hideOus lynchings.
In the men Of the south, the men
of the north, the east and the west, Z
there are all the possibilities OF the
most hideous cruelty But We have
advanced at least 10 this point, that
only horrid crime, horrible provOca- |
ton. can arouse within us the latent !
brutality of the savage.
There will be no burning alive OF ne
groes the moment that the negro |
ceases 20 commit the crimes that |
madden and make wild beasts of the |
lower types among whom they live.
Certainly an appeal should be made |
20 the nobler sentiments of the south |
ern mob-and that appeal is made |
every day by the best and strongest |
in the south. The own brother Of |
the murdered man, Hodges, d clergy !
man, implored the crowd to refrain |
from violence and let the law take its |
course. He acted nobly And thou |
sands Of splendid men in the south, |
whose provocations and difficulties
we little understand, act nobly in
fighting the tendency to lynch law.
But TO understand conditions there,
il Is well to transport ourselves in i'm
agination to the scene of the crime,
both before and after its commission.
Look at the family group-the ne
groes murdered by the mob confess
ing that they had murdered and burn
ed all of the family-the father, the
virtuous mother hideously maltreated,
the little baby in arms and the other
two little children.
There was the little girl six years
old, who saw the father murdered,
and then pitifully held up penny to
one of the murdered negroes, begging
him to take the penny and not hurt
her. Her brains were knocked out
and she thrown into the fire. 1t is
well to know these things, to remem-
Der that an eloquent orator reminded
the lynching mob of that little girls
appeal when the negroes pleaded for
mercy.
The south is struggling manfully