St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1940-02-16
COnnally VS.. White

COnnally VS.. White
Reading a prepared statement in
which he included devastating re-
port on a lynching survey con-
Quoted by the white Southern
Methodist university, of Dallas,
Texas, and a record of lynchings
in the United States for 1887
through 1889, Walter White, ex-
ecutive secretary of the N. A. A.
C. P, locked .horns with Senator
Connally almost as soon as White
took the stand.
In an attempt to discredit these
lynching records, Connally de-
manded to go over them before
having the committee pass upon
their inclusion in the record.
The Texas senator defended the
lynching records put out by Tus-
kegee Institute, in Alabama, as
mere reliable than those of the
N. A. A. c. P. White replied that
the Associations investigators,
branches, and contacts with news
papermen all over the country en-
abled the organization to get at the
facts of unreported lynchings as
well as publicized lynchings in a
manner which Tuskegee Institute
was unable to do. ..-.-.-. ..
The N. A. A. C. P. secretary ac-
cused opponents of the bill of be-
ing motivated by political consid-
erations. Bridling at this state
ment, Connally asked the secretary
whether the nay vote of Senator
Hale, of Maine in 1888, could be
said to have been dishonest in mo-
tive. Whites reply to. this was
that the Senate did not vote on
the bill in 1888, because filibuster
prevented a vote, despite the fact
that majority of the senators
wanted to vote on the bill.
"Both of the major parties in the
United States were eager for the
Negro vote" he said, "the Repub-
licans trying frantically to win
back this vote, and the Democrats
exerting every effort to hold this
vote"
Challenged by Connally on the
question of the N. A. A. G.. P.'s in
terest in gang killings, the Asso-
cations secretary replied that the
organization was not attempting to
have bill passed which would COW
er the whole gamut of crime in the
United States. Questioned specifi
cally about gang killings in New
York City, Mr.. White contrasted
the activity of police agencies in
tracking down gangster killers
with the apathy with which police
agencies have treated the culprits
responsible for lynchings.
During 1889 in New York City,"
he said, "the police department re-
ported pol homicides but pointed
out there were 24S arrests, At con-
victions, and 1872 persons still un-
der indictment awaiting trial" He
set this picture over against the
500 to 1000 persons who took part
in eleven lynchings between 1887
and the end of 1889, with only one
arrest and not single conviction
of the perpetrators of these crimes.
Hitler and Lynching
Arthur B. Spingarn, recently
elected president OF the National
Association for the Advancement
of Colored People, in a prepared
statement, quoted directly from
Adolph Hitler's newspaper, the
"Volkischer Beobachter," of Janu-
airy %, 1889, which chides the
United States Wanted display of
democracy with a report of the
1888 anti-lynching filibuster in the
Senate. An excerpt from this
paper regarded as Hitler's personal
mouthpiece, reads as follows:
"For weeks, three old gentlemen
fought in the American Senate
against the anti-lynching bill,
which includes that policemen who
let people snatch their prisoners
away, should be punished. They