Arizona sun., 1947-07-18
inst Lynchins Is Rough
THE FIGHT AGAINST
LYNCHING ROUGH
REPORTER RETURNED FROM THE SOUTH
OFFERS A VIEW OF WHAT'S AHEAD
By HARRY RAYMOND

The lynch spirit was growing.
You could see it. You could hear it.
You could feel it. But ladies and
gentlemen of the Southern ruling
class looked down their uplifted
noses and hailed "a new and bet
ter day."
Twenty-eight members of lynch
mob, 26 Of whom freely confessed
their part in mutilating and nnur-N
dering the Negro Willie Earle, had
been set free by a. jury of white
men the night before. %
They strutted the streets boast
ing of their white, superiority"
Scar-faced Hendrix Rector, the
man who carved five gaping knife
wounds in the quivering flesh of
the Negro, was out on drunk,
celebrating.
Roosevelt Carlos Hurd, who blew
out Earle's brains with two shot
gun blasts, was holding open house
in the Bluebird Taxicab office, re-
ceiving greetings from his friends
and shouting: Justice has been
done on both Sides"
Duran keenan,, who also carried
shotgun to the lynching, an
nounced to the press: "It's the best
thing that ever happened In this
county,"
LYNCHERS GLORIFIED
There, under the hot sun in
Greenville, S. c., May %, / was
witness of this macabre celebra-
ton. The glorification of lynch
murder went on under the toler-
ant eyes of blue-coated policemen,
proud of their SO percent enforce
ment of a local law against jay
walking.
Then, mingled with the fiendish
uproar, could be heard the apollo
getic voice of the South Carolina
ruling class.
"The community returns to nor
NAL now that the mass murder
trial is concluded and all defend
ants have been found not guilty,
verdict that, however it may ap-
pear to the world, close observers
agree was juSt-according to the
law and evidence" said The Green
vile Piedmont, editorial Sopkes-
man for the textile multi-million-
aire and plantation owners.
"It will return to normal, but
with fundamental change: this is
community in which cases of this
kind are less likely to occur
again."
Thus the newspaper compron-
ised the earlier crusade of CheveS
Lyon, it's inSurgent political writ
er, for punishment of the lynchers
to the full extent of the law.
"The community returns to nor
NAL" These words of the editorial
disturbed me as I departed that
evening from Greenville to report
the Reynolds Tobacco Co. strike in
Winston-Salem, N. c.
MOVING NORTHWARD
AS our plane winged 5000 feet
above the verdant Piedmont coun-
trySide North Carolina business
man talked to me about the Green
vile case. He spoke of the deep
and significant change" in the atti-
tudes of Southern state and local
governments toward lynching. He
said the South would eventually
take care of this problem" that it
would take time," Education"
But, he declared, trace equality
is not the solution" The trial, he
added, would act as "a brake on
lynch mobs." He praised what he
called better race relations in
North Carolina"
But the next day lynchers were
still making news-this time in
Jackson, N. G.
shall never forget the all-night
bus ride from Winston-Salem to
Jackson. At every bus stop sleepy
eyed travellers discussed over cof-
fee the mystery of what happened
to Buddy Bush, 24-year-old Negro
who was taken from the Jail by.
the mob.
"He's dead" "ae's at the bottom
of the Roanoke River" "He got
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