page_title: Springfield race riot of 1908
section_title: Support for attackers
hierarchical_section_title: Springfield race riot of 1908 / Aftermath / Racial atmosphere / Support for attackers
caption_attribution_description: English: Nevada State Journal. 16 Aug 1908.
context_page_description: The Springfield race riot of 1908 were events of mass racial violence committed against African Americans by a mob of about 5,000 white Americans and European immigrants in Springfield, Illinois, between August 14 and 16, 1908. Two black men had been arrested as suspects in a rape, and attempted rape and murder. The alleged victims were two young white women and the father of one of them. When a mob seeking to lynch the men discovered the sheriff had transferred them out of the city, the whites furiously spread out to attack black neighborhoods, murdered black citizens on the streets, and destroyed black businesses and homes. The state militia was called out to quell the rioting.
  The riot, trials and aftermath are said to be one of the most well-documented examples of the complex intersection of race, class, and criminal justice in the United States. In 2008 an NPR report on the centenary of the race riot said that the fact of its taking place in a Northern state, specifically in "The Land of Lincoln", demonstrated that blacks were mistreated across the country, not just in the South, and described the event as a proxy for the story of race in America.
context_section_description: The whites of Springfield largely came to support the riot, and eventually showed sympathy for the attackers. Whites talked about how "everybody knows that mob has made our families safe," boasting that the attacks were "the best thing that ever happened to the Capital City," and celebrating that "this was only the beginning of a crusade that shall make Springfield decent and keep it that way":
  ..."Springfield had no shame.  She stood for the action of the mob.  She hoped the rest of the negroes might flee.  She threatened that the movement to drive them out would continue.  I do not speak of the leading citizens, but of the masses of people, of working men in the shops, the storekeepers in the stores, the drivers, the men on the street, the wounded in the hospitals...
  — William English Walling, September 3, 1908
  Two weeks after Ballard died, the Illinois State Journal began running a comic strip: "Sambo and His Funny Voices."  The comic relegated blacks to bumbling stereotypes, allowing whites to ridicule and diminish black citizens.  Blacks were harassed and assaulted for several weeks after the affair.
  The Springfield community had primarily blamed blacks for the violence, or blamed both sides:
  The colored people are themselves partly to blame for rioting themselves, although the blame in and rebellion, all these is shared by the whites.
  — Reverend E. E. Frame, Plymouth Congregational Church
  Sin is at the bottom of it all. This murder of Ballard, and the assault of last Thursday, are simply outcroppings of an evil nature. – The Reverend Billy Sunday
  The implication is clear that the conditions, not the populace, were to blame and that many good citizens could find no other remedy than that applied by the mob.  It was not the fact of the whites' hatred toward the negroes, but of the negroes' own misconduct, general inferiority or unfitness for free institutions that were at fault.
  — Illinois State Journal, Editorial
  Such sympathy factored into the narrative of the attacks, minimizing the role of whites.  For example, following the attacks, newspapers began erroneously reporting that white deaths had outnumbered the deaths of blacks. The only deaths of blacks reported were the deaths of prominent men of Springfield (e.g. Burton, Donnegan).  This false claim, which suggested that blacks had killed the whites who died, and that the attacks were mutual in nature, was reported as fact for over 100 years.
caption: Nevada State Journal.
  16 Aug 1908.
exif: {}