LYNCH LAW

Waikato Times, Volume 91, Issue 14167, 18 September 1919, Page 8

LYNCH LAW

THE COLOUR LINE. TOO PREVALENT IN ENGLAND. TUSKEGEE’S GRIM RECORD. The Principal or llio groat Tuskegcc Negro Institute (Mr Robert R. Moton) has addressed the following letter to the New York Evening Post:— “Sir, —I send you the following information concerning lynchings for I lie first six months of this year. I find, according to (he records kept by the department of records and research of Tuskegce Institute, that there have been in the first six months of 1919 twenty-eight lynchings. This’ is seven less than the number (35) for the first six months of 1918, and 14 more than the number (14) for the first ( six months of 1917. "Of those lynched, 25 were negroes and three were white. Seven of those put to death were charged with the crime of rape. One woman is roporteu »to have been lynched. “The States in which lynchings occurred and the number for each State are as follow: Alabama 3, Arkansas 4, Florida 2, Georgia 3, Louisiana 4, Mississippi 7, Missouri 1, North Carolina

2, South Carolina 1, Texas 1.” Reports have been received from England and Wales of serious trouble between whites and coloured men in which fatalities were recorded and much bitter feeling. The ready taking of the law into its own hands by the people of Great Britain is becoming very common. The well-known writer, Mr Harold Spender, goes so far in the Daily Chronicle as to describe it as "Becoming the fashion of the world that people should take the law into their own hands. An injured husband of high military rank shoots his enemy, and is ‘confined during His Majesty’s pleasure.’ An angry youngster applies tar and feathers, and is given a generous platform in the press to boast of his deed and defy the authorities. Thus fanned and encouraged, the habit spread like a prairie fire." It begins to take a mass form. One body of aggrieved soldiers wrecks a camp which they have pome to hale; another storms a police station and kills a sergeant of police. Colour hatred adds a fresh spark of fuel of human passion. White mobs attack black and yellow men at Liverpool, Cardiff, and East London. When the black and yellow men defend themselves the defence itself becomes a new crime. The poison of lynch law, in other words, is beginning to creep into our social system. And there is no poison mpre cruel and virulent. Before we yibld to it any longer let us look the facts in the face. For this country of England has been hitherto singularly free from this malady, and it may be worth while to think carefully before public speakers or writers say or write anything to encourage it. Fascination of Judge Lynch.

For in its early stages lynching is a most attractive disease. The first onset of this fever is accompaneid by the most pleasing illusions and the most delightful fancies. None of us, for instance, are in love with the law courts. We associate them with long delays, with tedious pleadings, and with heavy expenses. The mere effort of listening to both sides of the case is repulsive to the ordinary passionate man. He often regards it as a sign of weakness. It sometimes even offends what lie imagines to be his conscience. What more simple, therefore,, than to take the law into his own hands ? Russia is at present the paradise of lynch law; and it is rather interesting to see how it works out. One of the latest refugees from Russia has been describing to me the state of affairs in one of her great towns. The law courts have all been abolished. So far, so good. It sounds quite a dream! But, curiously enough, offences against the law still happen. Certain people will steal, and certain possessors still resent being stolen from. The result is that crowds take the matter into their own hands. They do not wait for the revolutionary tribunal. The thief is just summarily taken and shot or hanged. There are no pleadings; there is no waste of policemen’s lime ; there is no worry about witnesses. Lynch Law in Russia.

But look at the other side. A week before iny friend left Russia a lady traveller at a provincial railway station thought she had'lost a hundred rouble notes, and suspected an unfortunate gentleman who was travelling in the same train with her. The unhappy man was hauled out, and as two hundred rouble notes were found on him, that was thought to provide a fair margin for risk, and so he was taken out and shot. ,

But as the tiring party returned from this virtuous deed they were met by the lady in an excited frame of mind, for she had discovered the rouble notes in another pocket. That seemed awkward; but it was quite easy to put it right. They there and then tried the lady for false evidence, put her up against the same wall, and shot her also. Pinal upshot of lynch law —two innocent persons Anally disposed of. Russia must go her own way and learn her own lessons; but surely our civilisation is old enough to prevent us from having to re-learn at such fearful cost these lessons of a nation’s childhood I For the plain fact is that our passions are no guide to’justice. The mere fact that we feel very angry with a person is not sufficient evidence of his gu:lt. "Revenge,” said Bacon, “is a wild justice.” But the main point is that there is very little justice about it, and a great deal of wildness. , The White Terror. Take the case of the Southern American States. Those States have taken over the unfortunate heritage of that system of negro slavery for which we were very largely responsible. A vast black race, the descendants of those black slaves whom we imported into America, now live in freedom in the midst of a white population. The black race is steadily increasing, and now numbers something like 12,000,000. On the other side the white race has taken the grim determination that there shall be no mixture of stock. That is by no means an easy task to maintain, even in a country like ours. How much more difficult in those States where the black population is rapidly threatening to outnumber .the white I But so deep is the determination that the white man refuses to hand over this matter to the process of law. The purity of the stock in these States is defended by a literal system of "white terror,” which has become part of the customs of the country. Lynch law, in other words, has become an institution. An Incurable Habit.

All the best Americans deplore the results; and surely they should be a warning to us. For it is calculated that every year, in the Southern States of America, some 60 people are done to death in this manner. Since 1885 over 2500 are estimated to have perished. Since 1912 there has been an increase in the yearly average. The process is often by burning, and has, in some cases, been patronised even by the responsible officials of the town in which these events occurred. The little children of the schools have been drawn up to witness the slow burning of an unhappy wretch, against whom some random accusations have been made. These things are well known to the American Government, and are deplored by the best opinion in that country. But so deeply has the habit of lynch law struck into the life of the Southern American Stales that no American Government dares to suppress it with a high hand.

It is not for us to dictate to tne Americans, wlio have their own troubles and their own problems; but here is an outstanding warning to any of us wlio may imagine that the process of lynching is a habit to be encouraged or trilled with. Warning to the Law. But one word to the Courts of Justice. Lynching almost always begins with a relaxation of law. Before the lawyers blame society, let them be quite certain that they are doing their duty to society. Some months ago the Recorder of London gave the impression, by a casual remark uttered on the bench, that he regarded bigamy as a light offence in a soldier returned from the war. Men are apt to take a liberal interpretation of such judicial utterances. But what about the deceived women, and those who care for them ? The next step would be, if such a policy prevailed, that, finding no protection in the law, the guardians of such women woul ; take the law Into their own hands. Then the very same people who applauded the loosening of the law become the first to applaud those who act without the law.

So the process goes on, with the power of a gyrating circle. “I should not, indeed, be surprised to find that the very people who condoned the tar and feathering at Cambridge would have been the first to defend the offence of the man who was tarred and feathered. So lightly and easily do pur passions work witli such kaleidoscopic changes, so capricious in their mastery over the tilings that belong to our peace 1” concludes Mr Spencer.