Cure for Lynching
Item
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Title
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Cure for Lynching
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Source Type
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Newspaper
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Publisher
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Southwest World
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Publication Place
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Guthrie, OK
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Publication Date
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09/07/1901
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Transcript
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CURE FOR LYNCHING. Mob law is on the increase. There can be no doubt of that among people who read the newspapers. Scarcely a day passes that does not bring to our attention an account of the hanging or burning alive of some wretched creature upon whom the lawful courts have imposed no sentence. Every such killing is a murder. The fact that it is done by dozens or by hundreds insted of by a single individual doesn't alter the character of the crime. It is murder just the same, says the Kansas City Journal. It cannot even be urged as extenuation that lynching is necessary in order to discourage the particular crime that it most frequently punishes, for its utter failure in this direction is proven clearly by the increasing number of such outrages. The burning of negroes at the stake, instead of deterring, seems to stimulate others to like crimes. Lynch law is a species of anarchy, and the growth of anarchy in any form is a serious menace to the welfare of society. What is to be done about these mob murders? is there no remedy, no way to check their multiplication, no way to discourage the mob spirit that is spreading through the land? Must good citizens who believe in upholding the majesty of the law and relying upon the constituted authorities for the maintenance of order the the punishment of crime submit passively to these exhibitions of anarchy in their midst? There is a remedy. Lynch law can be put down if it is dealt with properly. Georgia is a state in which there have been as many lynchings, perhaps, as in any other part of the country. They are becoming tired of the disgraceful practice in Georgia and are taking measures to check it. And they are pursuing the right method. A recent dispatch bearing a Wetumpka date line makes this apparent. The dispatch was only a brief one, consisting of only a few lines, but it is to the point. It reads: "George Howard has been convicted and will go to the penitentiary for life for participating, in the putting to death of Robert White, a negro, some monts ago." There is the remedy for mob law. Hold the participants in a lynching personally responsible for their deeds. Arraign them on a charge of murder, and if they are found guilty punish them as other murderers are punished. When it comes to be understood that members of a mob will be held to answer to a criminal charge for their crimes there will cease to be mobs. Ruffians, black and white, who maltreat women will be turned over to the courts and punished in accordance with the laws. Good citizens will cease to debauch their own moral natures by imbruing their hands in the blood of human beings, and respectable communities will no longer be disgraced by spectacles of revolting savagery masquerading in the guise of justice. And the women of the land will not be a whit less protected from the clutches of lecherous fiends than they were today, but rather they will have greater security. As a deterrent of crime the vigorous enforcement of law is worth ten times as much as the violence of the mob.
Cure for Lynching