| Show A threatening DANGER SCARCELY a day puma passes in which the newspapers donot do not contain accounts of bloodcurdling blood curdling lynching lunching lyn ching incidents A heinous crime is committed one or more persons are suspected of bet being ng guilty of the deed arrested and imprisoned A mob collects organizes advances upon the tail jail where the alleged criminals are r confined overpowers the often tooh willing officers enter the building drag the poor wretches rout ut hang them to the nearest tree or telegraph pole an and perhaps in addition riddle fiddle the bodies with bullets bullet tragedies of this character are so common that they cease to create alarm or cause any great degree of apprehension for the welfare of the nation these lawless misdeeds are not confined to newly settled districts but are becoming frequent in old communities with the multiplication of events of this nature comes a corresponding increase of apologists for such inexcusable and barbarous work the basis of palliation la Is the claim that the officers and courts are either too tardy in administering and executing the laws ar r in that respect ree fall fail altogether on this ground mobs are excused for assuming a criminal role it to is also erroneously and thoughtlessly contended talat anat such acts are done by the people simply because a limited number of the populace undertake to commit those out caga upon justice and enlightened civilization it will be a sorry day for the country when the people as a whole or even as a majority will condone such anarchical proceedings if that time aime shall ever come then law and the machinery for its application will be virtually abolished and confusion reign supreme if the lynching lunching lyn ching incidents are intelligently scanned as a whole or as they transpire it will be observed that aboe who participate in them are not animated by a desire for justice but for blind and bloodthirsty vengeance neither are they in the majority of cases incited to commit the deeds of ri violence olence that are disgracing the annals of american history by an expectation that justice will not in the regular way be meted out to criminals Lynch ings often occur in communities where there to is good reason to presume that abat the law if allowed to take its due course will be administered and executed those who insist on the rightfulness ful aass of the substitution of popular fury for the execution of law are either unable to grasp the consequences of such a course or indifferent to its in evitable evl table upon the nation but even where it la Is believed that courts will act corruptly we fall 1 to 0 see that the commission of another crime will have any beneficial effect upon society As a rule mobs who take the law into their own hands I are from to several hundreds to one of those on whom this sort of vengeance is wreaked wrecked wre aked this chia being the case came the criminal list of the country is enormously swelled the idea that men should be the victims of summary vengeance without the application of the civilized proem process of trial and conviction under any circumstances is in m monstrous nitrous this lawless mode moab has been applied to a number of people who i h 0 have been subsequently Bub proved to be innocent of the crimes of which they were suspected cases of this nature have occurred quite recently not only the deeds of crata but apologies for them spread a danger ous demoralization of public sentiment a contempt for law and for legal processes and tribunals this leads to the adoption of methods for the attainment of other othere ends such as the settlement of popular questions in this regard the disturb disturbances knees in tennessee in connection with convict labor may be cited in this instance the mob takes the exactly opposite position in one re res pea to that assumed by the operators and apologists for violence vs law in ordinary lynching lunching lyn ching incidents ci the latter have to rely on the pretence predence pre tence of ridding the country of bad people whom the courts will not punish now look at the tennessee situation the mobs in that state have no such plea they in order to accomplish an object turn loose upon society criminate criminals whom the courts have tried convicted and punished PU Dished thus the labor of the tribunals of justice is worse than undone and all the expense bad trouble of protecting the people thrown to the winds the fact is that one species of lawlessness les eness not only begets and brings forth of K its own particular kind but produces all the various species of human action iu in that line popular fury is both blind and contradictory the populace have no right to take the law into their own hands if such a paradoxical expression be ad they have delegated Is lawmaking and legal administration to their representatives and they therefore possess it only in that way they have no right to personally exercise powers which they have delegated to those they have chosen to be their official agents agento unless the cratto ig tendency of sentiment and action be checked the country will be loaded with deeds of violence which are aft everywhere alarmingly indrek increasing ang these are the skirmish attacks of anarchy on the outposts of good government ern ment |
