| Show LYNCHING BUSINESS BAD THE lynching lunching lyn ching of postmaster averill of sweetwater wyoming and the woman who lived with him as his wife was a startling tragedy this is not because of lynching lunching lyn ching incidents being rare ran on the contrary they are plentifully dished up every day to the readers of the papers but bat this particular episode had one rather unusual feature connected with it t a woman was one of the victims of the mob who took the law into their own hands and assumed the role of executioners execution ers without the preliminaries of trial triai and conviction these essentials of civilized procedure are going out of fashion and it is useless to ignore the fact that a gradual return to barbaric methods is in progress this hanging of a woman is a sad commentary upon the supposed gallantry of the cowboy the whole transaction was a deed of horror borror but the frequent occurrence of acts of summary vengeance wreaked wrecked by the hands ef mobs renders them familiar and they have come to be taken as matters of course thus popular conscience becomes gradually dulled events that would have horrified communities a few years ago are now regarded as almost too common for ordinary consideration this is a bad sign the reason assigned for the action of the mob or the apology offered for their conduct ought to be startling to a civilized people we do not refer now to the crime of cattle stealing of which averill and his female companion were alleged to be guilty the excuse for the doings of the lyn chers was that they had bad no hope of these unsavory persons receiving their deserts at the hands of the law this hopeless feature was super induced by the fact that out of a large number of trials for cattle stealing in the county where the tragedy was enacted not one conviction had ensued these failures to convict were not attributable to the attitude of the officials of the courts but to the condition of bf the juries who were afraid to render verdicts of guilty this is presumed to be the situation in a good many parts of the country this being the case here is anarchy which does not come from its professed votaries vot aries it is as daTig dangerous erous as if it emanated from the avowed enemies of society its constituents are failure of the courts to punish crime and 2nd this failure proceeds from the terrorizing influence of the criminal class over peaceable citizens ard 3rd these two causes lead to another class of people discarding all semblance of law and executing vengeance upon alleged criminals with their own hands these conditions prevail in many port portions Jons of the nation if they were to become universal anarchy social chaos would be the result that this situation is increasing in area is beyond question this being admitted another logical interrogatory ensues what rate of progress in this direction would throw the country into confusion in a given time |
