1 LAW-ABID1NGNESS' IN THE SOUTH-WEST 227 



combines with the law's miscarriage to ob- 

 struct reform ; and it may safely be asserted 

 that the large majority of sober citizens in 

 the 'lynching sections,' while bewailing cer- 

 tain horrible occurrences, bewail also the 

 circumstances encouraging them. Right or 

 wrong, exaggerated or no, this is the pre- 

 valent view. 



In the crusades against lynching, especially 

 when negroes are the victims, the fact that it 

 is the brutal bestiality of the offender which 

 has aroused the worst passions of his chas- 

 tisers is overlooked that is, by outsiders not 

 comprehending the situation. An ill-informed 

 person reading or giving ear to the crusaders' 

 outpourings might well believe the object of 

 mob-violence to be an innocent martyr. In 

 their hysterical clamour against what they 

 falsely term persecution of the poor negro, 

 and in righteous wrath at the sickening mode 

 of punishment occasionally meted out to him, 

 the crusaders aforesaid, hailing from both 

 sides of the ocean, plunge alike into that fatal 

 error of sentimentalism. True, it is but in 

 one or two of the South-Western States and 

 those, generally speaking, roughly settled 



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