Race and Place Newspapers

Location: Richmond, Virginia
Date of Publication: July 29, 1893 (Saturday)
Frequency: Weekly

Page 01

Column 01
Personals and Briefs

Transcript of Article

Mr. Samuel Meadows of Charlottesville, Va., was in the city this week, the guest of Mr. John L. Mines.

Summary of Article
This section of the paper provides an update on the travel plans of local community members. This week, Mr. Samuel Meadows of Charlottesville is visiting Mr. John L. Mines in Richmond.

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Column 06
Reduced Rates

Transcript of Article

To The Baptist Sabbath School Unions, Conventions, and Societies of Virginia:

Reduced rates have been granted by the following lines to delegates to the Sabbath School Convention, to meet in Charlottesville, Va., Thursday, Aug. 24, '93: Chesapeake and Ohio, Norfolk and Western, Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac, Richmond and Danville, Atlantic Coast Line for its Va. division, and Potomac, Fredericksburg and Piedmont. For particulars address

Summary of Article
This is an advertisement for reduced train rates to the Sabbath School Convention to be held in Charlottesville on Thursday, August, 24, 1893.W.P. Epps, Sect'y Ex. Board, 108 1/2 W. Duval St., Richmond, Va.

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Page 02

Column 03
A Democratic Journal Sounds the Alarm

Transcript of Article

We have come to the conclusion that after all our labors against lynch law have not been in vain. The following from the Charlottesville, Va. Chronicle, a Democratic journal of the deepest dye explains itself:

We hardly ever pick up a newspaper these days that we do not see some such item as this: "Special from Wytheville, Va. The town sergeant, V.S. (last name illegible) while attempting to arrest a Negro burglar this afternoon was shot through the shoulder. The Negro then escaped to the woods and is being pursued with dogs. If caught HE WILL DOUBTLESSLY BE LYNCHED.

It is not stated, and presumably he is not killed or mortally wounded - but suppose the officer was killed by the Negro in his effort to escape, ought it to be taken for granted in a civilized country, with the courts wide open for the trial and punishment of the guilty, that the prisoner "will doubtless be hanged without trial judge or jury." We know there are crimes of portentous frequency in the South in which the presumption of trial and execution by lynch law arises. For such crimes and such criminals, we have no word of mercy. But when it is to be presumed that every Negro who commits a capital felony against a white man or officer of the law is to be strung up without judge or jury the time has certainly come to call a halt.

There is no more reason for taking the ordinary crimes committed by Negroes from the ordinary courts of the land than there is for more prompt justice in the cases of white men.

What harm could have come from awaiting the decent and ordinary processes of law in the case of Wytheville offender. There is nothing in the shooting of an officer of the law by a Negro, any more than a white burglar, to arouse those elementary passions which excuse, if they do not justify the stringing up of the Negro ravisher to the first limb.

If all good citizens do not turn their faces like flints against this barbarism we will soon earn and receive the scorn of all civilized people.

We felt like exclaiming, "Thank God," when we read those lines. The words which we have written from time to time read like prophecy. We knew that lawlessness could not be allowed to exert itself unrebuked upon one class of citizens without demoralizing the people, undermining civilized government and making the lives of all citizens insecure. Lynch law must go!

Summary of Article
This is an interesting article that addresses the immorality of lynch law, which was a common practice in the Southern states. This article introduces into the discussion, an editorial that was published in the Va. Chronicle, which pointed out the barbarous and arbitrary nature of lynch law. The author of the Planet article commends the Chronicle editorial in acknowledging the inherent duplicity of lynch law and asserting that the practice should be ended.

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