“Within the last ten or twelve days, three suicides, four murders, and two executions, have occurred in the city!”

The “New Orleans Bee” of October 25, 1837, says: 

“We remark with regret the frightful list of homicides that are daily committed in New Orleans.”

The “Planter’s Banner” of September 30. 1838, published at Franklin, Louisiana, after giving an account of an affray between a number of planters, in which three were killed and a fourth mortally wounded, says that “Davis (one of the murderers) was arrested by the by-standers, but a justice of the peace came up and told them, he did not think it right to keep a man ‘tied in that manner,’ and ‘thought it best to turn him loose.’ It was accordingly so done.”

This occurred in the parish of Harrisonburg.  The Banner closes the account by saying: 

“Our informant states that five white men and one negro have been murdered in the parish of Madison, during the months of July and August.”

This justice of the peace, who bade the by-standers unloose the murderer, mentioned above, has plenty of birds of his own feather among the law officers of Louisiana.  Two of the leading officers in the New Orleans police took two witnesses, while undergoing legal examination at Covington, near New Orleans, “carried them to a bye-place, and lynched them, during which inquisitorial operation, they divulged every thing to the officers, Messrs. Foyle and Crossman.”  The preceding fact is published in the Maryland Republican of August 22, 1837.

Judge Canonge of New Orleans, in his address at the opening of the criminal court, Nov. 4, 1837, published in the “Bee” of Nov. 8, in remarking upon the prevalence of out-breaking crimes, says: 

“Is it possible in a civilized country such crying abuses are constantly encountered?  How many individuals have given themselves up to such culpable habits!  Yet we find magistrates and juries hesitating to expose crimes of the blackest dye to eternal contempt and infamy, to the vengeance of the law.

“As a Louisianian parent, I reflect with terror that our beloved children, reared to become one day honorable and useful citizens, may be the victims of these votaries of vice and licentiousness.  Without some powerful and certain remedy, our streets will become butcheries overflowing with the blood of our citizens.”

The Editor of the “New Orleans Bee,” in his paper of Oct. 21, 1837, has a long editorial article, in which he argues for the virtual legalizing of LYNCH LAW, as follows: 

“We think then that in the circumstances in which we are placed, the Legislature ought to sanction such measures as the situation of the country render necessary, by giving to justice a convenient latitude.  There are occasions when the delays inseparable from the administration of justice would be inimical to the public safety, and when the most fatal consequences would be the result.