the governor, in the presence of the courts, in the presence of the sheriff and his deputies, in the presence of the entire police force, take out the prisoner, take his life, often with fiendish glee, and often with acts of cruelty and barbarism which impress the reader with a degeneracy rapidly approaching savage life.  That the State is disgraced but faintly expresses the humiliation which has settled upon the once proud people of Tennessee.  The State, in its majesty, through its organized life, for which the people pay liberally, makes but one record, but one note, and that a criminal falsehood, “was hung by persons to the jury unknown.”  The murder at Shelbyville is only a verification of what every intelligent man knew would come, because with a mob a rumor is as good as a proof.

These efforts brought forth apologies and a short halt, but the lynching mania was raged again through the past three months with unabated fury.

The strong arm of the law must be brought to bear upon lynchers in severe punishment, but this cannot and will not be done unless a healthy public sentiment demands and sustains such action.

The men and women in the South who disapprove of lynching and remain silent on the perpetration of such outrages, are particeps criminis, accomplices, accessories before and after the fact, equally guilty with the actual lawbreakers who would not persist if they did not know that neither the law nor militia would be employed against them.

6 SELF-HELP

In the creation of this healthier public sentiment, the Afro-American can do for himself what no one else can do for him.  The world looks on with wonder that we have conceded so much and remain law-abiding under such great outrage and provocation.

To Northern capital and Afro-American labor the South owes its rehabilitation.  If labor is withdrawn capital will not remain.  The Afro-American is thus the backbone of the South.  A thorough knowledge and judicious exercise of this power in lynching localities could many times effect a bloodless revolution.  The white man’s dollar is his god, and to stop this will be to stop outrages in many localities.

The Afro-Americans of Memphis denounced the lynching of three of their best citizens, and urged and waited for the authorities to act in the matter and bring the lynchers to justice.  No attempt was made to do so, and the black men left the city by thousands, bringing about great stagnation in every branch of business.  Those who remained so injured the business of the street car company by staying off the cars, that the superintendent, manager and treasurer called personally on the editor of the Free Speech, asked them to urge our people to give them their patronage again.  Other business men became alarmed over the situation and the Free Speech was run away that the colored people might be more easily controlled.  A meeting of white citizens in June, three months after