Lynchings In America

Southern Horror s: Lynch Law in All Its Phases by Ida B. Wells took me on a journey through our nations violent past. This book voices how strong the practice of lynching is sewn into the fabric of America and expresses the elevated severity of this issue; she also includes pages of graphic stories detailing lynching in the South. Wells examined the many cases of lynching based on “rape of white women” and concluded that rape was just an excuse to shadow white’s real reasons for this type of execution. It was black’s economic progress that threatened white’s ideas about black inferiority. In the South Reconstruction laws often conflicted with real Southern racism. Before I give it to you straight, let me take you on a journey through Ida’s

Between 1882 and 1952 Mississippi was the home to 534 reported lynchings’ more than any other state in the nation (Mills, 1992, p. 18). Jim Crow Laws or ‘Black Codes’ allowed for the legalization of racism and enforced a ‘black way’ of life. Throughout the deep-south, especially in rural communities segr...

Vigilantism and the practice of ‘lynching’ individuals for any crime, real or imagined, had a long history in North America. Though the act was practiced throughout the world, the term lynching, as we know it, originated during the American Revolution. Colonel Charles Lynch and his group Virginia friends, made their own rules to confront loyal British Tories and others deemed as criminals: they used to hang a person by the neck until dead as a means of justice. The conditions of the American frontier encouraged this vigilante mentality for swift punishment as civil justice was slow: some courts were as far away as 200 miles (Chestnut 2009). As the Nation expanded, lynching justice was also used by white men against newly freed African American

Lynching is when a mob of people gather in one place to hang a person is a general idea. However, lynching is just an execution of an accused person by a mob (Lynching). A lynching could happen for many reasons including severe crimes like murder or theft, simple custom violations, or to make a simple example to strike fear into the “other” population. According to the article, “Lynching in America,” over 4,000 African Americans were lynched between 1877-1950. Though majority of the African Americans lynched were men, there were some women that were lynched, too. Lynching has become illegal within the United States today, but it was a difficult time coming to the end of “legal” lynching. This essay discusses how several factors led to the

The argument that the author is trying to prove is that there has been numerous of lynching events in America but it has progressed into different levels over the years to prevent African- Americans from getting a voice in America’s society. Such as, using lynching as punishment for people’s actions that were not accepted to the public community, a source of intimidation and protection of white women. Majority of white men and women tried every way to keep African- Americans at the bottom of society. Like, when blacks were free from slavery however were still not able to participate in politics, go to the best schools and were only able to work for the low paying jobs. Blacks were even lower than the poor white man such as a farmer however, both were uneducated and unfortunate but because they were able to participate in lynching events their place in society was higher than blacks. As stated on page 95 second paragraph third sentence “The white mind had long identified blackness with darkness, evil, and hypersexuality, in essence the opposite of whiteness and what was considered higher civilization”.

In the 1930’s, the southern life was rigid for African Americans. After the civil war, slaves were given freedom and were in the process of emerging into the struggling economy. Times were rough for everyone because of the economy’s depression. A Berea student stated in her report, “All over America it was common to see unemployed men and women riding the rails, looking for work, shelter, and food-for anything that offered some means of subsistence, some sense of dignity.” Many people lost their jobs and whites took this time to torment black communities. A special clan was formed, called the Ku Klux Klan, that encouraged white dominance and used violence and intimidation to try to undo all that the blacks had recently gained (Snodan). In October of 1926, in Due West, South Carolina, a typical lynching by the KKK took place (Enzler). Lynching is defi...

First, Lemann documents horrible accounts of violence against freed blacks. The casual observer views the underlying reasons for these attacks as simple racial hatred. However, Lemann connects the acts of violence to show an orchestrated movement intended to undermine both keys to the freed blacks’ quality of life, organizing abilities and voting rights. Violence against blacks existed for years, but in the form of a master supposedly disciplining his slave. The acts of violence outlined by Lemann show a shift from fear and ignorance to organized intimidation. After all, whites of the time viewed themselves “as protectors of [the] natural order” meaning racial superiority (65). What first started as a fear of being the minority turned quickly to a fear of losing political power and economic wealth. In the end, the use of violence all...

today in the ghost-robed Ku Klux Klan.” (26-27). Americans’ racist attitudes are devastating the lives of many black people, including Emmett Till.

She indispensably corrects Mathews’ and Poole’s otherwise cogent readings of lynching by refusing to write lynching as a collapse, short-circuit, or psychotic failure of whiteness. Further, she recasts the stakes of lynching in terms of theological anthropology. Following Sylvia Wynter, we might elaborate Wells by saying that African Americans threatened to unsettle the white male supremacist accomplishment of overrepresenting Man-as-human. Thus, she paints white masculinity as the devil that threatens the well-being not only of black men, but also white and black women. If being human is not a given but a practice, then through lynching African Americans, whites demonize and dehumanize themselves. Wells’ answer to the question that Terrance Hayes’ poem poses about disfigurement would be, I imagine, that it is the ones who hang and the ones who beat that are left more

Many years ago, Abel Meeropol famously wrote “Southern trees bear a strange fruit, blood on the leaves and blood at the root, Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze, strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees...” The purpose of this poem was to describe the heinous lynching of African Americans in the south. They would be strung up to a tree and hung in front of crowds of hateful people spewing ignorance with no regard for human life outside of their own race. Sometimes their neighbors and loved ones would be present as well, while they struggled to free themselves and gasp for air before they eventually die. Although lynching is better known as the act of hanging a body up to a tree, there are also other acts that fit into the lynching

Wexler, Laura. 2003. Fire in a Canebrake: The Last Mass Lynching in America. Scribner; 2004. Print

‘Fire in a canebrake’ is quite a scorcher by Laura Wexler and which focuses on the last mass lynching which occurred in the American Deep South, the one in the heartland of rural Georgia, precisely Walton County, Georgia on 25th July, 1946, less than a year after the Second World War. Wexler narrates the story of the four black sharecroppers who met their end ‘at the hand of person’s unknown’ when an undisclosed number of white men simply shot the blacks to death. The author concentrates on the way the evidence was collected in those eerie post war times and how the FBI was actually involved in the case, but how nothing came of their extensive investigations.

Four black sharecroppers (Roger Malcom, Dorothy Malcom, George Dorsey and Mae Murray Dorsey) are brutally murdered by a group of white people. The murders attracted national attention, but the community was not willing to get involved. The community was not fazed by these brutal murders but, by the fact that this incident got national attention. They were even more astounded that the rest of the nation even cared. In this book Laura Wexler shows just how deep racism goes. After reading the book I discovered that Fire in a Canebrake has three major themes involving racism. The first is that racism obstructs progression. The second is history repeats itself. The last theme is that racism can obscure the truth. This lynching, in particular, marks a turning point in the history of race relations and the governments’ involvement in civil rights. In the end this case still remains unsolved. No concept of the

One of the most appalling practices in history, lynching - the extrajudicial hanging of a person accused of a crime - was commonplace in American society less than 100 years ago. The word often conjures up horrifying images of African Americans hanged from lampposts or trees. However, what many do not know is that while African Americans certainly suffered enormously at the hands of a white majority, they were not the only victims of this practice. In fact, the victims of the largest mass lynching in American history were Chinese (Johnson). On October 24th, 1871, a white mob stormed into the Chinatown of Los Angeles. Burning and looting buildings with Chinese owners, they shot at, tortured, and hung every Chinese person they came across. All in all, at least 17 Chinese were killed. This event was only one of many during the time; indeed, the Rock Springs Massacre was even deadlier (“Whites Massacre Chinese in Wyoming Territory”). But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Lynchings were far from the only injustices perpetrated against the Chinese during the 1800s. They could be beaten up, robbed, forced out of town, or put out of business. In fact, even anti-Chinese legislation was common. Laws targeting Chinese immigration or culture were simply too many to count. The violent and discriminatory treatment of Chinese immigrants in 19th century America makes manifest a lack of social progress in an era often celebrated for expansion and physical growth.

The photograph Public Lynching has been edited, people have been removed and the saturation increased. The complex colors and composition draw the viewer's attention to the crowd of white people gathered below a tree at night. At first glance the main figure of the photograph is the gathering of white people, smiling and pointing at the tree, but at further investigation the viewer becomes aware of the black space below the tree, obviously lacking a hanging body. The photograph has no defined focal point, but people and plants placed around making the viewer's eye roam not targeting one piece of the photo since the bodies were edited out. The composition of the photo in enhanced by the colors. The photograph was edited and the