The Many Faces of Judge Lynch: Extralegal Violence and Punishment in America

270 Pages·2002·1.75 MB·English

by  Christopher Waldrep (auth.)

The Many Faces of Judge Lynch
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The Many Faces of Judge Lynch
Extralegal Violence and
Punishment in America
Christopher Waldrep
THEMANYFACESOFJUDGELYNCH
Copyright © Christopher Waldrep, 2002.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2002 978-0-312-29399-4
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations
embodied in critical articles or reviews.
First published 2002 by
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ISBN 978-1-349-38764-9 ISBN 978-1-4039-8271-1 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781403982711
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First edition: November 2002
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
Chapter One Prologue: The Origins of the Word 13
Chapter Two The Word and the Nation 27
Chapter Three “California Law”: The West and the Nation 49
Chapter Four “What We Call Murder”: Lynching and
the Meaning of Legitimacy in Reconstruction 67
Chapter Five “The Indignation of the People Knew No Bounds”:
The Lynching Narrative in the 1870s and 1880s 85
Chapter Six “Threadbare Lies”: Making Lynching Racial 103
Chapter Seven Tuskegee, the NAACP,
and the Definition of Lynching, 1899–1940 127
Chapter Eight “High-Tech Lynchings”:
Making the Rhetoric National 151
Epilogue Hate Crimes 185
Notes 193
Bibliography 233
Index 00
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Acknowledgments
Steve Whitfield generously gave this manuscript a careful reading, as
did Tom Appleton. Michael Les Benedict, Roberta Senechal de la
Roche, Dan McMillan, and Michael Fitzgerald read portions of the
text. I benefited greatly from all their insights and comments and claim all
the remaining errors for myself. I presented portions of this manuscript at
the Citadel, at a Southern Historical Association meeting, the Southern In-
tellectual History Conference, and Vernon Burton’s southern history read-
ing group at the University of Illinois. The discussion generated by these
presentations stimulated my thinking enormously. Michael Bellesiles en-
couraged me to first write about this topic in his anthology Lethal Imagination:
Violence and Brutality in American History(New York: New York University Press,
2000). I am still benefiting from my participation in Michael Johnson’s
1991 National Endowment for the Humanities seminar, “Slavery and Free-
dom.” Deborah Gershenowitz’s support has been essential.
Gordon Cotton and Martha Huie provided indispensable help as I
grappled with elements of this story. Jack Davis alerted me to the impor-
tance of Jesse James Payne and shared his materials on that case. Judy
Schafer, Cory Andrews, and Joe Tregle, Jr., helped me locate New Orleans
newspapers. Christian Fritz shared his work on popular sovereignty.
William Carrigan deserves mention for his excellent work on the lynching
of ethnic Mexicans. Beyond that, I must thank him especially for loaning
me the transcript of Jesse Washington’s trial. Michael Hussey at the Na-
tional Archives has been enormously helpful. Susan Sherwood at the San
Francisco State University Labor Archives found materials without being
asked. I am most grateful.
Chapter seven originally appeared as “War of Words: The Controversy
Over the Definition of Lynching, 1899–1940,” Journal of Southern History
LXVI, No. 1, February 2000, 75–100. I thank that journal for permission to
republish here.
My colleagues at Eastern Illinois University heard more about lynching
than anyone should have to endure, primarily in our monthly history collo-
quia. David K. Smith kept me supplied with books on the French Terror