Ethical Complications of Lynching: Ida B. Wells's Interrogation of American Terror (Black Religion Womanist Thought Social Justice)

Black Religion / Womanist Thought / Social Justice Series Editors Dwight N. Hopkins and Linda E. Thomas Published by Palgrave Macmillan

“How Long this Road”: Race, Religion, and the Legacy of C. Eric Lincoln Edited by Alton B. Pollard, III and Love Henry Whelchel, Jr. African American Humanist Principles: Living and Thinking Like the Children of Nimrod By Anthony B. Pinn White Theology: Outing Supremacy in Modernity By James W. Perkinson The Myth of Ham in Nineteenth-Century American Christianity: Race, Heathens, and the People of God By Sylvester Johnson Loving the Body: Black Religious Studies and the Erotic Edited by Anthony B. Pinn and Dwight N. Hopkins Transformative Pastoral Leadership in the Black Church By Jeffery L. Tribble, Sr. Shamanism, Racism, and Hip Hop Culture: Essays on White Supremacy and Black Subversion By James W. Perkinson Women, Ethics, and Inequality in U.S. Healthcare: “To Count Among the Living” By Aana Marie Vigen Black Theology in Transatlantic Dialogue: Inside Looking Out, Outside Looking In By Anthony G. Reddie Womanist Ethics and the Cultural Production of Evil By Emilie M. Townes Whiteness and Morality: Pursuing Racial Justice through Reparations and Sovereignty By Jennifer Harvey Black Theology and Pedagogy By Noel Leo Erskine

The Theology of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Desmond Mpilo Tutu By Johnny B. Hill Conceptions of God, Freedom, and Ethics in African American and Jewish Theology By Kurt Buhring The Origins of Black Humanism in America: Reverend Ethelred Brown and the Unitarian Church By Juan M. Floyd-Thomas Black Religion and the Imagination of Matter in the Atlantic World By James A. Noel Bible Witness in Black Churches By Garth Kasimu Baker-Fletcher Enslaved Women and the Art of Resistance in Antebellum America By Renee K. Harrison Ethical Complications of Lynching: Ida B. Wells’s Interrogation of American Terror By Angela D. Sims Representations of Homosexuality: Black Liberation Theology and Cultural Criticism By Roger A. Sneed (forthcoming) The Tragic Vision of African American Religion By Matthew V. Johnson (forthcoming) Uncovering Womanism: Ethical Themes and Values in Alice Walker’s Non-Fiction Work By Melanie Harris (forthcoming) Women’s Spirituality and Education in the Black Church By Yolanda Y. Smith (forthcoming) Racism and the Image of God By Karen Teel (forthcoming)

Ethical Complications of Lynching Ida B. Wells’s Interrogation of American Terror Angela D. Sims

ETHICAL COMPLICATIONS OF LYNCHING

Copyright © Angela D. Sims, 2010. All rights reserved. First published in 2010 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN: 978–0–230–62238–8 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sims, Angela D. Ethical complications of lynching: Ida B. Wells's interrogation of American terror / Angela D. Sims. p. cm.—(Black religion, womanist thought, social justice) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978–0–230–62238–8 (alk. paper) 1. Lynching—United States—History. 2. Wells-Barnett, Ida B., 1862–1931. 3. United States—Race relations—Moral and ethical aspects. I. Title. HV6457.S56 2010 364.1⬘34—dc22

2009039975

A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library. Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India. First edition: March 2010 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the United States of America.

To Sims

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Contents

Series Editors’ Preface Acknowledgments

ix xiii

Prologue

1

Introduction

5

Part One Identity and Formation: Character Development and the Shaping of a “Crusader for Justice” One Two Three

Black Slave Family’s Moral Situation in Mississippi during the Civil War

21

Freed-Person of Color’s Moral Situation in Mississippi during Reconstruction

27

Head of Family’s Response to the 1878 Yellow Fever Epidemic

35

Part Two A Matter of Perspective: Ida B. Wells’s Critique of Lynching Four

Wells on Lynching: An Overview

45

Five

Investigating Facts

49

Six

Interpreting Data

63

Seven

Challenging “Alleged Causes”

69

Part Three Beyond Rope and Fagot: A Womanist Ethical Analysis of Lynching Eight

The Issue of Race and Lynching

79

Nine

The Social Construction of Gender and Lynching

87

viii

Contents

Ten

The Intersection of Economics and Lynching

91

Part Four A Paradigm Shift: Resources for a Christian Ethic of Resistance in the Works of Ida B. Wells Eleven Twelve Thirteen

Re-Orientation: Viewing Justice in a Racially Violent World

101

Re-Evaluation: Demythologizing Hegemonic Structures

113

Re-Interpretation: Defining Hope from a Minority Perspective

119

Fourteen Just Act: A Mandate to Talk about the Lynched

127

Notes

135

Bibliography

171

Index

187

Series Editors’ Preface

In the contemporary period of justifiable concern about international terrorism, Angela D. Sims’s book recasts the American gaze from external to internal, homegrown, Christian forms of racialized terrorism. Indeed, Ethical Complications of Lynching: Ida B. Wells’s Interrogation of American Terror persuades us with compassion and intellect to consider the ethical insights from the peculiar American terror of race and faith. Or, in the memorable lyrics of blues-diva and tragic-triumphant singer, Billie Holiday, the United States produced “some strange fruit” that hung from southern and northern trees. Lynching, this made-in-the-U.S.A. fruit, was fundamental to the dark side of America’s look at the world, construction of nature, and faith in God. Black people were the fruit. Mostly men, they were strung up on a tree, beaten to a bloody pulp; and, on Sundays, people would leave church to go pick the skin and body parts off of this fruit. Thus the ethics of lynching, with families attending the practice of participation by multigenerations of believers in God, challenges us to review and represent a positive Christian ethic for positive community formation today. In a sense, parallels are inevitable: black men’s battered and broken bodies dangling from a tree; Jesus’ battered and broken body dangling from a cross of trees. Yet Sims complicates the obvious with scholarly nuance and a writer’s finesse. Sims utilizes Ida B. Wells’s thought, faith, and work against lynching to surface ethics for today. We know Wells as the historic crusader for justice. Not guns but the power of the written word became the weapons of resistance and ethical community building for Wells. She owned newspapers, published books, and wrote brilliantly about lynching terrorism. Indeed, her risk taking, life sacrificing, and tenacious fact finding paint a path to moral engagement with right and wrong. Sims calls it the “power of persuasive discourse.” We might also call it “to do justice”: the human community requires a Bible in one hand and a contemporary newspaper in the other.

x

Series Editors’ Preface

Methodologically, Sims applies womanist ethics on the “ought” and “should” in human relations. Womanism, an academic discipline and church practice, heralds back to formation from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s. Black women pastors and scholars clustered, primarily, around Union Theological Seminary (New York City) searched for common ground in their common experiences. As rising leaders and lay workers in Christian churches and educational institutions, they knew they had a positive relation to the Christian God. Jesus had made a way in their lives and on the rough side of their mammas’ and Big Mammas’ lives. Fathers and grandfathers had also called the prayer line of faith. Even under slavery, black women’s ancestors had had a little talk with “massa Jesus.” So when black women students at Union self-reflected on their positive relations to God, they named themselves womanist ethicists and theologians. Actually, in 1979, foremother, Union Ph.D. student Jackie Grant, coined the self-description of black feminist Christians. Yet, this name eventually proved limiting. It correctly pointed to black women’s solidarity with black male theologians, hence the “black.” And it correctly pointed to black women’s solidarity with white women theologians, hence the “feminist.” Still African-American women’s positive relation to God was complicated and, at times, desecrated by sexism in the black theology way of life and racism in the feminist claims to gender universality. Womanism, therefore, is a method of celebrating black women’s agency of forming herself, her family, her community, nature and ecology, and all peoples on planet earth. And God’s insights on what are good and not-so-good moral practices inform womanist ethics. Faith practice can move us beyond the encumbrances of human evil. This is where and when Angela D. Sims enters. She positions herself squarely within the womanist ethical tradition. Choosing lynching as the subject matter, Ida B. Wells as the biographical figure, and womanism as the methodology, Sims crafts artfully what is to be done today. With novel insight, she proposes an ethic of boycott, migrate, and write. Thus Sims raises the perennial questions of universal moral dilemmas: to build individual virtues and the common good in North America today, what communal values do we discern from America’s egregious period of lynching? The womanist thought and life of Ida B. Wells helps us to pause and think critically about that future being realized now—that is to say, live out now what we are striving for to come.

Series Editors’ Preface

xi

In a word, Christian ethics is deliberate, intentional, self-reflective examination of the choices applied in moral decision-making to achieve the good life. And Ethical Complications of Lynching: Ida B. Wells’s Interrogation of American Terror falls within the best part of this tradition. Indeed, it represents one definite dimension of the black religion/womanist thought/social justice series’ pioneering conceptual work and boundary-pushing effort. The series will publish both authored and edited manuscripts that have depth, breadth, and theoretical edge and will address both academic and nonspecialist audiences. It will produce works engaging any dimension of black religion or womanist thought as they pertain to social justice. Womanist thought is a new approach in the study of African-American women’s perspectives. The series will include a variety of African-American religious expressions. By this we mean traditions such as Protestant and Catholic Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Humanism, African Diasporic practices, religion and gender, religion and black gays/ lesbians, ecological justice issues, African-American religiosity and its relation to African religions, Taoism, Buddhism, new black religious movements (e.g., Daddy Grace, Father Divine, or the Nation of Islam), or religious dimensions in African-American “secular” experiences (such as the spiritual aspects of aesthetic efforts such as the Harlem Renaissance and literary giants such as James Baldwin, or the religious fervor of the Black Consciousness movement, or the religion of compassion in the black women’s club movement). Dwight N. Hopkins, University of Chicago Divinity School Linda E. Thomas, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago

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Acknowledgments

I work with a remarkable group of individuals who self-identify as scholar-pastors. Each of them embodies this understanding of call in unique ways. There are a few, however, who warrant special recognition. I am thankful to President Myron F. McCoy and Pamela D. Couture, vice president for Academic Affairs and dean, who work to create constantly an environment at Saint Paul School of Theology in Kansas City, MO, where I can “do the work my soul must have.” Harold C. Washington read this manuscript prior to my dissertation defense and provided comments that were most helpful to my revising the material for a book; James M. Brandt, Nancy R. Howell, and Patricia Beattie Jung offered invaluable assistance in my ongoing scholarly formation; and Israel Kamudzandu, F. Douglas Powe, Elaine A. Robinson, and Claire Smith provided many opportunities to discuss the relevance of this project for the church. I also want to thank Samantha Hasey, editorial assistant at Palgrave Macmillan, for guiding me in this initial publication process and her prompt responses to my numerous emails. An amazing circle of family, friends, and colleagues made this transition from dissertation to monograph possible. I would be remiss if I did not mention two friends, Cindy Bowers and April Swofford, who provided countless hours of technical support. Finally, I am especially grateful to my spouse, Terron, and our children, Terron II, Douglas, and Helene who continue to remind me, in countless ways, that with God all things are possible.

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Prologue When the universal does not comport with the particular we must re-evaluate how to respond when the impersonal becomes personal. —Angela D. Sims1

He lived near the eighth fairway in a planned community that included multiple “human-designed” lakes, tennis courts, a country club, and schools. Employed as a senior executive by a leading national organization, he was active in his community and church. Married for more than twenty-five years, his oldest son was a graduate of the same tier one institution where his youngest son was matriculating. His daughter, a recent high school graduate, would commence her undergraduate studies in the fall at one of the top-rated public universities in the nation. In fact, he looked forward to his time with his baby girl on Monday when they would journey to the small college town for her orientation and foreign-language placement examinations. But on Sunday, his sense of normalcy came to a screeching halt. Minutes before midnight, three police officers arrived at his home and arrested him for breaking and entering and sexual assault. Without any physical evidence or investigative findings prior to the arrest and subsequent preliminary hearing, he was arraigned and indicted based on the believability of his accuser. Six weeks after his arrest and arraignment, he sat in the courtroom with family members and his pastor and watched his neighbor of eight years enter the preliminary hearing. He listened as his accuser provided an account that defied reason and left much room, or so he thought, for reasonable doubt. Although it would not make any difference, he was thankful that in a matter best characterized as “she said/he said,” he had retained a court reporter to record the proceedings. In the short run, it would not make any difference. He was not

2

Ethical Complications of Lynching

aware that the prosecutor controls the criminal procedure, including the grand jury process. Thus, evidence and proof are not criteria and breaking and entering, at least in this particular jurisdiction, could be subjectively defined as someone alleging that you refused to leave when requested. His family’s life became a living nightmare. They attempted to make sense out of madness. His wife could not sleep. Anger consumed her. Hatred welled up in her. Trying to rationalize the situation and to control her anger his wife ignored his attorney’s instructions and shared the story with trusted colleagues, who initially responded that the charges would probably be dropped. Yet, when his wife mentioned that their neighbor, the accuser, was white, her colleagues retracted their previous reaction. After all, this was still the South where, as someone ominously pointed out, some white residents are very good at living in the past but not so good at living in the present or preparing to live in the future. It did not matter that he had no prior criminal record. It did not matter that there was no evidence. It did not matter that the alleged victim’s testimony differed from what was noted in the police report. It did not matter that his young white female neighbor provided conflicting stories. To the authorities she was convincing. And so, on the day of the scheduled trial, when this woman asked for money to settle and dismiss the charges, he and his wife agreed. They had seen enough and were not willing to risk that a jury of her peers would be able to see beyond the black and white of the matter. A sense of false naiveté disappeared on that Sunday night and in its place came the reality that we cannot afford to remain ignorant about the intersection of past and present. This is a shared story with unidentified others. Although the names and locations in this story are intentionally omitted, the incident in this narrative is real. It emerges from and is informed by an encounter that accurately reflects incidents in the lives of many American citizens. 2 This contemporary historically informed account illustrates, as sociologist Jonathan Markovitz explains, that “lynching was always intended as a metaphor for, or a way to understand race relations.”3 And in 1893, Ida B. Wells4 recognized that the simple word of any white person against a Negro is sufficient to get a crowd of white men to lynch a Negro. Investigation as to the guilt or innocence of the accused is never made. Under these conditions, white men have only to blacken their faces, commit crimes against the

Prologue

3

peace of the community, accuse some Negro, nor rest till he is killed by a mob. 5

Wells did not, however, use a fictionalized account of reality as a source from which to expand her vision of American justice. Her late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century critique of lynching and her advice to black residents of Memphis in the aftermath of that city’s March 1892 vigilante execution6 function as the starting point for this research. A cautionary note, however, is warranted. It is possible to study lynching without examining Wells’s socio-ethical analysis of this heinous act. However, in order to comprehend the relevance of her recommendations to boycott, migrate, and write as constructive resources for a Christian ethic of resistance to injustice in America in the twenty-first century, it is essential to recognize that lynching became a pivotal point of reference from which Wells interpreted the grotesqueness of life in the United States that contradicted conceptions of the common good during this era.

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Introduction

Lynching,1 the malicious taking of an alleged criminal’s life without benefit of due process of law, has been a frequent occurrence in human history. During the late nineteenth- and early twentieth century, mob rule in America developed in a society that justified morally reprehensible behavior through a selective interpretation of legislation which, in turn, led to outbreaks of executions of terror. As a result, lynching, clearly a violently destructive act, was perceived by many citizens as acceptable. This heinous practice, dependent to a large degree on a climate of fear, often accompanied by torture, functioned to preserve a desired lifestyle contingent on the perpetuation of socially constructed divisions of race, gender, and social location. As Kate Tuttle noted in a 2005 article on lynching, [D]espite its stated justification—that lynching is merely a response to crime—in most cases victims had not been convicted, or even charged with a specific crime. . . . Because of its unpredictability and extralegal nature—black men knew that they could become victims at any time, for any reason—lynching cast a shadow greater than its 3,386 known black (mostly male) victims between 1882 and 1930. It is almost certain that these numbers are understated. 2

Ultimately, as Arthur Raper writes, “[T]he logical issues of prejudice and lack of respect for law and personality, plus a sadistic desire to participate in the excitement of mob trials and the brutalities of mob torture and murder”3 had a dual function. On the one hand vicious rituals of execution became a form of entertainment to justify behavior that was informed and shaped by ignorance and hatred. At the same time, horrific mutilations functioned as intimidating symbols designed to control a labor pool of former slaves. Moreover, emancipation did not include any basis for resistance or redress. Images of spectators gathered in a killing field to collect souvenirs from the lynched

6

Ethical Complications of Lynching

corpse or standing on the sidelines to watch an individual, particularly black men and boys, hang and then be shot and/or dismembered, portray what is sometimes referred to as “southern horrors.” Although there is evidence that a review of the number of lynchings in the former slave states during the period 1882–1962 may lead to more reliable statistics, I accept the lynch statistics of African Americans during the period 1892–1910 presented in selected works of Ida B. Wells. What she offers is evidence to assess critically the culture of terror whose continued existence was dependent upon the ability to sustain some semblance of slavery, a “peculiar institution”4 upon which this nation was built. The euphemism “peculiar institution” as a term for slavery and the economic ramifications associated with the practice seem to explain away the contradiction of legalized slavery in a country whose Declaration of Independence states, “[W]e hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Consequently, lynching perpetrators are required to justify their motives for engaging in such dehumanizing conduct. At the same time, observers of “the strenuous and bloody campaign by whites to elaborate and impose a racial hierarchy upon people of color”5 are challenged to seek creative ways to respond on behalf of those who are still affected by the atrocities of oppressive systems sustained by deliberate injustice. Although the Federal Bureau of Investigation “began investigating what we now call hate crimes as far back as the early 1920s,”6 its Civil Rights Division, the primary compiler of hate crime statistics, did not begin publishing hate crime data until 1995. What then might statistics from 1954, the year the Supreme Court ruled to desegregate public schools, to 2004, the fifty-year anniversary of this landmark decision, reveal about actions to advocate on behalf of justice? In particular, what insights might we glean about the nature and response to crime and what that reaction signals about moral problems and Christian responsibility? It is important to note that the graphing or charting of this data will be of little value if unaccompanied by a theological ethical analysis that explores the operative value systems and the impact of the complicity of an economics of racism in society that may distort notions of the common good. Born into chattel slavery on July 16, 1862 on her white paternal grandfather’s plantation in Holly Springs, Mississippi, to give voice to oppressive conditions was not an option for Ida B. Wells. To engage

Introduction

7

in the work of justice was an imperative that was not restricted by the fact that her response to lynching, which evolved into an antithesis of the prevailing position, might elicit a negative response. Wells assumed this position when the violation of civil rights, in the form of lynching, affected her personally on March 9, 1892. According to Wells, “[I]t was the murder of three young colored men . . . who were known to be among the most honorable, reliable, worthy and peaceable colored citizens of the community”7 that changed her life. Although she was not in Memphis when the lynching occurred, Wells’s description of the victims provides a contextual point of reference from which we can examine the nature of vigilante justice. She informs us that these industrious young men, Thomas Moss, Calvin McDowell, and Henry Stewart “owned and operated a grocery store in a thickly populated suburb.” In addition to this entrepreneurial endeavor, Moss, employed as a postal worker, was well known by Wells. In fact, Wells informs us that this “exemplary young man and his wife Betty” were her “best friends” and that she was godmother to their “one little girl, Maurine.”8 This personal knowledge, coupled with a review of the allegations, led Wells to question the validity of the charges. In addition, she could not ignore collusive law enforcement practices evident in the case. Moss’s lynching, and that of his colleagues, shocked Wells. She could not rationalize this appalling incident. A week after this grisly inhumane act of cruelty Wells offered an assessment in the Free Speech, a Memphis newspaper that she co-owned.9 She concluded, “[T]here is nothing we can do about the lynching now, as we are out-numbered and without arms.” Wells recognized that confronting violence with violence was not a viable option. After all, “the white mob could help itself to ammunition without pay, but the order was rigidly enforced against the selling of guns to Negroes.” Left without legal recourse, Wells realized “there is therefore only one thing left that we can do; save our money and leave a town which will neither protect our lives and property, nor give us a fair trial in the courts, but takes us out and murders us in cold blood when accused by white persons.”10 In many respects, her decision to become a “crusader for justice,” with the express intent to raise the consciousness level of anyone who would engage in a constructive analysis of her message regarding the illegal and heinous practices of mob rule and “lynch law,” was informed by Wells’s faith in a God of justice.11 In this regard, she understood the power of written and oral communication and recognized the potential of language to shape and dominate public opinion.12

8

Ethical Complications of Lynching

Described as one of “the most fearless and respected women in the United States during a forty-year period”13 Wells was, according to historian John Hope Franklin, perhaps “the first person to recite the horrors of lynching in lurid detail.”14 Although her opposition to lynching to a large extent was based on information from secondary sources,15 Wells “did not hesitate to go to the scene of racial disturbances, including riots and lynchings, in order to get an accurate picture of what actually occurred.”16 Her attention to detail and considerable communication skills contributed to the fact that “few defects in American society escaped her notice and her outrage.”17 Franklin further declares that “by the written and spoken word she laid bare the barbarism and inhumanity of the rope and fagot, for Ida B. Wells was determined that the entire world should know her native land for what it really was.”18 He informs us that she “worked equally hard in the effort to devise means to improve the lot of her fellows” and was “in the forefront in promoting political activity among Negroes.”19 Franklin goes further to say that her “zeal and energy were matched by her uncompromising and unequivocal stand on every cause that she espoused. She did not hesitate to criticize southern whites, or northern white liberals, or members of her own race when she was convinced that their positions were not in the best interests of all mankind.”20 This suggests that Wells possessed the requisite skills and ability to contribute to the diverse communities in which she participated. It also hints at her ability to understand the challenges confronted by a people whose understanding of liberty was typically defined on terms other than their own. In addition, reliance on secondary information sources was not her preferred journalistic approach. Franklin’s assessment of Wells is similar to that offered by Frederick Douglass. In his October 25, 1892 letter used to introduce Wells’s first two publications on the rituals of torture, Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases and A Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynchings in the United States, 1892–1893– 1894, Douglass informs us that Wells “deals with the facts with cool, painstaking fidelity.”21 While his introductory letter to Wells’s work acknowledges that others, himself included, contributed to the antilynching campaign, Douglass is adamant that her account is the most convincing. Like Frederick Douglass, James Elbert Cutler also acknowledged, in chapter six of Lynch Law: An Investigation into the History of Lynching in the United States, that others had written about lynching.

Introduction

9

In his publication, Cutler also pointed out that comparative analysis of lynching statistics warranted serious consideration. Of particular interest is the remarkable similarity to Cutler’s proposed approach to the method Wells employed in 1892. However, Cutler did not recognize Wells’s initiative to verify published data. Nor did he indicate that he was aware of her efforts to travel to lynching sites in order to validate the facts. The only reference that Cutler made to Wells was her effort to obtain foreign endorsement in support of her anti-lynching campaign. 22 In spite of this omission or lack of recognition, this oversight does not negate Wells’s contribution. Rather, from Cutler, an instructor in economics at Wellesley at the time his book was published in 1905, we gain a greater appreciation for Wells’s analytical ability, her interpretation of the facts, and her subsequent recommendations. Wells did not underestimate the power of persuasive discourse. She used her investigative reporting skills to portray lynching vividly. She also questioned the veracity of alleged causes that resulted in brutal expressions of vigilante justice. In response to mob rule, she offered a nonviolent corrective. She encouraged oppressed people to recognize the value and power of fiscal solidarity, to consider the possibilities of migration, and to tell their story in their own voice. In essence, she realized that those most impacted by a culture of lynching possess tremendous potential to effect change. From her, we discover new insights into human virtue and how to evaluate responses to tragedy. One place we see this is in Wells’s proposal to implement fiscal practices as strategies to present a minority viewpoint that, in turn, necessitates a further examination of the relationship between constructions of power and concepts of justice. Wells’s approach requires that we make a deliberate decision regarding the distribution of personal resources. Her strategy also suggests that we can employ economic boycotts and human capital to minimize the effects of exploitative practices. While response to injustice was mandatory and not optional for Wells, it should be noted that silence is also a tactic that members of oppressed communities and those who stand with them can implement. Despite the fact that this is certainly a viable option to exercise, especially when it appears that confrontation may lead to increased occurrences of violence, it does not guarantee that silence will yield a peaceful or just outcome. Often at possible risk to her own life, Wells described graphically the lived experience of those subjected to lynch law. She understood that her evaluation of contemporary manifestations of injustice was

10

Ethical Complications of Lynching

directly related to and informed by practices of a not-so-distant past. She recognized that the exploitation of African Americans was perceived as necessary by those who sought to sustain a prescribed social code. Consequently, Wells’s advocacy on behalf of individuals subjected to sadistic rituals of execution and mob rule during the years 1892 to 1910 is a legacy that can function as a model to promote social justice in the face of contemporary manifestations of lynching in the twenty-first century. Written from a womanist ethical perspective, this text examines Ida B. Wells’s critique of systemic violence from an historical perspective, with specific attention to lynching, in order to evaluate contemporary responses to social issues. Appropriated by Katie Geneva Cannon in 198523 as a theological method, womanist ethics is a principled construct that emerges from the lives of African-American women. An interdisciplinary approach, womanist ethics examines socially constructed fragmentations, such as race, sexual orientation, and class, as a means to appraise established theories, doctrines, and debates of Eurocentric, male-normative ethics. Womanist discourse seeks, through its emphasis on a commitment to the “survival and wholeness of all people,”24 to destroy oppressive hierarchies that function on deliberative injustice. Womanist scholars such as theologians Jacqueline Grant and Delores Williams as well as ethicist Emilie Townes25 stress, in a manner similar to Cannon, black women’s literary tradition, sociology of black liberation, and black women’s historiography as sources for constructive womanist ethics. To evaluate the importance of Wells’s analysis of murderous vigilante justice, I modify the womanist historiographical process. 26 To accomplish this, I employ a systematic interrogatory approach to Wells’s works. In addition, because of the oral tradition that is prevalent in the culture that I share with individuals who were legally denied the right to read and write, research is not limited to books, articles, essays, and correspondence. Attention is given, for example, to the power of lynching statistics27 and photographs28 to generate unarticulated questions, to influence historical retelling, and to name present realities. Between 1892 and 1900, Ida B. Wells published three works on America’s lynching crisis. Each publication, Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases (1892), A Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynchings in the United States, 1892–1893–1894 (1895), and Mob Rule in New Orleans: Robert Charles and His Fight to the Death (1900) is, in many regards, a social ethical analysis

Introduction

11

of domestic terror in America during the late nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries.29 Wells’s critical assessment of what some scholars describe as “America’s national crime,”30 is a framework against which I examine the historical implications associated with lynching. In addition, her evaluation and subsequent alternative interpretation of specific events also function to demythologize ostensibly “benign” racial assumptions in order to broaden the ethical dialogue. When other voices enter the moral discourse, Wells’s analysis indicates that alternative responses require that we reassess our understanding regarding the relationship between Christian belief about love and Christian behavior regarding justice. Thus, Wells’s works augment the corpus of theological ethical resources that address insidious behavior in contemporary times. The scholarly discussion of Wells’s commitment to social justice has primarily focused on an analysis of her life work. Historical analyses also provide extensive insight into Wells’s response to social injustice. Mildred Thompson’s research provides a comprehensive view of Wells’s involvement in sociopolitical activities and highlights the challenges that Wells encountered as a result of her commitment to lobby for civil rights. Thompson does not, however, examine the broader implications emerging from a minority perspective that contradicts a normative depiction of American justice.31 My research is enriched by intellectual projects that explore Wells’s works from linguistics and historical perspectives as well as literature and religious viewpoints. 32 From a theological ethical perspective, Emilie Maureen Townes, who earned her doctorate from the joint Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary/Northwestern University Program in Religious and Theological Studies, presents a compelling case that Wells’s stance on liberation, reconciliation, suffering, and obedience functions as a framework to outline a contemporary womanist Christian social ethic. 33 The first scholar of religion to write about Wells, Townes’s 1989 dissertation, “The Social and Moral Perspectives of Ida B. Wells-Barnett as Resources for a Contemporary Afro-Feminist Christian Social Ethic” and published in 1993 as Womanist Justice, Womanist Hope, explores the social and moral spheres of AfricanAmerican women in the nineteenth century through Wells’s life and work with specific emphasis on Wells’s strong commitment to social justice and to the church as an active churchwoman. While Wells’s way of thinking about leadership is the principal criterion for Townes’s proposed Christian social ethic, in this book

12

Ethical Complications of Lynching

I seek to demonstrate that a change of perspective regarding sociocultural location can subsequently influence approaches to address injustice. To address inconsistencies and inequities in American society, Wells provided a cultural interpretation that would later describe the response to tyranny in America during the 1960s civil rights era. That is, she asserted that the collective strength of African Americans to recognize the power represented by the effective deployment of economies of scale might be strategically employed to produce a “bloodless revolution.” At issue is how, through a theological ethical analysis, to understand the diverse ways in which language can be used strategically to promote change in order to determine the broader moral implications associated with lynching and its residual effects. My research affirms that Wells’s recommendations were specific suggestions that required, in some cases, geographical relocation. At the same time, I explore the metaphorical connotations that arise when new descriptors, which I refer to as re-orientation, re-evaluation, and re-interpretation, are understood from two perspectives. On the one hand, these designators characterize the significance of empowerment, identity, and agency contained in her recommendation to black residents of Memphis, following that city’s first lynching since the Civil War, to boycott, migrate, and write. On the other hand, this proposed way of understanding also allows us to recognize that Wells’s suggestions can function as a guide to analyze motives and subsequent actions. Following this line of thinking, Ida B. Wells’s ethical interrogation of the public sphere in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries functions as the basis from which to construct a Christian ethic of resistance to identify, name, and confront contemporary forms of injustice in America in the twenty-first century. Most importantly, I address the need for a method that lends itself to a theological ethical analysis that takes into consideration not just the act of lynching but that which allows the use of mob violence to simulate power. In this regard, Wells’s sociocultural critique serves as a guide to facilitate an examination that explores the correlation between murders committed by mobs and societal constructions based on race, gender, and class. In addition, a review of Wells’s works requires that we identify and name deceptive expressions of authority in order to offer an alternative response to strategies employed to create a culture of fear. Attention is also given to Wells’s ethical interrogation of America’s infatuation with terror. She encouraged oppressed people and those who advocate on their behalf to work actively for justice. To abolish a pervasive and semiofficial institution, she offered a set of relevant

Introduction

13

tools that can be employed to address current issues confronting marginalized people. The tools that she recommended to “effectually stamp out lynch law, that last relic of barbarism and slavery, are boycott, emigration, and exposure in the press, and a combination of all these agencies.”34 Under consideration in my work is not just Wells’s critique of lynching in the United States from 1892 to 1910 but also factors that preceded and subsequently allowed the use of mob violence to create an impression of power. I analyze correlations between unmitigated racial violence and maintenance of social stratifications based on exploitation. To do this I situate Wells’s assessment of the nature of public life, freedom, and democracy within the broader scheme of her understanding of self and world. Finally, the significance of Wells’s 1892 recommendation to Memphis’s black residents is evaluated for its effectiveness to function as criterion for developing a twenty-first-century Christian ethic of resistance. Wells’s work illustrates the importance of examining the correlations between social concepts and moral decision making. She offered some practical options that could be implemented “to prevent lynching, to thwart anarchy and promote law and order throughout our land.”35 She encouraged people to (1) share with others her alternative presentation of the facts; (2) encourage churches and other religious organizations with which they were affiliated to communicate to their constituents that they denounce lynchings; and (3) encourage businesses not to operate in locales that actively or passively supported lynching. When Wells realized the influence she possessed to make a difference, she made a conscious decision to use writing and public speaking to participate in a reordering of society. That is, she exercised agency as an initial act of resistance that was accompanied by a commitment to name and then to assess the presenting moral problem, in this case lynching. One approach extended to us is to exhaust, as thoroughly as possible, any and all questions that enable us to begin to “peel back the layers” in order to more clearly understand a moral issue. The actualization, perhaps perceived by some as a response to a system of beliefs, is, in essence, an act of reconciliation that enables us to begin to envision things as they should be and not as they are. A challenge, though, is often how to discover or recover sources and resources that support the analysis of an alternative depiction of reality. From Wells we discern that a Christian ethic of resistance points to the importance of excavating hidden treasures that provide insight into survival techniques that emerge from oppressive situations. If we

14

Ethical Complications of Lynching

are to articulate a life-affirming counter-perspective that facilitates movement toward eradicating mistakes of the past, we must become proficient in identifying sources designed to promote justice. For this reason, we must learn how to comb library stacks. Once we are in the library stacks, we must allot time to look at titles and to peruse books that are shelved on racks immediately adjacent to an identified text. Often we will discover relevant sources that were not included in our initial query. Attention to details, such as the publisher and jacket endorsements, may also provide additional insight about a specific topic. While it is a good practice to know how to retrieve books from the shelves, it is equally important to have a broad understanding of the resources at a particular institution. For example, archived documents and rare book collections can, in some cases, function as a clue to an institution’s position on justice. In other instances these papers and often limited volumes of seminal works provide additional information on previously unidentified primary sources. In addition, because of the relatively short distribution life of publications (in many instances books are out of print in less than five years), discussions with resource librarians are almost essential. These conversations, combined with research tutorials, can lend themselves to new discoveries of periodicals, recent and / or pending publications, reliable Internet sites, and best research practices. In addition to learning how to comb library stacks, we must read newspaper articles and periodical journals on microfiche if we are to assess minority perspectives regarding justice. Since many blackowned newspapers established during the middle nineteenth- to the middle twentieth centuries are no longer operational, this is a laborious but necessary task not to mention a valuable option to engage these primary sources. Many articles archived in repositories, such as The Moorland Spingarn Library at Howard University, The Library of Congress, and The Schomburg Library, are preserved on microfiche. When reading these articles, attention should be given to those who authored the article or editorial. This is one way to determine how social location and factors such as race and gender may have impacted the message. Next, consideration must be given to the intended audience. We want to know to whom the author was speaking and why in order to determine a possible motive or maybe to determine whether there were other factors that are not necessarily explicit that motivated the writer to address a specific issue. At the same time, we list names, dates, and places referenced in the article

Introduction

15

in order to determine what additional sources might indicate about positions on a specific issue. Not only must we learn how to comb library stacks and read microfiche documents, we must also develop a skill to listen to and document oral histories. This is an art that often demands that the inquirer refrain from interrupting the speaker either to interject an opinion, to raise a question, or to clarify a statement. Rather, the purpose of learning to listen to narratives that have not been published is to determine how another version of a shared story informs participation in acts of justice. Take for instance, various accounts offered by victims of the 2006 natural disaster that virtually demolished New Orleans. In a number of documentaries on Hurricane Katrina36 the stories of displaced people give us some clues to disparities at local, state, and national levels that drastically shape a commitment to justice. The manner in which individuals were evacuated is only one example of many that point to issues of visible and invisible poverty as a factor that sometimes determines moral response. Equally important to listening to unfolding history, it still matters very much how we listen to history past. Thus, time must be devoted to hearing stories of former slaves, recorded in the early twentieth century as part of a federal government initiative, 37 tapes of 1960s civil rights workers, and songs of civil rights activists, such as Sweet Honey in the Rock, as examples of the vast resources that offer clues to constructing a just society. Print sources shelved in the library or stored on microfiche as well as oral histories are often narratives or personal perspectives that point to a larger story. Thus, it is important that we learn to interpret statistical data as one way to become adept in raising relevant questions. What I am suggesting is that we must learn how to look beyond the numbers in order to determine how the data functions. For example, as discussed earlier, Wells used lynch statistics collected and published by major Euro-American-owned newspapers but drew significantly different conclusions that subsequently served as a basis for her ethical analysis of the response to lynching. Just as Wells learned to read the numbers as a way to interpret the devastating effect of America’s almost insatiable thirst for blood-letting, so too must we learn to interpret data if we are to be justice advocates. One way to do this work of interpretation is to inquire about the source of the data. For instance, who collected and compiled it, who published it, when and where was it published, how accessible is the information, is the data verifiable and, if so, by what methods, what are prevailing and counter-perspectives about the data, what major issue or issues do the

16

Ethical Complications of Lynching

statistics address, who stands to benefit, and how, if justice is not a primary concern? Wells’s deconstructive analysis of the excuses used to justify lynching illustrates the vast resources from which we can engage in ethical conversations in the public sphere about experiences in the everydayness of life and its often accompanying disparities that, lamentably, often enable us to name accurately the madness that is denied by its architects. Last, but not least, we must search in familiar and unfamiliar sources for insight and direction. We must learn to comb electronic libraries, for example Questia.com, to read footnotes for additional clues about an issue or as a lead to track down a primary source from which to gain additional insight and direction. In addition, since distance learning is quickly becoming a significant aspect of educational delivery, consideration must be given to how to maintain data integrity in chat rooms and other modalities that support technological interaction. It is extremely important though that we become familiar with the criteria by which online resources are evaluated within the academic community. As a rule, if users can modify information, as allowed by some open source search engines, safeguards are not in place to guarantee that references can be verified at some point in the future. One way to determine the reliability of websites is to periodically peruse publications, such as The Chronicle of Higher Education, for articles on pedagogical approaches that address the use of technology in research and teaching. Finally, we should read opposing views as counterpositions often enable us to critique our claims concerning justice issues with greater clarity. Comprised of four parts, the first part is a contextual analysis of factors that influenced Wells’s commitment to confront injustice. This background information serves two purposes. First, it situates Wells within her sociohistorical context. At the same time, we can, from this biographical data, explicate some of the events that would subsequently inform Wells’s ethical interrogation of the public sphere and juxtapose her emerging ethic of resistance with the death-dealing nature of lynching reflective of the dominant culture. In the second part, Wells’s self-identification as a journalist serves as a lens to examine some of the ways in which lynching shaped public opinion. Here, I draw on the research of selected scholars, such as historians W. Fitzhugh Brundage and Philip Dray,38 outside the theological academy, to emphasize the consequential impact of racially motivated mob executions on the African-American community. Next, I employ a womanist ethical framework39 to examine lynching

Introduction

17

through the intricately connected dynamics of race, gender, and class. In this section, I evaluate the historical and contemporary implications associated with these socially constructed fragmentations for both the academy and the broader society as a way to raise awareness about the subtleness that often characterizes the manner in which domestically sanctioned forms of terror are disguised as practices that promote the common good. In the final part, I evaluate the criteria for developing a guide for a Christian ethic of resistance in the twentyfirst century based on evidence contained in Wells’s works. Wells’s advice is not limited to physical movement. But in order to determine how her specific recommendations to boycott, migrate, and write can function as constructive resources to address contemporary forms of injustice, we must consider the relevance of her social critique in relation to the symbolic meaning associated with a collective effort to employ strategies that encourage collaborative financial sanctions, geographical relocation, and a retelling of events. I stress, in particular, that both an individual and communal-sense-of-self determines, to a large extent, moral response. I make many suggestions that Wells’s ability to explain social disparities and inequities serve as a reminder that justice in America is an historical struggle with contemporary implications. Her analysis of lynchings illustrates that knowledge of past events is an important aspect of theological ethical inquiry. More importantly, she demonstrates that historical remembrance and retelling can be employed as a resource to analyze present-day realities. As Wells’s findings on lynching make clear, we can employ this intentional act of reframing narratives to construct future possibilities to minimize the perpetuation of oppressive legacies.

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Part One

Identity and Formation: Character Development and the Shaping of a “Crusader for Justice” To self-name is to recognize that agency empowers us to effect change, to tell our stories and to expand our canon. —Angela D. Sims

Accounts of enslaved, and subsequently emancipated, peoples of the African Diaspora are neither objective nor are they value free. On the contrary, narratives by and about bondspersons and freedpersons of color are written from a specific viewpoint, to a particular audience, and for a precise purpose. For example, in response to a question regarding her role as an anti-lynching spokesperson, Ida B. Wells stated that she wrote her autobiography, Crusade for Justice, in order to document her participation in the making and shaping of history. Since history can provide insight into human behavior, knowledge gaps about specific persons or events can often be addressed when we situate them in a broader context. One of the benefits associated with contextual historiography1 is the ability to comprehend more fully, or at least to engage our questions in a more informed manner as we consider the ways in which culture

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Ethical Complications of Lynching

influences our sense of justice. I find the work of Stephen B. Bevans helpful in this regard. In Models of Contextual Theology, 2 Bevans, professor of mission and culture at Catholic Theological Union, emphasizes the role of culture in theological discourse. He suggests that culture provides a lens through which we can make sense of the Christian faith. But he also recognizes that culture, the communication of meaning, can be perceived from two distinctively different perspectives. Bevans points out that there is both a classicist and an empiricist understanding of culture. From the classicist viewpoint, that which determines meaning and value is defined as normative, universal, and unchanging. Proponents of this thought contend that this concept of culture is achieved via and reflective of a western tradition. Although Bevans is not explicit, it should be noted that the classicist position is reflective of an interlocking cycle of oppression based on multiple constructions of fragmentations. In other words, it is inferred that other cultures possess similar cultural ideations, performances, and material manifestations that will, at some point, be validated as normative. From that point of view, non-western cultures are always striving to subscribe to a predetermined alien standard. Empiricists, on the other hand, offer a counter-perspective. They contend, and I concur, that culture is not normative. Rather, it is contextual and dynamic and therefore not universal. In order to determine operative values and meanings, it is imperative to interpret the signs that are specific to a particular context based on criteria that reflect a local theology versus a universally constructed concept of theology. Wells’s sense of personhood was informed by both the historical reality of life in the United States for African Americans during the first five decades following the abolition of chattel slavery and concepts of identity within the black community.3 In order to identify some factors that influenced Wells’s understanding of self, as evidenced by her sense of justice, prior to emerging as a leading antilynching spokesperson in 1892, consideration is given to (1) the black slave family’s moral situation in Mississippi during the Civil War,4 (2) the moral situation of the black family during Reconstruction, 5 and (3) a head of household’s response to the 1878 yellow fever epidemic.

Chapter One Black Slave Family’s Moral Situation in Mississippi during the Civil War

The black family, while it had no legal existence in slavery, was in actuality one of the most important survival mechanisms for the slave.1 Perhaps it was with this awareness that Elizabeth Warrenton Wells and James Wells Sr. 2 chose to marry.3 By the time the Civil War started, “the white population in 1860 was in the minority”4 and “Mississippi’s social, economic, and political institutions were hopelessly entangled in the web of slavery. An increasing dependence on staple agriculture created a slave-based cotton culture that affected all of the state’s white residents to one degree or another.”5 When Ida B. Wells, the oldest6 of Elizabeth and James Wells’s eight children, was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi, on July 16, 1862 the nation was in the second year of a civil war. At the time of Wells’s birth, “Holly Springs was one of Mississippi’s most vibrant towns.”7 But within three months after her birth, in “October 1862, General John C. Pemberton8 ordered the army to evacuate Holly Springs and the Confederates moved south through Oxford and Water Valley to Grenada. As planned, Ulysses S. Grant9 also moved south in pursuit. He occupied Holly Springs and there established a major supply depot designed to fuel his move into central Mississippi.”10 Within approximately five months of Wells’s birth, in December 1862, “the Southerners drove the federal cavalry away and afterwards Grant halted his advance to redeploy some of his men. The federal delay proved significant and made Holly Springs the focal point of what would be remembered as the greatest Confederate victory in Mississippi during the war years.”11 Furthermore, the Emancipation Proclamation that Abraham Lincoln issued on January 1, 1863 to free slaves in the Confederate states was ignored in Mississippi.

22

Ethical Complications of Lynching

Much of Mississippi embraced the ultimate act of political defiance in 1861, and many of its citizens turned their backs on the nation of their birth.12 This suggests that not all white Mississippians supported the decision to withdraw from the Union. This minority view should not, however, be misconstrued to suggest that it reflected an antislavery position. Quite the contrary, for as Wynne’s research indicates, “while slavery became an issue to be debated, and to many an institution to be defended with greater ferocity as time wore on, withdrawal from the Union was a reckless alternative by most Mississippi communities for most of the antebellum period.”13 Likewise the perpetuation of chattel slavery, whose proponents’ economic well-being the Civil War jeopardized, remained dependent upon methods of control designed to govern all aspects of slave life. It is widely acknowledged that “southern whites were brought up to believe that slaves were something less than human, that they were property unable to care for themselves without close supervision.”14 Whether slaves were subjected to physical or mental forms of punishments, slavery as a system of domination was characterized by violence. Consequently, the viability of this institution was contingent on compliance. In order to ensure minimum disruptions to this intentional method of control, slave proponents employed a number of schemes, from the lash to the auction block, to foster a sense of powerlessness among African Americans. Yet, from Wells’s limited knowledge about her parents’ experience as slaves, we can construct a snapshot to examine aspects of the black slave family’s moral situation during the Civil War. Most importantly, we can consider how Wells’s family developed survival strategies that would subsequently influence the manner in which she responded to moral dilemmas. While Wells, regrettably, did not provide extensive details about her family’s life in Mississippi during the Civil War, we do know that her “father was the son of his master, who owned a plantation in Tippah County, Mississippi, and one of his slave women, Peggy.15 Mr. Wells had no children by his wife, ‘Miss Polly,’ and my father grew up on the plantation, the companion and comfort of his old age.”16 These statements provide tremendous insight about the intricacies of the slave family’s moral situation. From these two sentences we discover that miscegenation complicated Wells’s family of origin’s life. Wells did indicate that when her father “was eighteen years old, his father took him to Holly Springs and apprenticed him to learn the carpenter’s trade, which he expected him to use on the plantation.”17 From this recollection we can question Wells’s paternal grandfather’s

Black Slave Family’s Moral Situation

23

motives and what this action might connote about his intention to free his son. Regardless of the reasons associated with this decision to outsource his son, while acquiring the skills to become an artisan, James Wells met his wife. According to Wells, her mother “was cook to old man Bolling, the contractor and builder to whom my father was apprenticed.”18 When war erupted in the United States two years later, we do not know why James and Elizabeth did not explore other options. For “by the final months of 1863, thousands of slaves had run away as federal troops moved through the Confederacy.”19 Wells’s parents were not among this group. In addition, we do not know whether their decision to remain in Holly Springs during the Civil War could be attributed to the fact that they had an infant or whether leaving would result in more than a ten-mile separation from other family members. Wells’s recollection of her mother’s experience of life within “the favorite institution of the South”20 differs, at least on the surface, from that of Wells’s father. Contrary to James Wells’s depiction of an “idyllic childhood,”21 Wells said that her mother “was born in Virginia and was one of ten children. She and two sisters were sold to slave traders when young, and were taken to Mississippi and sold again.”22 In order to understand the complexities of the black slave family’s ethical predicament in Mississippi during slavery, consideration must be given to intent. For instance, we know that Wells’s father “was never whipped or put on the auction block, and he knew little of the cruelties of slavery.”23 However, as I discuss later, James Wells remembered that his mother was beaten. We are not able to ascertain, however, whether he was branded or whether he witnessed other slaves being mistreated. It is quite possible that the lash, next to separating families, was one of the most visible signs of injustice during slavery and its historical symbolism should never be minimized. But of equal importance are the invisible wounds of slavery to the mind, heart, and soul that remain permanently etched into the psyche of those who endured and those who continue to live with the consequences of American chattel slavery. Thus, it is important that we recognize that the fact that James Wells was his father’s property and not a free-person of color is, in itself, indicative of the mental and emotional cruelties of slavery. And even though James Wells was not actually whipped, his mother was subjected to physical torture. In a conversation she overheard as a child between her father and his mother, Wells recalled that their

24

Ethical Complications of Lynching

exchange about their former slave mistress revealed that James Wells had indirectly experienced the effects of the lash. Because of their slave mistress’ treatment toward his mother, James Wells told his mother he would always remember how their slave mistress had her “stripped and whipped the day after the old man died.”24 We do not have evidence to determine whether this statement demonstrates that an agreement in some form existed between Mr. Wells and his wife. For example, we do not know whether Mr. Wells died prior to the start of the Civil War or after Mississippi’s constitutional convention voted to abolish slavery by a count of 87 to 11.25 In addition, we do not have any information that would give us insight into the dynamics of Wells’s grandmother’s interaction with her slave owners after the birth of her son. What we do know, as Blassingame emphasizes, is that “miscegenation often led to complications in the South,” and “southern white women apparently believed that they suffered most from the effects of miscegenation.”26 If this were the case, perhaps Polly Wells’s husband’s death was the first opportunity that she had to express her frustration over his sexual infidelity. While we do not know how she handled this marital dilemma while he was alive, it is unfortunate that she took her anger out on another woman who, like herself, was technically Mr. Wells’s property. What we do know is that “the shock of seeing their parents flogged was an early reminder to many black children of what slavery was,”27 and James Wells never forgot the abuse that his mother endured. Like her mother-in-law, Elizabeth Wells also experienced the sting of the lash. While we do not know by whom or why she was whipped, Wells remembered that her mother “used to tell us children how she had been beaten by slave owners and the hard times she had as a slave.”28 While autonomy, as James Childress explains, “does not necessarily imply that an individual’s life plan is created by that person de novo, it does suggest that the individual has adopted, usually reflectively and critically, a life plan as his or her own even if it was drawn from a community and a tradition.”29 This definition raises concerns about whether slaves were in a position to make independent decisions. Since Childress claims that an “essential condition is that the agent’s decisions and actions not be substantially controlled by others,” his explanation of the term does not take into consideration coping strategies employed by oppressed populations that can and should be viewed as autonomous actions. For example, adult slaves understood

Black Slave Family’s Moral Situation

25

that failure to train their children on rules governing interaction with whites could result in some form of punishment. In other words, as Blassingame explains, “since slave parents were primarily responsible for training their children, they could cushion the shock of bondage for them, help them to understand their situation, teach them values different from those their masters tried to instill in them, and give them a referent for self-esteem other than their master.”30 In addition, according to Blassingame, “the lessons the slave child learned about conformity were complex and contradictory. Recognizing the overwhelming power of the whites, parents taught children obedience as a means of avoiding pain, suffering, and death. At the same time, they did not teach unconditional submission.”31 It is important, then, that we realize, as Blassingame so emphatically reminds us, that the slave “family was . . . an important survival mechanism.”32 With this understanding, it is possible to envision that when Wells reflected on the “stony road” that her family members “trod,” she gained a better appreciation for autonomy as an act of adaptability that enabled slaves to create a counterreality. Reflecting on her father and paternal grandmother’s conversation, Wells asserted “I have never forgotten those words. Since I have grown old enough to understand I cannot help but feel what an insight to slavery they give.”33 When she thought about conditions associated with slavery, America’s peculiar institution, Wells discovered that in spite of inhumane conditions her parents demonstrated a remarkable ability to foster a sense of hope that was in stark contrast to their actual situation.

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Chapter Two Freed-Person of Color’s Moral Situation in Mississippi during Reconstruction

When Mississippi voted to abolish slavery in 1865 “times were especially tough for Mississippi’s newly freed slaves.”1 Mississippi’s decision to retain its Confederacy status2 signaled that the end of the Civil War was not, however, the end of oppressive conditions for blacks. In a move that would have devastating consequences for freed-persons of color, Mississippi adopted black codes3 to regulate African Americans’ participation in the state’s civic life. The adoption of these codes by most southern states was one way to “forecast, to a remarkable degree, the future attitude of former Confederates toward the place of blacks in the South and in American life,”4 asserted historian John Hope Franklin. Almost as a symbol of both allegiance to southern traditions and defiance of the Union’s military victory, these policies—implemented to control a recently emancipated labor pool—were essentially “systems of peonage or apprenticeship resembling slavery,”5 as historian C. Vann Woodward noted. W. E. B. Du Bois, in his extensive research on Black Reconstruction in America 1860–1880, emphasized that black codes were a vehicle by which “Mississippi simply reenacted her slave code.”6 After all, as Franklin pointed out, “most of the laws employed such terms as ‘master’ and ‘servant’ and clearly implied a distinction that consigned blacks to a hopeless inferior status.”7 Given the climate in post–Civil War Mississippi, it is now generally acknowledged that emancipation did not guarantee that basic requirements, such as employment and housing, would be readily accessible to former slaves. Wynne recounts that “from 1865 to 1867, federal troops were ordered to look out for the physical safety of the former

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Ethical Complications of Lynching

slaves, but they were also told not to interfere to any great degree with Mississippi’s civilian authorities.” Because of this stance, “federal officials in Mississippi did little to counter the laws restricting freedmen and, despite subsequent claims to the contrary, military and civilian authorities in the state generally coexisted peacefully.”8 Because of this collusion of northern and southern forces, many freed-persons of color found themselves in situations that continued to mirror former master-slave relationships. Consequently, the Union’s inability to mitigate the adverse affect of the war’s outcome on southern blacks contributed to acts of gross negligence. John Hope Franklin summarized the situation like this, “. . . the enactment of these black codes confirmed the North’s worst fears. Reformers believed that the former Confederates were attempting to re-establish slavery.”9 The black codes demonstrated southern whites’ resolve to maintain their cultural identity. Yet, in spite of the fact that “the violence directed against blacks on almost every hand indicated how determined the former Confederates were to maintain this white supremacy,”10 African Americans employed strategies to counter the effect of black codes. The manner in which blacks viewed politics, education, and religion as avenues to respond to challenges associated with their new legal classification of citizen provides insight into the moral situation of freed-persons during Reconstruction.11 When the war ended, three-year-old Ida and her parents remained in Holly Springs. As Jacqueline Jones noted in her study, freed-persons of color often worked under a contract system that did not guarantee that they would be compensated for services provided.12 In view of the fact that “times were especially tough for Mississippi’s newly freed slaves,”13 it is possible to attribute Wells’s parents’ decision not to relocate in part to an employment invitation extended by the man to whom her father was apprenticed in 1858 and for whom her mother cooked. Another reason that her parents may have remained in Holly Springs is because of its close proximity to relatives, especially to Wells’s paternal grandmother who lived about forty miles from them in Tippah County. About “Miss Peggy,” Wells tells us that “she and her husband owned and tilled many acres of land and every fall brought their cotton and corn to market.”14 Even though Wells does not tell us how or when they acquired their property, the fact that Wells’s paternal grandmother was not a sharecropper is noteworthy since “a significant change in land ownership would not be forthcoming”15 in the rural South.

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29

Regrettably the absence of any mention about the stipulations associated with the terms of agreement under which James Wells worked makes it difficult to determine the exact conditions of his employment. Foner does, however, explain that “the postwar labor shortage, indeed, gave former slaves considerable bargaining power,”16 or at least, to a certain extent, freed-persons with nonagrarian skills, such as James Wells. What Wells shares is that “. . . after the war was over Mr. Bolling urged his able young apprentice to remain with him. He did so until election time.”17 While we cannot determine the date from the aforementioned statements, an editorial footnote provided by Alfreda Duster suggests that this critical incident occurred “sometime late in 1867, when Negroes in Mississippi were given the franchise.”18 In this brief description, references to professional competence and political awareness are two significant indicators that provide additional insight about the moral situation of freed-persons of color in Mississippi during Reconstruction. Described as a competent carpenter, James Wells was about twenty-seven when Congress declared that “the southern states must ratify the Fourteenth Amendment and adopt new constitutions embodying the principle of manhood suffrage without regard to race.”19 Wells is very clear about two things: the reason her father was fired and the consequences associated with his employer’s decision. She stated that her father’s employment was terminated because “Mr. Bolling wanted him to vote the Democratic ticket, which he refused to do.”20 When James Wells voted in 1867, “there were few, if any, blacks who had previously voted in a Southern state.”21 Franklin points out that “most blacks had little knowledge of governmental machinery, but they manifested a strong desire to learn and participate. They had to overcome fears of reenslavement and reprisals by their employers and former owners for assuming their new roles as citizens.”22 As a result of his act of agency, Duster reports that Wells noted that when her father “returned from voting he found the shop locked. Jim Wells said nothing to anyone, but went downtown, bought a new set of tools, and went across the street and rented another house. When Mr. Bolling returned he found he had lost a workman and a tenant, for already Wells had moved his family off the Bolling place.”23 Wells was approximately five years old when her father made this series of independent decisions. Thus, we can only speculate that someone told her about this defining moment in her family’s life. Regardless of how she acquired this information, her

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Ethical Complications of Lynching

father’s actions illustrate that Reconstruction was a time of political and social reidentification. During a period when “Negroes were not aggressive in pressing their rights,”24 Wells’s description of what occurred as a result of her father’s decisive action demonstrates that James Wells was not intimidated by his employer. At the same time, noncompliance to prevailing customs came, sometimes, at a tremendous cost. Despite the fact that Wells’s father had financial means, a marketable skill, and housing options, his interest in politics was not without risk of potential physical harm to himself and possibly to his family. For instance, Wells said that, “long before she knew what they meant” she “heard the words Ku Klux Klan . . . and knew dimly that it meant something fearful, by the anxious way my mother walked the floor at night when my father was out to a political meeting.”25 Established in Tennessee in 1865, the Ku Klux Klan 26 described itself as an institution of chivalry, humanity, mercy, and patriotism. In actuality it was a domestic terrorist organization with the express intent to “maintain and re-establish white supremacy in the South” through “every kind of intimidation and violence against blacks and their supporters.”27 By contrast, Wells’s parents did not succumb to fear. Instead, although gender equality was still a point of contention in American society, a freed-person of color’s decision to participate in the political process symbolized a major aspect of democracy. While Wells characterized her father as civic minded, she described her mother as “a deeply religious woman,” actively engaged in the life of her children, who “won the prize for regular attendance at Sunday School.”28 Religion played a major role in southern reconstruction. To increase its presence among recently freed-persons of color, Sally G. McMillen’s research confirms that “northern missionary organizations and churches became actively involved in organizing and supporting hundreds of black Sunday schools.” She notes that “as black and white missionaries tried to assist former slaves, competition grew rapidly.” According to McMillen, “beyond teaching reading and exposing children to the Bible, missionary societies supported schools by donating money, Bibles, books, lesson plans, and periodicals, and by assisting officers and teachers as they set about their work.” Furthermore, “by 1872, white northern Methodists had more than seventy-five missionaries working in southern states, with many focusing on African Americans.”29 Although we do not have details on factors that influenced Elizabeth Wells’s concept of parenting, Wells shared that her mother “brought

Freed-Person of Color’s Moral Situation

31

us up with a strict discipline that many mothers who have had educational advantages have not exceeded.”30 Although the slave auction block had severed Elizabeth Wells’s relationship with her biological mother, Wells said that her mother “taught us how to do the work of the home—each had a regular task besides schoolwork, and I often compare her work in training her children to that of other women who had not her handicaps.”31 Wells also stated that her parents expected their children “to go to school and learn all we could.”32 While Wells could not “remember when or where she started school,”33 her “earliest recollections are of reading the newspaper to my father and an admiring group of his friends.”34 Regrettably, it cannot be concluded from her memoir whether or not her father was literate, that is able to read and/or write. Autobiographical references do, however, indicate that Elizabeth Wells accompanied her children to school until she acquired the skills that enabled her to read the Bible. At a time when it was no longer illegal for blacks to read and to write, each of Wells’s parents, in their own way, stressed the importance of education. During Reconstruction, schools, now commonly referred to as Historically Black Colleges and Universities, 35 were established throughout the South to address the educational needs of former slaves. Some were designated land-grant institutions while others were founded by organizations, such as the Freedmen’s Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church (MEC), 36 philanthropists, denominations, 37 or a combination thereof. In his study of religious reconstruction in Georgia and Tennessee during the last two years of the Civil War through the end of Federal Reconstruction in 1877, Daniel W. Stowell38 examines approaches employed by black and white Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians to address the challenges associated with religious reconstruction. His research reveals that each of these denominations took an integrated approach to educational and missionary endeavors. Stowell also mentions that “in its first year of operations in the South, the Freedmen’s Aid Society of the MEC began schools in nine southern states.”39 And as Wells mentioned, “the Freedmen’s Aid had established [in 1866] one of its schools in our town—it was called Shaw University then, but is now Rust College.”40 According to Ralph S. Morrow, the Freedmen’s Aid Society based its mission and vision on the premise that “the black man had to lift his own race” and “focused its attention on professional training, especially for the ministry and teaching.”41 To accomplish its primary

32

Ethical Complications of Lynching

objectives, “Methodist schools were designed as factories to hammer out the future leaders of the freedmen.”42 Founded by Rev. A. C. McDonald, a minister from the North, to address the educational needs of former slaves, Rust College provided instruction at all levels and grades, including the basic elementary subjects. During its initial year of operation, classes for the oldest of eleven historically black United Methodist-related colleges and universities were held at Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church in Holly Springs. On the life of the institution that she attended until 1878, Wells did not mention the fact that Richard Rust worked with Rev. Moses Adams, an African-American minister in Holly Springs. Instead, she recounted that “the bishops I had known were scholarly, saintly men in the Methodist Episcopal Church and most of the pastors we had were the same. All my teachers had been the consecrated white men and women from the North who came into the South to teach immediately after the end of the war.”43 Without further comment, Wells’s recollection corroborates Richard Rust’s vow that “the South would be evangelized” by individuals who were “of single purpose, of one work, whose souls were on fire.”44 Rust stressed that these positions would only be filled by individuals who were “known to be . . . uncompromising, anti-slavery, loyal men.”45 In his research on postsecondary education, Christopher J. Lucas devotes a chapter to the evolution of black colleges. His historical synopsis, which includes evidence dating back to rare instances of blacks earning undergraduate degrees from white colleges in the early 1800s, confirms that “supporters of black schools and colleges shared in common an ardent faith in the power of newly emancipated blacks to move into the mainstream of American society if they were afforded opportunities to do so. Black Americans, they argued, should be free to do and become what they chose, limited only by the strength of their own endeavors.”46 In light of the number of schools begun by the Freedmen’s Aid Society and other organizations we should acknowledge the validity of the Society’s claim that it, “in connection with similar organizations, has demonstrated to the South that the freedmen possess good intellectual abilities and are capable of becoming good scholars.” Society members, “recognizing the brotherhood of mankind and knowing that intellect does not depend upon the color of the skin nor the curl of the hair,” stressed they “never doubted the Negro’s ability to acquire knowledge, and distinguish himself by scholarly attainments.”47

Freed-Person of Color’s Moral Situation

33

Wells described herself as a “voracious reader.”48 She stated that she “had read all the fiction in the Sunday school library and in Rust College.”49 In addition, she shared that not only had she read the Bible in its entirety but that she “could read nothing else on Sunday afternoons at home, because my parents would not permit it.”50 Although she was introduced to classical literature, especially Shakespeare, she was not familiar with works written by African Americans; neither was she knowledgeable about different expressions within Methodism. This lack of awareness about black authors and traditionally black Methodist churches and their bishops could be due to the fact that “the African Methodist Episcopal Church had pledged not to interfere with congregations that wished to remain in the MECS.”51 Nevertheless, her experience at Rust College provided a foundation from which she would greatly benefit in the future. Most notably, her parents’ stance on politics, religion, and education functioned as avenues to foster a sense of hope-filled expectation that influenced Wells’s perception of fairness and her subsequent commitment to social justice.

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Chapter Three Head of Family’s Response to the 1878 Yellow Fever Epidemic

The year 1878 was a defining moment for Ida B. Wells. From slavery to freedom, she had witnessed and benefitted from African Americans who reinterpreted concepts of domination and autonomy, compliance and resilience, calibrated violence and moral courage, and powerlessness and agency. And when a particularly virulent variety of yellow fever1 swept up the Mississippi River from New Orleans to Memphis, responses to this plague provide additional insight about the moral character of the black family during a time of community and family crisis. Memphis had refused to close its ports to ships that were suspected of transporting patients infected with yellow fever. Carnival or Mardi Gras, rather than disease, was the primary focus. Although “no one would even know how yellow fever spread from one person to the next until 1900,”2 it was a common belief that African Americans were immune to yellow fever but whites were not. As stories of shocking accounts of fever deaths reached Memphis, panicked whites fled the city. Fearing contagion, communities quarantined themselves and turned refugees away at gunpoint. Wells, visiting her paternal grandmother in Tippah County, Mississippi, when “yellow fever was raging in Memphis, Tennessee, fifty miles away, as it had done before,”3 recalled that Holly Springs’s mayor “refused to quarantine against Memphis.” Instead, Wells’s hometown “opened its doors to any who wanted to come in.” And by “summer the fever took root in Holly Springs.”4 Wells and her relatives assumed that James Wells “would take the family out in the country with my aunt Belle, my mother’s sister; and because the mail was so irregular we didn’t expect letters.”5

36

Ethical Complications of Lynching

Wells and her extended family members would soon discover that they had misjudged James Wells’s response to Holly Springs’s crisis. After a mass exodus, Holly Springs “was left with the sick, the dying, the poor who could not leave, and the few who,” like Wells’s parents, “would not.”6 Eventually, Wells received word that “Jim and Lizzie Wells have both died of the fever. They died within twenty-four hours of each other.”7 Orphaned at sixteen, “after being a happy, light-hearted schoolgirl,”8 Wells’s initial reaction to her parents’ death was that she “wanted to go home at once.”9 Her relatives expressed concern and delayed her departure until they received “a letter from the doctor in charge, who said I ought to come home.”10 We may question whether she acted out of a sense of obligation. After all, as Wells shared with a train conductor who questioned her decision to return to Holly Springs she was “the oldest of seven living children.11 There’s nobody but me to look after them now. Don’t you think I should do my duty, too?”12 Based on an account of her father’s activities immediately preceding his death, we may also wonder whether Wells’s decision to join her siblings reflected an awareness of love of neighbor that is lived out in practical ways. Although, as I mentioned previously, Wells was not aware of black ecclesial leaders, her father’s actions mirrored those of Absalom Jones and Richard Allen during Philadelphia’s 1793 yellow fever epidemic.13 Upon her return to Holly Springs, Wells’s sister Eugenia told her that their father had nursed the sick, made coffins, delivered meals, and inquired about those who were infected and affected by yellow fever. The physician, who wrote Wells about her parents’ death, also confirmed her sister’s account of their father’s response to yellow fever in their community. In particular, Wells recalled that the doctor shared that her “father would be passing through the court house, which was used as a hospital, on his way to the shop, carrying some lumber to help make a coffin. If he passed a patient who was out of his head, he would stop to quiet him. If he were dying, he would kneel down and pray with him, then pick up his tools and go on with the rest of the day’s work.”14 James Wells worked as a carpenter for almost twenty years, seven as a slave and thirteen as a freed-person of color. When he died, he left his children three hundred dollars,15 a mortgage-free home, and no written stipulations about who would assume primary responsibility for his children in the event of his death. Perhaps, since Wells’s father was a Mason,16 it was understood he would not have to worry about his children’s welfare. For as Wells recalled, “[W]hen the fever

Head of Family’s Response

37

epidemic was over, there was a gathering of Masons at our house to decide what to do with us. Because my father had been a master Mason, the Masonic brothers were our natural protectors. The unanimous decision among the Masonic brothers was that I was old enough to fend for myself.”17 Without input from Wells, the Masons discussed and made decisions about her siblings’ living arrangements. Upon hearing the Mason’s recommendation, Wells informed them that “they were not going to put any of the children anywhere; I said that it would make my father and mother turn over in their grave to know their children had been scattered like that and that we owned the house and if the Masons would help me find work, I would take care of them.”18 During her transition from student to head of household, Wells declined well-intentioned recommendations and instead elected to become head of family, assuming primary responsibility for her five siblings. In order to care for her sisters and brothers, Wells obtained employment as a public school teacher. She received support from family and friends. During the years immediately following her parents’ death, her grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends provided assistance as Wells learned to manage multiple priorities related to household and career responsibilities. After her parents’ death, Wells had to make significant lifestyle changes. She accomplished this by exploring ways in which to broaden her circles of influence. This shift in perspective contributed to her ability to maximize opportunities. Take, for example, her decision to augment her formal education by enrolling in summer classes at Fisk University.19 This emphasis on professional development positioned Wells to be hired by multiple school jurisdictions during her tenure as a public school educator.20 Eventually, Wells’s lifestyle choices became the subject of much debate and would remain so for the remainder of her life. For example, as a single career woman, she defied existing protocol and commuted on the weekends. After relocating to Memphis in 1879, her social outings were scrutinized and her character questioned. Though only a few miles from the Mississippi border, Memphis provided an opportunity for Wells to broaden her cultural awareness. For instance, she stated that she “joined a lyceum composed mainly of teachers of the public schools” that “met every Friday afternoon in the Vance Street Christian Church” with “literary exercises consisting of recitations, essays, and debates interspersed with music.”21 Not only did she gain a tremendous appreciation for the arts, Wells also discovered that she

38

Ethical Complications of Lynching

possessed a natural talent for journalism. Her participation in this social group led to an invitation to write for religious publications, such as the Living Way, “a weekly started in 1874 in the interest of Negro Americans.”22 Writing under the pen name Iola, 23 Wells addressed local and national issues. Her articles regarding Memphis’s preferential school board practices eventually led to her contract not being renewed. In an editorial concerning this particular issue, Wells, who had been teaching in this jurisdiction for seven years, highlighted the inadequate school facilities and questioned employment practices that authorized the hiring of teachers with substandard professional qualifications. Wells was neither surprised by the board’s decision to discontinue her employment nor remorseful about her resolve to “take a chance in the interest of the children of our race.”24 When the Memphis school board rendered its decision not to renew her contract for the 1891–1892 school year, Wells realized the possibility existed to support herself from income generated as a partner in a newspaper, as well as from freelance journalism work, and elected to pursue her entrepreneurial endeavors full-time, though not without a struggle. As a young teacher in Memphis, Wells, perhaps for the first time, became conscious of class distinctions. Her position as an educator granted her access to certain venues to which she might not have otherwise been invited. At the same time, her decision to defy traditions regarding the appropriate age by which a female should marry resulted in gross gender misrepresentations. When her personal reputation was threatened, she was not swayed by negative characterizations. Instead Wells realized that she had to deal with the matter for, as she emphasized, her “good name was all that I had in the world, that I was bound to protect it from attack by those who felt that they could do so with impunity because I had no brother or father to protect it for me.” Not easily intimidated, Wells stated adamantly “that virtue was not at all a matter of the section in which one lived; that many a slave woman had fought and died rather than yield to the pressure and temptations to which she was subjected.”25 From her father—an entrepreneur, mason, and active participant in his community—Wells obtained a passion for justice and a profound understanding of self-esteem. In addition, her parents taught her to honor family commitments. James and Elizabeth Wells demonstrated that faith and action were complimentary aspects of Ida’s value system. This attributed to Wells’s ability to respond to the exigencies of life. She recognized early that tremendous personal sacrifices often

Head of Family’s Response

39

accompany our ability to fulfill obligations. Through a variety of means, she learned to skillfully apply her writing and oratorical ability to combat some of the injustices that she witnessed and experienced. Her critique of social practices resulted in an onslaught of both gender and racial recriminations. In spite of conflict encountered on many levels about distorted concepts of justice with which she contended, Wells’s sharp eye, keen insight, quick thinking, and bodacious attitude contributed to her amazing concept of “crusading for justice.”

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Part Two

A Matter of Perspective: Ida B. Wells’s Critique of Lynching From our inner strength, we acquire courage to stare hatred in the face and examine the limits to which some will go in order to manufacture a prescribed way of life. —Angela D. Sims

Lynching, without qualification, is a destructive act. In a speech delivered at Tremont Temple1 in the Boston Monday Lectureship2 on February 13, 1893, Ida B. Wells asserted adamantly that the observing and thoughtful must know that in one section, at least, of our common country, a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, means a government by the mob; where the land of the free and home of the brave means a land of lawlessness, murder and outrage; and where liberty of speech means the license of might to destroy the business and drive from home those who exercise this privilege contrary to the will of the mob. 3

To address a national sentiment expressed in these remarks, Wells’s work had two distinct purposes. She wanted to promote a collective positive self-definition of African Americans in the public sphere and “at the same time arouse the conscience of the American people to a

42

Ethical Complications of Lynching

demand for justice to every citizen, and punishment by law for the lawless.”4 James Cutler, as I indicated earlier, wrote about this “grisly chapter in American history”5 in the early twentieth century for some of the same reasons as Wells. In the foreword to his 1905 publication Lynch-Law: An Investigation into the History of Lynching in the United States, Cutler, an economics professor at Wellesley College and a visiting professor in political economy at Yale University when he conducted his research on lynch law, listed four specific objectives that he hoped his research would accomplish. From the data that informed his study, Cutler hoped to (1) determine the causes for the prevalence of the practice, (2) determine what the social conditions are under which lynch law operates, (3) test the validity of the arguments that have been advanced in justification of lynching, and (4) contribute in some measure to a better understanding of this most serious and difficult problem.6 Cutler provides a more extensive overview of the origination of the term lynch than that offered later by scholars such as civil rights historian Philip Dray and sociologist Orlando Patterson.7 As one example of many proffered definitions, Cutler referred to an 1899 legislative act in Indiana that declared that any collection of individuals assembled for any unlawful purpose intending to injure any person by violence and without authority of law shall, for the purpose of this act, be regarded as a “mob,” and any act of violence exercised by such mob upon the body of any person shall constitute the crime of “lynching,” when such act or acts of violence result in death.8

Like other “forms of collective action mob violence is more than simply random and irrational violence,”9 as historian W. Fitzhugh Brundage emphasized. This exertion of will is frequently associated with a deliberate use of coercion for self-serving purposes. As Michael J. Pfeifer explained, “[C]ollective violence most often served the goals of white supremacy, as lynchers especially targeted alleged African American offenders.”10 Published in the late twentieth century, Brundage’s research documents vicious acts of human butchery during a fifty-year period, from 1880 to 1930, in Georgia and Virginia. His results parallel the findings presented by Wells almost a century earlier. Although Brundage and sociologists E. M. Beck and Stewart E. Tolnay presented evidence that

A Matter of Perspective

43

pointed to black participation in mob violence,11 Brundage insisted that “there can be little question that lynchings were inherently conservative, directed as they were against blacks and other subordinate groups, and that the mere threat of mob violence became a form of coercion that sustained the status quo in the South.”12 Based on this, it stands to reason that such intimidating behavior can contribute to sanctioning a culture of terror as a normative social construct. Given this climate, the horrors of lynching and the sense of vulnerability it created left a permanent mark on black culture. Quite often, individuals who subscribe to a tyrannical form of government do so to protect perceived points of privilege. In response to an 1897 opinion on lynching, the Rev. Norman B. Wood, a graduate of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary of Louisville, explained what was accepted by many as a given in the United States. Wood stated correctly that “we have Anglo-Saxon law in our American code for the Anglo-Saxon civilization, which it is; and then for the new race of African citizens, the inauguration of African law in the form of lynch law.” All too often, as Wood noted, this tendency to view America and Anglo-Saxon as synonymous perpetuated America’s race problem. Given this prevalent view, Wood recognized that as “long as we have two races so diverse in genius, so long will it be necessary to adapt the forms of law to those special types of humanity, and if the statute books do not furnish them the abiding sense of justice vested in the mind of the body politic will.” For this reason, Wood surmised that “the sentiment of the South is one law, and one standard of right for the white citizen and another law, and another standard of right for the black citizen.”13 His assessment implies that active and passive participation can function to foster an environment in which, as Wells wrote, “the unsupported word of any white person for any cause is sufficient to cause a lynching.”14 Although this statement is broad and may be perceived by some as an overgeneralization, an examination of U.S. history during the period 1892–1910 supports Wells’s claim about the tendency to ignore what she characterized accurately as human slaughter. Wells asserted, in no uncertain terms, that failure to acknowledge barbaric practices that symbolize a “league with death and the covenant with hell”15 only serve to exacerbate the problem.

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Chapter Four Wells on Lynching: An Overview

Wells understood the dynamics of corrupt complicity that allowed lynching to become an almost unquestioned practice. Furthermore, her observations illustrate that justice is often determined by constructions that intersect race and gender representations. Take for instance the facts that she presented regarding a January 1, 1892 race-based lynching that were subsequently published in an October first edition of the Chicago Inter Ocean. It was reported that: 1. The woman who was paraded as a victim of violence was of bad character; her husband was a drunkard and a gambler. 2. She was publicly reported and generally known to have been criminally intimate with Coy (the alleged rapist) for more than a year previous. 3. She was compelled by threats, if not by violence, to make the charge against the victim. 4. When she came to apply the match Coy asked her if she would burn him after they had “been sweethearting” so long. 5. A large majority of the “superior” white men prominent in the affair are the reputed fathers of mulatto children.1

Wells realized that “these are not pleasant facts.” “They are,” however, “illustrative of the vital phase of the so-called race question, which should properly be designated an earnest inquiry as to the best methods by which religion, science, law and political power may be employed to excuse injustice, barbarity and crime done to a people because of race and color.” Furthermore, as Wells pointed out, “there can be no possible belief that these people were inspired by any consuming zeal to vindicate God’s law against miscegenationists of the most practical sort.” In the case referenced earlier, Wells concluded that since “the woman was a willing partner in the

46

Ethical Complications of Lynching

victim’s guilt, and being the ‘superior’ race must naturally have been more guilty.”2 Even though Wells recognized that “the power of the State, country and city, the civil authorities and the strong arm of the military power were all on the side of the mob and of lawlessness,”3 she asserted that the onus of moral responsibility should rest with the white female. In other words, Wells juxtaposed opinions about the inferiority of blacks in America against the hypocrisy surrounding interracial sexual activity to illustrate that to some extent lynching as a moral crisis could not be understood apart from the problem of the color line in the United States. We see, on a very elementary level, that Wells astutely observed that gender and class constructions can be used to foster divisions that are not necessarily based on pigmentation. According to Wells, the problem of the color line “. . . is the Banquo’s ghost of politics, religion, and sociology which will not down at the bidding of those who are tormented with its ubiquitous appearance on every occasion. Times without number, since invested with citizenship, the race has been indicted for ignorance, immorality and general worthlessness—declared guilty and executed by its self- constituted judges.”4 Her assessment demonstrates the ability of a dominant group, in this case leading white male citizens, to advance dual myths of black male bestiality and white female innocence without a requirement to confront white male promiscuity. 5 Or, as she put it, “as excuse for the same, a new cry, as false as it is foul, is raised in an effort to blast race character, a cry which has proclaimed to the world that virtue and innocence are violated by Afro-Americans who must be killed like wild beasts to protect womanhood and childhood.”6 In light of this historical reality, Wells’s comments on lynching indicate that we must seek creative ways to act on behalf of victims of violence in a society that often refuses to confront domestic forms of terror in a systematic and consistent manner. Although Wells had a definite reason for writing, her commitment to tell the truth, from a minority perspective, was not without risk. She was not naïve but her dedication to her race, as well as her sense of professionalism, compelled her to examine the facts closely. From her evaluation of data collected and published by major newspapers, coupled with her investigative reporting, Wells’s interpretation pointed to inequities in the justice system of the United States and highlighted the nation’s distorted sense of civilized behavior. In a context where African Americans were viewed by many as inferior, her cultural

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47

assessment challenged the world’s view of life in nineteenth-century America. Or as Cutler stated, “[B]y many it is believed that in no other respect to-day is American civilization so open to reproach as in its toleration of the practice of lynching, and there is an increasing demand that this summary method of administering justice be suppressed and utterly abolished.”7 A prominent spokesperson on lynching, Wells articulated atrocities that were attributed to a society established on stratifications based primarily on race, gender, and class in unambiguous terms. Aware of the complex nature of the problem confronting her, Wells’s anti-lynching apologetic was, to a large extent, based on an analysis of data contained in white newspapers.8 By using information collected and compiled by established and reputable sources endorsed by the status quo, she employed a method that is perhaps best described as a liberation praxis that recognizes that behavior is a learned experience that is subjected to socioeconomic influences. One of the ways Wells accomplished this was the manner in which she used language to raise awareness about the broader implications of lynching. We need look no further than the title page of Wells’s A Red Record for evidence of her ability to assign new meaning to familiar terms and phrases.9 Wells’s choice of words, “respectfully submitted to the Nineteenth Century civilization in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave,”10 would factor significantly in her effort to gain international support to advance her anti-lynching campaign.11 In essence, before the first paragraph of Wells’s “tabulated statistics and alleged causes of lynchings in the United States” is read, her title page implies that the information that she provides about the latter half of the last decade of the nineteenth century challenges ideas about justice in a society that self-identifies as civilized. Wells viewed this challenge to expose injustices that resulted in inhumane displays of brutality as a key aspect of her life vocation and mission. Her resulting ethical analysis reflects her ability to employ an approach that encourages raising questions and probing the depths of those queries. Consistent use of this method contributed significantly to Wells’s ability to present a different viewpoint about behaviors that were selectively condoned on the basis of established practices that were subsequently presented as commonly held traditions. What Wells accomplished is no small feat for a former slave whose formal education would perhaps be equivalent to a

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Ethical Complications of Lynching

twenty-first-century secondary education.12 Ultimately, I contend that Wells’s deliberate questioning modality can be implemented as a tool that can be employed to discern accurately that which is uniquely different yet essential to moving toward a collective understanding of what constitutes justice.

Chapter Five Investigating Facts

Ida B. Wells, writing twenty-seven years after Mississippi passed legislation1 that freed her from a perpetual state of bondage, employed journalistic skills to evaluate a moral problem.2 Wells’s committed determination to document southern horrors led to her emergence as a leading nineteenth-century anti-lynching advocate. She couched the purpose of her analysis in biblical language. She said that her goal “is not a shield for the despoiler of virtue, nor altogether a defense for the blind Afro-American Sampsons who suffer themselves to be betrayed by white Delilahs.”3 Wells did not deny the existence of racially based sexual crimes. She did, however, suggest that some of the charges were deceptive allegations to avoid public disclosure of consensual biracial relationships. Thus, of primary importance to Wells, as she noted in Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases, was the ability to: A. Give the world a true, unvarnished account of the causes of lynch law in the South; B. Contribute to truth, an array of facts, the perusal of which it is hoped will stimulate this great American Republic to demand that justice be done though the heavens fall; C. Accept responsibility for showing that the Afro-American race is more sinned against than sinning; D. Contribute toward proving that the Afro-American is not a bestial race.4

While it is impossible to know the exact number of persons who were lynched in any given year, 5 the 1892 lynch statistics Wells obtained from the Chicago Tribune indicated that of the 241 documented lynchings6 160 “were of Negro descent.”7 Because the individuals were

70 58

60 50

46

40

6

3

6

1

Self-defense

2

Desperadoes

4

Rioting

6

Race prejudice

1

No offense

1

Incendiarism

4

Unknown offense

Murder

Insulting women

Attempted rape

Rape Figure 5.1

6

Fraud

1

0

Larceny

2

Attempted murder

2

Assault and battery

11

10

Robbery

20

Suspected robbery

30

Charges Alleged against Blacks Lynched in 1892.

Source: Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 82–87. Data compiled from lynch law statistics, which, according to Wells, were published in the Chicago Tribune on January 1, 1894. See Wells’s Chapter II: “Lynch Law Statistics in a Red Record” for additional details.

300

269

250

253

200 150

13

10

7

5

4

Burglary

27

Miscegenation

32

Rioting

37

Making threats

44

50

Quarreling with white men

100

Race prejudice

Unstated reasons

Incendiarism

Robbery

Murder

Rape

0

Figure 5.2 Charges Alleged against Black Men Lynched (January 1, 1882—January 1, 1892). Source: Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 82–87. Data compiled from lynch law statistics, which, according to Wells, were published in the Chicago Tribune on January 1, 1894. See Wells’s Chapter II: “Lynch Law Statistics in a Red Record” for additional details.

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51

subjected to a most vile form of vigilante justice, it was often difficult to determine the validity of the charges. However, of the reported lynchings, figure 5.1 shows that the majority of the purported crimes in 1892 were for murder (fifty-eight) and rape (forty-six).8 When we look at raw data for the period January 1, 1882–January 1, 1892 (see figure 5.2), it is quite plausible to understand why the 1892 reasons ascribed to lynching caused Wells, upon close examination, to question the allegations. For instance, the average number of black men lynched for rape and murder between January 1, 1882 and January 1, 1892 is approximately twenty-seven and twenty-five, respectively. Based on this, the number of black men lynched in 1892 for rape increased by almost 70 percent while the number of black men lynched during the same year for murder more than doubled. It is important to note, though, that Wells did not condone criminal behavior. She stressed that “the Negro does not claim that all of the one thousand black men, women and children, who have been hanged, shot and burned alive during the past ten years, were innocent of the charges made against them. But we do insist that the punishment is not the same for both classes of criminals.”9 Of primary concern for Wells was the reason for increased lynchings and the ineptness of elected officials at the local, state, and/or national level to act in a just manner. She took the position that “it should be already established as a fact and not as a theory, that every human being must have a fair trial for his life and liberty, no matter what the charge against him.”10 Since attempts were sometimes made to rationalize this depravity, suggesting that lynchings were “the result of frustrations caused by the inability to predict the outcome of a trial,”11 to provide an account of lynching from the underside was not a pleasant but a necessary task for Wells. The lynching of individuals with whom she was personally acquainted prompted Wells to consider that an innocent person could become the victim of mob violence for any reason. She realized that this was especially true for southern blacks and commented that “the mob spirit has grown with the increasing intelligence of the AfroAmerican. It has left the out-of-the-way places where ignorance prevails, has thrown off the mask and with this new cry stalks in broad daylight in large cities, the centres of civilization, and is encouraged by the ‘leading citizens’ and the press.”12 In addition, the 1892 lynch statistics indicate that a black man could be lynched on a variety of charges that included, but were not limited to, self-defense, fraud,

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Ethical Complications of Lynching

insulting women, and suspected robbery.13 In her effort to challenge an almost unquestioned practice, Wells’s persistence to examine alleged causes used to justify lynching can be described as a living into vocation. In a letter dated October 25, 1892, Frederick Douglass endorsed Wells’s initial publication “on the lynch abomination now generally practiced against colored people in the South.”14 Born Frederick Augustus Bailey in July 1818 on a slave plantation in Maryland,15 Douglass “rose through the ranks of the antislavery movement in the 1840s and 1850s to become black America’s most electrifying speaker and commanding writer.”16 Most recognized for his oratorical abilities during his lifetime, it is Douglass’s commitment to social justice issues such as slavery, franchise, and women’s rights that make him one of the world’s most prominent human rights advocates. Primarily self-educated, at twenty Douglass wrote his narrative. Given his fugitive slave status in 1845, Douglass exercised tremendous courage when he published an account of his life as a slave. To minimize the possibility of his capture and return to bondage, his abolitionist friends arranged for him to spend almost two years overseas. Douglass used this time in Ireland, Scotland, and England to stress the inhumane conditions associated with slavery in the United States. This initial international exposure influenced his abolitionist stance. When he presented an antislavery apologetic based on his interpretation of the equality of all people contained in key documents upon which the United States was founded, Douglass called into question the argument of abolitionists who “regarded the Constitution as a slaveholding instrument.”17 The editor of the Rochester, New York antislavery newspaper, The North Star and an Underground Railroad conductor, Douglass was appointed U.S. minister to Haiti in 1889. It was in this ambassadorial capacity that Douglass represented Haiti during the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago as well as sought to provide a forum for the contributions of black citizens of the United States to be recognized. Although Wells opposed Douglass’s recommendation that African Americans participate in the World’s Fair, she noted in her autobiography that without his involvement in this venue on behalf of Haiti “. . . Negroes of the United States would have had no part nor lot in any official way in the World’s Fair. For the United States government had refused her Negro citizens participation therein.”18 Less than a half century after his initial antislavery trip to England, Douglass commended Wells for her effort to both outline the problem

Investigating Facts

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of lynching and to offer a solution to address this issue. With skilled succinctness, he also made several key observations. For example, he contended that Wells offered, with “convincing power,”19 an exceptional account of lynching that surpassed efforts to evaluate the situation put forth by him and other undisclosed individuals. Wells and historian John Nerone provide supporting evidence to substantiate Douglass’s assertion. For example, Wells’s June 1892 editorial is remarkably similar to Jesse C. Duke’s, publisher of the Montgomery Herald, August 13, 1887 editorial. Duke’s editorial, quoted in part by Wells and included in Nerone’s Violence against the Press, noted that Every day or so we read of the lynching of some negro for the outraging of some white woman. Why is it that white women attract negro men now more than former days? There was a time when such a thing was unheard of. There is a secret to this thing, and we greatly suspect it is the growing appreciation of the white Juliet for the colored Romeo, as he becomes more and more intelligent and refined. If something is not done to break up these lynchings, it will be so after a while that they will lynch every colored man that looks at a white woman with a twinkle in his eye. 20

Like Duke, Wells uttered a warning that care should be given to the long-term implications of this charge. Both editors went to the heart of the matter and declared that the southern white man’s ego and the white woman’s character were at stake. Another aspect of Douglass’s review of Wells’s work spoke to her journalistic and analytical ability. In his evaluation of her work, Douglass stated that “you give us what you know and testify from actual knowledge. You have dealt with the facts with cool, painstaking fidelity and left those naked and uncontradicted facts to speak for themselves.”21 Finally without discrediting other interpretations of lynching, Douglass applauded Wells for her contribution for both its present and future benefit. He declared that “if American conscience were only half alive, if the American church and clergy were only half Christianized, if American moral sensibility were not hardened by persistent infliction of outrage and crime against colored people, a scream of horror, shame, and indignation would rise to Heaven wherever your pamphlet shall be read.”22 Although we are not given any particulars, it is admittedly possible that this rhetorical method can be employed as a strategy to encourage the serious student of current events (history past, present, and

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future) to contrast the veracity of popular cultural views on lynching with Wells’s analysis of the situation. At the same time, Douglass stressed that “even crime has the power to reproduce itself and create conditions favorable to its own existence.”23 Nevertheless, he was adamant that Wells “must still think, speak and work, and trust in the power of a merciful God for final deliverance.”24 In other words, he encouraged Wells to expose injustice through a commitment to assess the evidence from multiple perspectives in order to determine how to develop, implement, and evaluate alternative approaches that take seriously the impact of policies designed to control human behavior through the construction of fear. Like Douglass, journalism and public speaking became vehicles that Wells used to provide a social analysis of lynching as a moral problem and ethical dilemma that pervaded many aspects of American culture. In his interdisciplinary study on race, violent crime, and American culture, political scientist James W. Clarke’s research indicated that “sociologists have attempted to discover the causes of lynching by statistically analyzing such data as demographic characteristics, election returns and economic cycles. But the inconclusive results of these studies suggest that lynching was not closely associated with census figures, voter preferences, or fluctuations in the business cycle.”25 As scholars continue to explore the multiple dimensions of lynching, considerable care must be taken to avoid an oversimplification of techniques that Kelly Brown Douglas accurately describes as “the most violently gruesome weapons used by white society to maintain power over black men and women, particularly during the Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction South.”26 It is virtually impossible to read and not be affected by lynching techniques. Rather than list some of the horrific practices noted by Wells and other scholars, I offer this personal characterization to stress why we must avoid a tendency to sanitize barbaric methods: The citizens broke into the penitentiary and without any resistance from law officials got their man. Dragged through the street in the middle of the day, knives were plunged into the targeted victim as the mob led the defenseless man to the execution site. Members of the mob tied their helpless prey to a tree and prepared him for the slaughter. The noose was tightened. The rope ate into this man’s suspended body. Thoughts of his parents, his partner, his children, his friends, his acquaintances raced through his mind as bullets were pummeled into his almost lifeless physique. While still conscious, he felt the intensity

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of the fire eat into his flesh and the whip lash against his smoldering frame. “Death at the hands of unknown persons” was not swift. While the flames ate away at his flesh, his final conscious memory was that of his body being quickly dismembered as photographers took pictures from different angles. He wondered if the children, the virtuous women, and the chivalrous men in the crowd would have nightmares. Perhaps they, like their parents and others who stood in the crowd waiting for him to take his final breath, had become desensitized to a madness that knew no limits.

In Southern Horrors, Wells provided a plethora of examples to support her position. Beginning her argument with, “The Offense,” Wells presented a critique on the cult of true womanhood and its impact on the outgrowth of dominant assumptions and prevalent thinking. Historian Barbara Welter’s 1966 essay, “The Cult of True Womanhood: 1820–1860,”27 was the first to define and map a specific ideology of gender that circumscribed women’s identity and behavior. The idea of “The Cult of True Womanhood,” or “the cult of domesticity,” sought to assert that womanly virtue resided in piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity.28 Almost forty-five years after Wells made an assertion regarding the use of lynching as a vehicle to address alleged rapes of white women the Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching put forward the same argument. 29 W. Fitzhugh Brundage, a historian, agrees with several scholars that “the preoccupation with sexual attacks also was an expression of concern about the apparent weakening of conventional standards of sexual behavior and traditional gender roles.” Brundage’s research reveals that “white southerners, who clung ‘with a vengeance’ to a particularly potent blend of Victorian values, placed an inordinate stress on the dangers that uncontrolled sensuality posed not only to conventional morals but also to civilization itself.” In many respects, Brundage’s findings confirm that “in an era of rapid social and economic change, when patriarchal rule faced trials from a nascent women’s movement and the expanding economic role of women, polemics about the threat of sexual assault exposed the desperate efforts of white men to reaffirm their dedication to the idealization of male chivalry and shore up the traditional dependence of white women.”30 Yet, as Wells, Clarke, and Brundage point out, a similar reaction is not forthcoming when the victim is a black woman. Wells gave examples to substantiate her assessment of the situation. In a description of one particular incident, Wells said that “it was a deed dastardly

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enough to arouse Southern blood, which gives its horror of rape as excuse for lawlessness, but she was an Afro-American. The case went to the courts, an Afro-American lawyer defended the men and they were acquitted.”31 Careful not to minimize the physical and emotional trauma associated with rape, additional information regarding the circumstances under which a black attorney represented the perpetrators of this crime might provide additional insight into late nineteenth-century cultural nuances that cut across color, gender, and class lines. This would be especially beneficial in light of Clarke’s conclusion that neither whites nor blacks were ever lynched for raping black women.32 Unfortunately, because of the nature of lynching, it is virtually impossible to document this assertion. Yet, we can assume that even though research by some scholars provides evidence that blacks participated in mob butchery, it is unlikely that a “death at the hands of persons unknown” would have gone uninvestigated in the disappearance of a white man. In chapter two, “The Black and White of It,” Wells continued to build her case. She presented a race and class analysis that illustrated the strategic nature of systemic oppression. To illustrate this point, she summarized several Memphis cases during the years 1885–1892. One example she offered was a mutually consenting sexual liaison between a white married woman and a black married man. The spouse of a minister who spent a significant amount of time traveling, the white woman cried rape when she thought that she might be pregnant. Of note in this particular incident though is the woman’s husband’s reaction when, four years after the man’s conviction for rape, his wife admitted her role in the affair. Not only did the minister file for divorce, he also requested that an innocent man be released from prison. Wells did not, however, provide an analysis of this response. Instead, she used this example to emphasize the dynamics of race and gender when a member of the majority culture chose to protect a standard of living even if it jeopardized someone else’s life. According to Wells “there are thousands of such cases throughout the South, with the difference that the Southern white men in insatiate fury wreak their vengeance without intervention of law upon the Afro-American who consort with their women.”33 I take exception, though, with Wells’s assessment of an example in which a white girl’s accusation of assault by a black man did not result in a conviction. Wells attributed the defendant’s acquittal to a lack of evidence to substantiate the charge. Wells’s lack of details related to

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this 1885–1886 incident in Memphis to support how she arrived at this conclusion prompts me to speculate why the jury arrived at a nonguilty verdict. I find Wells’s analysis problematic since she presented similar examples, such as the one noted in the previous paragraph, to illustrate that convictions for sexual assault were not dependent on the presentation of concrete evidence. In fact, Brundage pointed out that “loose definitions of sexual assault provided a convenient pretext to lynch black men for offensive behavior that even white southerners could not construe as a sexual threat.”34 Brundage further noted that “occasionally, there were surprising instances in which the circumstances of a case were taken into account and summary punishment was not inflicted upon the accused criminal.” In some of these cases, Brundage stated that “family and relatives of alleged rape victims might plead with mobs to allow the courts to punish the alleged assailant, and the public might take into account the age and repute of the parties involved as well as other mitigating conditions.”35 In this particular instance, Wells fails to give us enough documentation to support her conclusion regarding the lack of evidence as the basis for acquittal. For instance, she did not take into consideration how information about the alleged victim and accuser influenced the subsequent verdict. In addition, she did not address the racial climate in Memphis that attributed to the accuser not being lynched by a mob. Further elaboration by Wells might possibly have given us valuable insight about the judge and the existing legal system with specific attention to changes that occurred between this reported account and the March 1892 lynching of Thomas Moss and his business partners. To somewhat rectify the analytical weakness in chapter two, Wells put forth some insightful observations in the third chapter. Her evaluation of the almost unquestioned acceptance of “The New Cry” of rape to justify lynching points to what Anne P. Rice, in her introduction to Witnessing Lynching: American Writers Respond, credits to the creation of a climate of terror. After all, as Rice writes, “the racial and sexual mythology of southern apartheid demanded that even consensual sex between a black man and a white woman be punished by death.”36 Wells noted that it is important to recognize that in order “to palliate this record (which grows worse as the AfroAmerican becomes intelligent) and excuse some of the most heinous crimes that ever stained the history of a country, the South is shielding itself behind the plausible screen of defending the honor of its women.”37 Yet the reputation of all female citizens was not at issue.38 As Wells noted, citing a Chestertown, Maryland case as a basis for

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her assessment, “when that poor Afro-American was murdered, the whites excused their refusal of a trial on the ground that they wished to spare the white girl the mortification of having to testify in court.”39 This position reinforces Wells’s conclusion that “this cry has had its effect. It has closed the heart, stifled the conscience, warped the judgment and hushed the voice of press and pulpit on the subject of lynch law throughout this ‘land of liberty.’ ” Wells gave voice to the hypocrisy that characterized lynching. She observed that “men who stand high in the esteem of the public for Christian character, for moral and physical courage, for devotion to the principles of equal and exact justice to all, and for great sagacity, stand as cowards who fear to open their mouths before this great outrage.” In fact, as far as Wells was concerned, silence was an act of conspiracy whereby “they do not see that by their tacit encouragement, their silent acquiescence, the black shadow of lawlessness in the form of lynch law is spreading its wings over the whole country.”40 Although Wells did not go into detail, she referenced actions by Oscar B. Fitzgerald and Benjamin Tillman. Fitzgerald, “editor of the Christian Advocate when he was elected bishop of the Methodist Church South in 1890,”41 “excused and condoned lynching on the grounds of defending the honor of white women.”42 When he was elected governor of South Carolina, Tillman “called lynching a blot on our civilization and noted that since whites controlled every aspect of the criminal justice system it was simply infamous that resort should be had to lynch law.”43 Yet, prior to the start of his second term, Tillman became an advocate of lynch law. Wells noted that “men who, like Governor Tillman, start the ball of lynch law rolling for a certain crime, are powerless to stop it when drunken or criminal white toughs feel like hanging an Afro-American on any pretext.”44 With ecclesial and political endorsements, the problem of lynching along sexually and racially manufactured lines is exacerbated and justice becomes little more than an illusion. African Americans and European Americans accepted the word of ordained clergy and elected officials without considering the impact that a subculture of condoned vigilante activity had on society at large. Due process was not a primary concern and when the cry of rape echoed throughout the land questions about mulatto children and the white men who slept with their black mothers were frequently rendered taboo for discussion in the public sphere. We dare not mention black men’s inability to intervene on behalf of black women attacked by white men

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without fear of further retaliation nor discuss the manner in which African-American men were portrayed in the larger society. In “The Malicious and Untruthful White Press,” Wells pointed out that within her own profession white journalists’ subjective use of the power of the pen justified lynch law by dehumanizing blacks. Characterized by some white journalists as “beastial and roving ruffians,”45 newspaper articles could further incite the fury associated with mob rule. Wells referenced one such article in which the writer contributed this animalistic behavior to the demise of slavery and maintained that the generation of Negroes which have grown up since the war have lost in large measure the traditional wholesome awe of the white race which kept the Negroes in subjection even when their masters were in the army, and their families left unprotected except by the slaves themselves. There is no longer a restraint upon the brute passion of the Negro.46

Based on this claim, lynching was very much a symbol of control. The rope and fagot, burning and maiming, and other grotesque forms of inhumane treatment were designed to communicate a specific message. Take for instance the response to a self-generated question regarding a viable option to address the perceived problem of an increase in incidences of the rape of white women by black men. Referencing an article printed on May 17, 1892 in two Memphis newspapers, Wells used the following to illustrate the extent to which the press could malign a people in order to shape public opinion. While the unidentified author is unquestionably correct that the crime of rape is always horrible, the emphasis on race can be interpreted to infer that blacks are not appalled by this act as well as to suggest that black women are not raped. The writer emphasized that for southern white men there is nothing which so fills the soul with horror, loathing and fury as the outraging of a white woman by a Negro. It is the race question in the ugliest, vilest, most dangerous aspect. The Negro as a political factor can be controlled. But neither laws nor lynchings can subdue his lusts. Sooner or later it will force a crisis. We do not know in what form it will come.47

That time came for Wells in a defining tragic moment in which her goddaughter’s father and his two business partners were lynched in Memphis. Wells described Thomas Moss and his associates as

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“peaceful, law-abiding citizens and energetic business men.”48 By contrast, “the dailies and associated press reports heralded these men to the country as ‘toughs’ and ‘Negro desperadoes who kept a low dive.’ ”49 In response to this character assassination, Wells recognized that “the mob-spirit was not to be satisfied until the paper which was doing all it could to counteract this impression was silenced.”50 The individuals who destroyed the Free Speech did not realize that at a deeper level they were perhaps instrumental in reshaping Wells’s understanding of the power of words to convey messages of truth, courage, and hope. Furthermore, Wells noted that lynching reflected “a growing disregard of human life.”51 Consequently, this false concept of justice is based on exaggerated representations of a targeted population. The ability to use language to shape a society’s sense of social justice illustrates what Wells characterized as “The South’s Position.” In the penultimate chapter, Wells compared and contrasted the almost unnoticeable differences between the manner in which blacks were treated during the “Antebellum South and the New South.”52 Wells challenged the prevailing notion that “the South is brutalized to a degree not realized by its own inhabitants, and the very foundation of government, law and order, are imperiled.”53 She examined the exchange of one form of tyranny for another type of bondage and insisted that “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.”54 In the final chapter, “Self Help,” Wells accurately observed that southern community and business leaders maintained a laissez faire approach to incidents of lawlessness. Tolnay’s and Beck’s findings were similar. In their study of lynching in ten southern states, they confirmed that “when newspapers reported that a lynch mob included many prominent and respected members of the white community, they not only legitimated mob violence, but also left the clear message of racial solidarity—of all whites united against the common foe.”55 While exceptions most certainly existed Wells stated that in several reported lynch cases in which the perpetrators were known, an attempt was not made to “bring the lynchers to justice.”56 For instance, in response to Memphis’s March 1892 lynching, Wells explained that “a meeting of white citizens in June, three months after

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the lynching, passed resolutions for the first time, condemning it. But they did not punish the lynchers. Every one of them was known by name, because they had been selected to do the dirty work, by some of the very citizens who passed these resolutions.”57 Wells attributed this attitude to the majority culture’s self-centered focus to employ whatever means were necessary to maintain an accustomed lifestyle and stressed that “the race thus outraged must find out the facts of this awful hurling of men into eternity on supposition, and give them to the indifferent and apathetic country.”58 To deal with this indifference toward lynching and its impact on society, Wells proposed a strategic option that would later describe a response to tyranny in the United States advanced by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in his efforts on behalf of oppressed persons. To abolish pervasive and semiofficial institutions, 59 Wells offered a set of relevant tools that we can employ to address current human rights violations. She encouraged subjugated people, and those who advocate on their behalf, to employ a variety of nonviolent strategies in their efforts to work actively for justice.

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Chapter Six Interpreting Data

A critical engagement of Ida B. Wells’s A Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynchings in the United States, 1892–1893–1894, reveals her ability to uncover hidden values that reflect a countercultural perspective that demands a recasting of narratives in order to ascertain truth. A skillful strategist, Wells used her rhetorical skills to challenge contemporary viewpoints regarding civilized existence in nineteenth-century America. Wells juxtaposed concepts of liberty, codified in the constitution, against the reality of lynch law in the United States to demonstrate that “whatever faults and failings other nations may have in their dealings with their own subjects or with other people, no other civilized nation stands condemned before the world with a series of crimes so peculiarly national.” As far as Wells was concerned, “it becomes a painful duty of the Negro to reproduce a record which shows that a large portion of the American people avow anarchy, condone murder and defy the contempt of civilization.”1 Given the complexity of mob violence, Wells’s second publication is a specific account of important information about a particular demographic component. Wells’s opening remarks to A Red Record indicate that the “student of American sociology will find the year 1894 marked by a pronounced awakening of the public conscience to a system of anarchy and outlawry which had grown during a series of ten years to be so common, that scenes of unusual brutality failed to have any visible effect upon the humane sentiments of the people of our land.”2 The gravity of this statement suggests that mob rule had become synonymous with accepted forms of tyranny. In other words, lynching, through the use of terror, had become the mechanism to maintain indefinitely certain social customs. Execution, without a

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judicial requirement that enacted statutes may not contain provisions that result in the unfair, arbitrary, or unreasonable treatment of an individual, was therefore believed to have the power to cure all social ills. In essence, the abolition of chattel slavery had the chilling and numbing effect of advancing the idea of white supremacy. As I stated in the prologue, quoting sociologist Jonathan Markovitz, “lynching was always intended as a metaphor for, or a way to understand, race relations.”3 Markovitz goes on to explain that “while there were many different types of lynchings, lynch mobs typically worked to ensure that black audiences were aware of the strength of white supremacy and the costs of violating the boundaries of the racial order.”4 In his analysis of lynching, Brundage concluded that there was a ritualistic aspect associated with lynching and that “the ideology of white supremacy gave license to violence of all kinds against blacks, but, because white southerners attached varied and contradictory meanings to the slogan of white supremacy, white violence against blacks necessarily took myriad forms.” Furthermore, “even if most whites were committed to defending white power and maintaining the subordinate status of blacks, they advocated a wide range of strategies, including conflicting methods, to accomplish that end.”5 Thus, tools to enforce conformity to prevailing racial roles resulted in what Wells described as “a new system of intimidation” in which “the Negro was not only whipped and scourged; he was killed.”6 In his essay “The Prophetic Tradition in Afro-America,” Cornel West provides evidence to support his claim that “black prophetic practices best exemplify the truncated content and character of American prophetic practices; they reveal the strengths and shortcomings, the importance and impotence, of prophetic activities in recalcitrant America.”7 West goes on to say that “black prophetic practices assume that—after the most intense scrutiny—some ultimate sense of a morally grounded sense of justice ought to prevail in personal and society affairs.”8 Wells’s ability, in her 1910 essay “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings,” to exegete accurately her social context indicates that she understood that her analysis of contemporary manifestations of injustice were directly related to and informed by practices of a not-so-distant past whose very existence was predicated on the exploitation, by whatever means necessary, of human beings, primarily those of African descent. While she did not address the issue of gender inequality, her assessment of practices that

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contradicted laws is still remarkable given the era in which she wrote. Her analysis of the freedom to vote pointed to a larger social issue. Wells noted correctly that one-third of the states of the union have made and enforced laws which abridge the rights of American citizens. Although the Constitution specifically says, no state shall do so, they do deprive persons of life, liberty and property without due process of law, and do deny equal protection of the laws to persons of Negro descent. The right of citizens to vote is denied and abridged in these states, on account of race, color and previous condition of servitude, and has been so denied ever since the withdrawal of the United States troops from the South. This in spite of the fifteenth amendment, which declares that no state shall do this.9

Wells’s choice of language suggests that she targeted a specific audience to present the results of her analysis of lynchings that occurred during a three-year period from 1892 to 1894. She wrote during an era in which liberal thought concerning constitutionalism, wider suffrage, toleration of dissent, absence of arbitrariness, and policies designed to promote happiness had acquired powerful advocates in Britain and other European countries and in the United States. Despite a prevalent tendency to find fault within the United States, European visitors considered this country an exemplar of liberalism because of its popular culture, emphasis on equality, and wide suffrage. Even though Wells did not identify her desired reading group, it was probably not coincidental that she submitted her findings to the nineteenth-century civilization in the “land of the free and the home of the brave.” Perhaps she hoped to capture the attention of individuals who had already demonstrated a willingness to stand with and work on behalf of people who were perceived as less than fully human. Wells attended a school founded by the Northern Methodist Church and was, herself, living proof, that “when emancipation came to the Negroes, there arose in the northern part of the United States an almost divine sentiment among the noblest, purest and best white women of the North, who felt called to a mission to educate and Christianize the millions of southern ex-slaves.”10 At the same time, Wells knew from personal experience and from the unfolding historical record of the United States that it took a tremendous amount of courage to defy social norms. Reflecting on the challenges

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that female missionary-teachers faced during Reconstruction Wells recalled that these young women braved dangers whose record reads more like fiction than fact. They became social outlaws in the South. The peculiar sensitiveness of the southern white men for women, never shed its protecting influence about them. No friendly word from their own race cheered them in their work; no hospitable doors gave them the companionship like that from which they had come. No chivalrous white man doffed his hat in honor or respect. They were “Nigger teachers”— unpardonable offenders in the social ethics of the South, and were insulted, persecuted and ostracized, not by Negroes, but by the white manhood which boasts of its chivalry toward women.11

Reverdy Cassius Ransom offered12 a prophetic sermonic complement to Wells’s international anti-lynching campaign. Founder and builder of churches, literary genius, author of many books and pamphlets,13 civil rights activist, editor, and preacher, Ransom was one of the most important black churchmen of the first half of the twentieth century. Born in Flushing, Ohio, in 1861, Ransom lived all of his life in the North. Licensed to preach in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in 1883, Ransom completed his schooling at Wilberforce University in 1886 and began his service as an itinerant minister. His ordination to the diaconate in 1886 was followed two years later by his ordination as an elder. In 1924, Ransom was elected the forty-eighth bishop of the Church and retained that position until his retirement in 1952. For Ransom, to be Christlike required a concern for the condition of African Americans. Daily contact with those who were suffering raised questions for Ransom concerning the relationship between human suffering and the Christian God. Making use of the social gospel and its implicit liberal theology, Ransom constructed a working response. He argued that the proper practice of Christian principles, understood through a liberal theological lens and democratic ideals, did not allow for the avoidance of hard race issues. Thus, the social gospel and its implementation provided him with a theoretical framework for an evaluation of the black existential situation. Ransom was one of the few AME ministers to openly advocate socialism as the answer to the nation’s socioeconomic and political problems in general and African Americans’ problems in particular. As early as 1897, he suggested that since the great majority of blacks

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belonged to the proletarian class, it would be the socialists who, believing like Jesus “that the rights of men [sic] are more sacred than the rights of property,”14 would bring about the solution of the race problem. Based on this assessment, we can surmise that Ransom’s understanding of socialism entailed the full enactment of democracy and equality. Casting it in terms of communal cooperation and a Christian code of ethics, Ransom argued that socialism allowed for the unity and selfless sharing earmarking the gospel of Christ. In 1912, as a member of the AME’s Committee on the State of the Country, Ransom, along with others, spoke of the danger to American institutions involved in increasing prejudice, discrimination, and mob violence and called on all members of the race to exert themselves like men and women against those who were cheating the race out of the priceless heritage of their citizenship. According to Ransom, the sense of full humanity and community espoused in socialism was the only way to provide the type of level playing field necessary for the development of the United States in keeping with its ideals and desires outlined in its early founding documents. Ransom sought to rethink the sense of Manifest Destiny of the United States, which he viewed as a warped concept of divine privilege that allowed for the abuse of others, and to replace it with a commitment to the welfare of all humanity, both at home and abroad. The term Manifest Destiny, introduced by John Louis O’Sullivan, a New York journalist of Irish descent, in 1845, originally referred to the annexation of Texas and the adjustment of the Oregon boundary dispute. However, by the middle of the nineteenth century Manifest Destiny was viewed by many as a belief that the United States was destined to expand across the continent, by force if necessary. Robert W. Johannsen said that “what has not been generally recognized, if it is known at all, is that there was nothing in O’Sullivan’s statements to suggest territorial expansion by force.”15 O’Sullivan did, however, emphasize the belief that the United States was guided by a providential destiny, in other words, that the nation had a preordained, God-sanctioned mission to fulfill. His words reflected the boundlessness, the rejection of limits on national as well as individual development, and an impatience with anything that restrained or inhibited progress that characterized what the Romantics called the “spirit of the age.” It was destiny, moreover, that tied territorial expansion to the American mission. Mission and expansion were inseparably linked by Manifest Destiny.16

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The controversy over slavery further fueled expansionism, as the North and South each wanted the nation to admit new states that supported its section’s economic, political, and slave policies. An eloquent and influential spokesperson for racial justice, Wells described Ransom as one of the most effective and well-known ministers in Chicago. For Ransom, working for God was synonymous with working on behalf of humanity. He asserted that an act of justice was the ability to make the gospel plain by placing the essentials of the Christian message within a contemporary and relevant language and context. For instance, his speeches and sermons addressed the epidemic of mob violence and disgust with the press’s attitude. Ransom argued that lynching was a means of social control that had nothing to do with the maintenance of law and order. Rather, lynching allowed white Americans to maintain an unfair advantage in the major arenas of life. Ransom admitted that African Americans could only save themselves from these barbarities by making use of their political power and through self-defense. While Wells stated that every black household should have a Winchester rifle, and she herself owned a gun, she realized, like Ransom, the potential contained in the vote. Ransom also believed that each nation has a unique and divinely ordained task to promote the common good. For each group, the contribution made is influenced by the conditions under which the group lives. Hence, Ransom stressed that the work of African Americans had been hampered by the oppressive circumstances of life in the United States. Unrelenting in her determination to gather, to analyze, and to interpret lynching data, Wells’s counterposition to the dominant opinion demonstrated that responses that reflect one’s sense of duty to adhere to the letter of the law were not necessarily synonymous with justice. Following this line of thinking, Wells identified the hypocrisy operative in a society that would go to tremendous extremes to justify a way of life and concluded that executions with little, if any, regard for proof of the victim’s guilt or evidence of innocence were unethical.

Chapter Seven Challenging “Alleged Causes”

Ida B. Wells’s third text on terrorist tactics, Mob Rule in New Orleans, is a succinct analysis of legal complicity, silent conspiracy, and the economics of lynching. I draw upon the following timeline1 as a basis from which to suggest that it is highly probable that concerns about a police-precipitated incident that fueled extreme mob brutality, without intervention from elected officials, would not have been raised had New Orleans’s bond rating not been adversely impacted: ●

●

●

● ●

Monday, July 24, 1900—at approximately 10:30 p.m. police instigated an unwarranted assault against two colored men sitting outside a residence on Dryades St. Tuesday, July 25, 1900—manhunt located Charles, between 2:30 and 5:00 a.m., at 2023 4th Street; an unidentified innocent man subjected to mob rule; two officers killed. Wednesday, July 26, 1900—manhunt continued as rampant lawlessness escalates. Thursday, July 27, 1900—mob rule continued. Friday, July 28, 1900—concern surfaces regarding financial impact of mob rule as rioting continued; house in which Charles hid set on fire by besiegers, forcing Charles to confront the mob who riddled his body with bullets.

In his analysis of the crisis of the new South, historian Edward L. Ayers’s description of what he described as deliberately orchestrated insanity suggests that whites were not necessarily conscious that they were, in effect, responsible for the chaotic fear-based society in which they were the primary architects. According to Ayers, “[W]hites, it seems fair to say, did not know they were battling a foe of their own creation.”2 After all, as Ayers explained, “when white Southerners

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read of a widely publicized lynching . . . they automatically assumed that a rape had indeed occurred and began to look for warnings of the crime in their own community.” Tangible proof was not required. “The ‘insolence’ of local blacks, the appearance of a ‘strange nigger,’ a rash of breaking and entering—all could be taken as evidence that an ‘outrage’ might be imminent.” For this reason, “every accusation, every suspicion, every lynching of an innocent ‘rapist’ echoed throughout the South, so that all sense of proportion disappeared.”3 Wells illustrated quite effectively that from the perspective of law enforcement officials, the issue at hand more often than not dictated that a public image be maintained by whatever means necessary. The evidence, according to Wells, indicated that “legal sanction was given to the mob to kill Charles at sight by the Mayor of New Orleans, who publicly proclaimed a reward of two hundred and fifty dollars, not for the arrest of Charles, not at all, but the reward was offered for Charles’ body, dead or alive.”4 Does it stand to reason that to lie, then, is to ensure that a prescribed way of life will not be interrupted? People lie for different reasons. But once set in motion, initiators must continue to build upon the fabrication in order to safeguard their public persona. All too frequently this means that persons will go to extreme measures to misrepresent the facts. When this occurs, alleged accusers rarely consider the impact that falsification of details will have upon families and communities. The supposed victim, in most cases, is also oblivious to what could occur should the truth of the matter be discovered or revealed at some future time. This line of thinking demonstrates that “to deny either the irrationality or rationality of lynching . . . is to miss its essence” since “lynching was madness, but with a method,”5 as Ayers’s research confirmed. In a context where provocation by authority figures fueled unmitigated terror without fear of retribution it is perhaps no coincidence as Brundage, concurring with Wells, noted that “at work stirring up mobs and focusing their wrath upon certain targets were social, economic, and political concerns rooted in the dramatic changes that the South underwent between 1865 and 1930.”6 Echoing the prophet Habakkuk (2.2b), Wells’s stated purpose for documenting this particular incident and providing supporting statistics is to “present the facts in a plain, unvarnished, connected way, so that he who runs may read.”7 According to Wells, an unpredictable meeting resulted in many individuals combining forces to destroy Robert Charles who, from all accounts, was guilty of daring to defend himself against arrogant

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and lawless policemen. Wells identified some of the excessive actions that mobs employed to exact punishment and to dehumanize blacks that, in my opinion, are best described as the heat of white hatred. For instance: During the entire time the mob held the city in its hands and went about holding up street cars and searching them, taking from them colored men to assault, shoot and kill, chasing colored men upon the public square, through alleys and into houses of anybody who would take them in, breaking into the homes of defenseless colored men and women and beating aged and decrepit men and women to death, the police and the legally-constituted authorities showed plainly where their sympathies were, for in no case reported through the daily papers does there appear the arrest, trial and conviction of one of the mob for any of the brutalities which occurred.8

The aforementioned description comes close to representing what Brundage, in his chapter on mobs and ritual, categorized as a mass mob.9 “Mass mobs,” as Brundage explained, “were the most spectacular type of mob and potentially included anyone who wanted to participate.”10 In his extensive research that spanned more than fifty years, Brundage presented compelling evidence to support his argument that lynchings and mobs were not synonymous. He suggested that lynching was the by-product of mob activity. When she described the fury in New Orleans, Wells observed that “the whole city was at the mercy of the mob and the display of brutality was a disgrace to civilization.”11 Mob activity had indeed precipitated lynching. She recounted that “unable to vent its vindictiveness and bloodthirsty vengeance upon Charles, the mob turned its attention to other colored men who happened to get in the path of its fury. Even colored women, as has happened many times before, were assaulted and beaten and killed by the brutal hoodlums who thronged the streets.”12 The following summary highlights numerous accounts that occurred over this five-day period of orchestrated vigilante activity: Shocking brutality, manifested in multiple occurrences of senseless cruelty, illustrated the insane behavior that characterizes mob rule. Examples of deplorable viciousness scattered the path from the interior sector of the French Quarter to the levees that protect the city from the mighty Mississippi. But no one protected the victim in the market. After all, mob members could brag about their exploits without fear

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Ethical Complications of Lynching of police intervention or arrest. The beating of a defenseless seventy five year old man was a painful reminder that no colored person was beyond the mob’s reach. And for fun in Gretna, blacks were chased for sport. The mob’s energy spread across the river and prompted this small town’s mayor to validate tyranny.13

It is little wonder that Wells also emphasized that freedom of speech was not synonymous with freedom to speak against mob rule, orchestrated brutality, or legal corruption. In other words, she stressed that we must remember that “it is now, even as it was in the days of slavery, an unpardonable sin for a Negro to resist a white man, no matter how unjust or unprovoked the white man’s attack may be.”14 The mob reigned and there was little that its victims could do to protect themselves in the aftermath that followed Robert Charles’s initial encounter with two New Orleans policemen. Wells found it “almost past belief to read that civilized white people, men who boast of their chivalry and blue blood, actually had fun in beating, chasing and shooting men who had no possible connection with any crime.”15 At the same time, her assessment raises several questions. For example, did Wells mean that mob activity could be justified if employed against individuals who were connected with criminal activity? This, of course, demands that we ask who determines what constitutes a crime. The ambiguity of her statement also requires that we consider how formal and informal types of authority influence moral responses at both the individual- and corporate level. Even with these questions, I would suggest that Wells sought, in her conclusion, to underscore that silence did not absolve those who were in a position to confront the mob with their responsibility for what they knew was happening. From Wells’s perspective, silence only encouraged the horrific displays of injustice. In response to a hypothetical question about mobs: “Men and women of America, are you proud of this record which the Anglo-Saxon race has made for itself?,”16 she responded: “Your silence seems to say that you are. Your silence encourages a continuance of this sort of horror. Only by earnest, active, united endeavor to arouse public sentiment can we hope to put a stop to these demonstrations of American barbarism.”17 Due to the attention given to provide the minutest details related to the furor surrounding Charles, Wells used information contained in the New Orleans Times Picayune and New Orleans Times-Democrat. Wells used these sources to analyze events initiated by the abuse

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of power and sustained by mob furor over a five-day period from Monday to Friday, July 24–28, 1900. She acknowledged that both papers, “in their editorial comment they were at all times most urgent in their defense of law and in the strongest terms they condemned the infamous work of the mob.”18 But she also pointed out inconsistencies in the Picayune’s and the Times-Democrat’s descriptions of the occurrence that sparked this almost one-week spree of violence. She conducted her own investigation in order to present another perspective on the protagonist’s encounter with individuals empowered to carry out the city’s ordinances. Wells found that “the Times-Democrat unguardedly states that one of the two colored men tried to run away; that Mora seized him and then drew his billy and struck him on the head; that Charles broke away from him and started to run, after which the shooting began.” Yet, as she noted, “the Picayune, however, declares that Pierce began the firing and that his two shots point blank at Aucoin were the first shots of the fight.”19 In his history of lynching, Cutler also addressed errors in lynch statistics. In particular, he explained that “anyone who has endeavored to sift the truth from conflicting newspaper reports will readily appreciate the difficulty of obtaining an accurate account of a lynching from such a source.”20 To justify his use of the statistics compiled by the Chicago Tribune, Cutler reasoned that the reporter did not have any motive to exaggerate the facts nor was there any reason to doubt that a publisher would report known lynchings. However, in this account of Charles, Wells argued that the initial stories printed by New Orleans’s two major newspapers “attempted to fix the beginning of the hostilities upon the colored men, but both were compelled to admit that the colored men were sitting on the doorsteps quietly conversing with one another when the three policemen went up and accosted them.”21 When she reviewed the contradictory news reports, Wells’s analysis revealed that public opinion often informed the media’s approach to reporting what was subsequently perceived as truth. She specifically concluded that in this particular instance, some journalists “substituted fiction for facts in their attempt to prove Charles a desperado.”22 Wells noted that the New Orleans Times-Democrat described Charles as a “ravisher and a daredevil” or a “fiend in human form.”23 According to Wells, rather than admit that law enforcement personnel behaved inappropriately, some reporters “gave full license to their imagination and distorted the facts that they had obtained, in every way possible, to prove a course of criminality, which the records absolutely refuse to show.”24

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Wells presented reports of other uncontested lynch burnings from 1891 to 1899. Her investigation indicated that what occurred in New Orleans was not an anomaly. Cutler concurred with her and provided a summary related to the twenty-two human burnings for the years 1884–1904. In addition, Wells did not dispute the fact that Charles fatally wounded several individuals. She did, however, point out that the initial altercation and subsequent actions occurred because Charles chose to defy rules of southern culture. That is, rather than acquiesce when approached by a member of the majority culture, Charles elected to exercise agency when he responded to a white man. Wells’s evaluation of the facts suggested that Charles resolved to die fighting rather than to participate in the mockery of justice that would inevitably accompany his surrender. Although protection by public servants was not an option for Charles, Wells stressed that “the Negro asks only justice and an impartial consideration of these facts”25 in order to combat the atrocities of lynch law. Wells understood the intricate connection between the personal and the political. She recognized that silence and secrecy provided little, if any, distinction between the private and the public. An examination of her life, through a detailed reading of some of her published works, indicates that Wells realized from a young age the importance of questioning established practices. A trailblazer, her determination to read the red record of lynching, coupled with her ability to examine human response within a context of terror, suggests that she was more than a verbal footnote. She was a woman with whom to be reckoned. She examined the facts, confronted biased systems, and presented a version of a shared story that many in America preferred not to address. Wells’s analysis of the pervasiveness of lynching in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries led her to conclude that the United States was a fragmented republic whose leaders had a vested interest to maintain a system that began unjustly so that a few could continue to benefit at the expense and annihilation of many.

Part Three

Beyond Rope and Fagot: A Womanist Ethical Analysis of Lynching When language is used to manipulate public-private response we can use graphic depictions to examine the manner in which unrevealed actions function as indicators of culturally endorsed moral behavior. —Angela D. Sims

Ida B. Wells, described as a “fiery reformer, feminist, and race leader,”1 was depicted “over and over again as militant, courageous, determined, impassioned, and aggressive in newspapers, magazines, journals, and books of the period from 1890 to 1931.”2 Consider, for example, the following excerpts from the Kansas City Times attributed to members of the Ministerial Alliance of Kansas City: (a) . . . the sensational Negro lecturer, on lynching in the South. (b) . . . the agitator be given a fair and impartial hearing wherever she may go. (c) . . . this Negress, who was, . . . , by her intemperance, doing more harm to her race, and plainly stirring up the very passions she claimed to be anxious to subdue. 3

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Characterizations about Wells can be attributed in part, perhaps, to her forthright communication style. But in other ways, portrayals of Wells highlight some of the challenges that she faced as a single black woman4 who sought to give the world a detailed account of lynching. Self-identifying as a journalist, Wells used a combination of practices as interpretive tools to document the causes of lynching in America in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries. Attention to her use of information compiled by leading newspapers of the time, for example, the Chicago Tribune, is discussed in detail in part two. Wells also went to lynch sites. She was conscious, though, that some black male journalists “accused her of jumping in ahead of them and doing work without giving them a chance.”5 But when her African-American male colleagues neglected to investigate an early twentieth-century lynching in Illinois, Wells, at the insistence of her husband, went because “nobody else will.”6 In addition, she realized that she could assist vulnerable residents of the city in which the lynching occurred. During her site visit to this Illinois lynch site, Wells informed a group of concerned black residents that she had come down to be their mouthpiece; . . . correctly understood how hard it would be for those who lived there to take an active part in the movement to oust the sheriff; . . . willing to take the lead in the matter but they must give me the facts; that it would be endangering the lives of other colored people in Illinois if we did not take a stand against the all too frequent lynchings which were taking place.7

Wells addressed the hypocrisy that fueled this American practice and understood, as Dora Apel rightly surmised, that “lynching was used as a weapon to terrorize the black community as a whole in both racial and gender terms. It was an instrument of social discipline intended to impress all who saw or heard about it, not merely to punish the victim; thus innocent black men were sometimes substituted when a fugitive could not be found.”8 Concurring with Wells and Apel, Stewart E. Tolnay and E. M. Beck’s research of ten southern states makes clear that “mob violence represents a dramatic and profoundly important public manifestation of social control of its citizenry of color and offers an opportunity to investigate the social, economic, and political dynamics that produced a period so ripe with racial violence.”9 In Black Womanist Ethics, Katie Geneva Cannon stresses that “racism, gender discrimination and economic exploitation, as

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inherited, age-long complexes, require the Black community to create and cultivate values and virtues in their own terms so that they can prevail against the odds with moral integrity.”10 For the aforementioned reason, what we receive from Wells is not just a collection of lynching narratives. She asks that we consider the ways in which an inherited theological tradition continues to remain silent about injustices that are sanctioned by its doctrines. One challenge, however, is the ability to recognize how symbolic representations of rope and fagot are disguised, for example, as economics of racism that are essential to the maintenance of the prison industrial complex and the exploitation of children in foster care systems as multiple sources of what I term black gold that ignores the percentage of children of color who are targeted to populate juvenile and adult penal institutions.11 While some might disagree with this metaphorical application of lynching,12 Clarke explains that “court-ordered executions carried out under first local, then state, authority gradually took the place of lynchings in the early decades of the twentieth century.”13 Eliza Steelwater, on the other hand, provides this description of a twenty-first-century lynch scene: Gallows Hill, its ten thousand spectators, and its drawn-out spectacle of suffering belong to the past. But the hangman’s knot goes on being tied—in a room within a building within a compound. The room is windowless, brightly fluorescent, divided in two by Plexiglas and a curtain. On one side are a dozen people, on the other side one. We’ve regularized and sanitized until we’re down to white tiles, a gurney, and an intravenous drip. What was an event has been downgraded to an occurrence, then to the parody of a therapeutic procedure.14

The number of innocent individuals who populate jails and prisons in the United States is, like the number of people lynched, unknown.15 In recent years, several states placed a moratorium on executions based on a review of data that indicated prosecutorial and law enforcement misconduct.16 Without question, Wells provided numerous examples that revealed some of the residual effects of lynching on passive participants in the death-dealing act of lynching. Wells’s determination to give the world an unvarnished account of the impact of this most despicable form of hatred is an ethical analysis that addressed the interconnectedness of lynching to race, gender, and economics. Her ability to juxtapose subcultures, especially preconceived ideas about women that polarized and further fragmented

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communities, against a larger context cast lynching as a significant aspect of this country’s public sphere. What Wells’s examination ultimately asks is that we consider how socially constructed categorizations of race and gender shape individual and communal responses related to issues of justice.

Chapter Eight The Issue of Race and Lynching

Decades before Alice Walker coined the term womanist that Katie Geneva Cannon and others appropriated theologically, Wells’s tenacity to investigate lynching was, from my vantage point, a gift from God. In fact, her ability to find “truths where everyone else seems afraid to look”1 is a trait typically shared among individuals who deliberately probe beneath the surface of an issue in order to better understand how the interrelatedness of various dynamics of race, gender, and lynching operate to obscure lessons about strength and hope. For this reason, Wells was convinced that “the Afro-American papers are the only ones which will print the truth, and they lack means to employ agents and detectives to get at the facts. The race must rally a mighty host to the support of their journals, and thus enable them to do much in the way of investigation.”2 Due to her stance, no aspect of society was exempt from Wells’s critique, 3 as highlighted in her assessment of African-American apathy toward lynching. In a February 18, 1893 article, “The Reign of Mob Law,” written for publication in the New York Age,4 Wells raised questions about the limited involvement of blacks in the fight against lynching. She vehemently asserted that our race still sits and does nothing about it and says little except to doubt the expediency of or find fault with the remedy proposed. No plan of raising money by which the things can be investigated, the country arpused [aroused] and the temple of justice, the pulpit and the press besieged until public opinion shall demand a cessation of the reign of barbarism, lynch law and stake burnings. 5

From interviews with various individuals who were directly or indirectly impacted by “routine and systematic efforts to subjugate

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the African-American minority,”6 Wells subsequently evaluated factors7 that influenced the manner in which individuals reacted in an environment sustained and maintained by fear. Speaking on behalf of African Americans, Wells noted that “it is his [sic] regret, that, in his [sic] own defense, he [sic] must disclose to the world that degree of dehumanizing brutality which fixes upon America the blot of a national crime.”8 She observed correctly that the responsibility to disprove the public image presented by and about African Americans rested with them, for national sentiment was such that the fate of the majority of alleged victims was “death at the hands of unknown persons.” This was the case even in states where some form of anti-lynching legislature was in place. For instance, Illinois passed a bill in 1905 that, among other conditions, “provided for the suppression of mob violence, not only by punishment of those who incited lynchings, but provided for damages against the City and County permitting lynchings.”9 In addition, Wells’s subsequent evaluation of a 1907 lynching in Springfield, Illinois, illustrated that legislation alone could not guarantee just and equitable treatment. In this particular situation, she mentioned that the men lynched then were not prisoners in the custody of the Sheriff, but peaceable, lawabiding citizens whom the mob lynched at their homes for the fun of it. Because of the dangerous public sentiment, which says it is all right to kill so long as the victim is a Negro, no jury has been found in Springfield to convict any of those who were tried for that lynching and murder.10

Even though, as sociologists Stewart E. Tolnay and E. M. Beck point out in their study of lynching, “relatively little was known about the underlying forces that drove southern society to such extreme and violent behavior,”11 Wells not only reported the facts, she rendered an ethical commentary that revealed that lynching was a gross violation of human rights. Ida B. Wells was adamant that “the race problems or negro question, as it has been called, has been omnipresent and all-pervading since long before the Afro-American was raised from the degradation of the slave to the dignity of the citizen. It has never been settled because the right methods have not been employed in the solution.”12 Tolnay and Beck assert that “the premier indicator of status within southern society during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was

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one’s race.”13 According to historian John Hope Franklin, “during the brief span of three and one-half centuries of colonial and national history Americans developed traditions and prejudices which created the two worlds of race in modern America.”14 And art historian Dora Apel, in her introduction to Imagery of Lynching: Black Men, White Women, and the Mob, adamantly declares that “the transformation of the nation that came with the emancipation of African American slaves began a process of redefining race and identity that has been the central social conflict in America ever since.”15 Consequently, it is perhaps no accident that a legal definition of race is a “great division of mankind [sic] having in common certain distinguishing physical peculiarities constituting a comprehensive class appearing to be derived from a distinct primitive stock.”16 In his study on race relations in the United States, political scientist James W. Clarke notes that “racial lynchings began in the South shortly after emancipation and reflected the new vulnerability of free blacks.”17 Historian Fitzhugh Brundage agrees with Clarke but also reminds us that “lynching in the American South during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century was but one manifestation of the strenuous and bloody campaign by whites to elaborate and impose a racial hierarchy upon people of color throughout the globe.”18 This attitude paved the way for southern horrors and mob violence to become perceived as normative and subsequently enforced by fear in order to justify a desired lifestyle based on race. Unfortunately, to ensure this sustained practice as a viable tool to achieve a desired outcome, a rite of passage often required children to witness lynching. According to Apel, “the participation of women and the early initiation of white children were also noted by the press. School might be let out to allow children to attend a lynching, or the day’s routine delayed until pupils returned from viewing a lynch victim.”19 Apel also correctly notes that although “early antilynching crusades stressed the emotional damage that mob violence had on children, many learned the intended lesson and continued in the violent tradition of their forebears.”20 While Wells did not specifically address the long-term implications of lynching on children, she did include photos of two lynching scenes in A Red Record. At first glance, the photos are remarkably similar. We are given little information, other than the date and site of the lynchings, July 7, 1893 at Bardwell, Kentucky, and August 21, 1891 at Clanton, Alabama, to distinguish the two scenes. The only other identifying information noted is C. J. Miller, the name of the man who died at the

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hands of unknown persons in 1893. But what we are given is a visual depiction from which to explore the moral complexity that existed in a society that did not think it unusual to gather at a lynching cross. Both photos appear to be staged for the unidentified photographer. Unlike the second photo in which the lynched victim is fully dressed, the lynched victim in the first picture is clothed only in a loin cloth. Whereas the victim in the first photo was suspended from the ground by a linked chain attached to a tree, the lynched man in the other picture appears to be suspended from a tree by a rope. In these two lynchings, men gathered with boys at the foot of a cross to participate in a tradition that reflected that their sense of personhood was shaped by learned behavior that was intricately connected to the vile dehumanization of someone deemed less than human. With the exception of one girl in the second photo, there is an obvious absence of female spectators. And yet, the women were there—represented by their sons, their partners, their brothers, their uncles, their cousins, their nephews, their neighbors, their pastors, and their friends. As such, white males gathered to participate in a sacrificial ritual condoned by members of their respective communities. Lynching spectators gathered to perpetuate a practice whose existence depended on the passing down of hatred from one generation to the next. They lynched because they could, without fear of retaliation, kill at will. In contrast to this mode of indoctrination, Tolnay and Beck point out that “Blacks never knew when whites would interpret the most innocent or trivial of behavior—an impertinent glance, ill-advised stare, or surly word—as insolent or threatening and worthy of brutal retribution. This meant that many African-Americans lived at the discretion of the white community and its whims.”21 This statement highlights that survival for African Americans, in a fear-induced society where nooses represent racially condoned hatred, necessitates an ability to interpret and to respond in a prescribed manner to unwritten rules that govern the communities in which they live. Race, a socially constructed designator, is used as one way to distinguish groups of people. Almost a century after Wells articulated her chilling assessment about the plight of blacks in America, 22 then University of Pennsylvania professor Michael Eric Dyson stated, in a 1998 dialogue on issues of whiteness hosted by National Public Radio, that “people have gotten into a habit in the twentieth century of making being white the normal state of affairs, the condition of a regular person.

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Race, then, is used as a marker to describe people who are set apart from that normality. We use race as a label of non-whiteness.”23 In other words, “racial divisions,” as Apel points out, “were regarded as natural and unchanging categories” and “the very practice of legally defining ‘white’ and ‘black’ created racial identities.”24 At issue is a fallacy wherein “the burden of race,” as Dyson’s comment suggests, “is that one is forever fixed by external categories that people impose on you.”25 In other words “race functions as social categorization, politically constructed categorization,”26 as Peggy McIntosh, agreeing with Dyson’s sentiment, stresses. To further complicate this dilemma of race Glenda Gilmore points out that “in the 1890s, southern middle-class white men embraced the racialization of manhood—so international, so scientific, so modern—and put it to work on their own backyards.”27 Darlene Clark Hine and Kathleen Thompson provide some insight into the scientific justification for racial designators. Hine and Thompson rightfully contend that “an unholy alliance was formed between southern racist politicians and northern academics. Scientists and social scientists began to support race mythology with spurious ‘research’ and ‘scientific’ theories. White supremacy, they declared, was the natural and desirable order of things. To interfere with it was to stand in the way of progress.”28 It is imperative that we do not underestimate how race functions, in a nation whose founding document states that “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” as a vehicle to engineer and to justify lynching in the United States of America. As one example, Wells’s social analysis illustrates primarily that “white men who had created a race of mulattoes by raping and consorting with Negro women were still doing so wherever they could, these same white men lynched, burned, and tortured Negro men for doing the same thing with white women; even when the white women were willing victims.”29 Apel’s analysis on the public display of lynching and the mob reemphasizes Wells’s assessment. Apel explains that “the practice of lynching attempted to preserve and reinforce by extralegal means the racial hierarchies that were no longer sanctioned by slavery in order to assure the continuity of community class structures. Upper-class and poor whites united against blacks, who were isolated in a color caste system and forcibly kept at the bottom of the economy.”30 In addition to Apel’s evaluation on the interrelatedness of race and lynching, Tolnay and Beck’s research on race as a social

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construction demonstrates that in order “to maintain a stable white class structure it was necessary to construct a vigorous racial caste system. Reinforcing the caste boundary and affirming white racial superiority diminished the odds that an alienated white lower class might unite with blacks to challenge the privileged position of influential whites.”31 Finally, we must remember, as Franklin articulates so vividly, that “the most powerful direct force in the maintenance of the two worlds of race has been the state and its political subdivisions. In states and communities where racial separation and discrimination are basic to the way of life, the elected officials invariably pledge themselves to the perpetuation of the duality.”32 In the United States, this system of racial stratification is perpetuated by policies that reinforce the objectification of Americans of African descent. 33 In effect, as Tolnay and Beck’s research on lynching confirm, [t]he civil rights that whites enjoyed were rarely extended to blacks because of the racism that permeated so much of southern culture. This meant, among other things, that whites could harass and assault blacks with little fear of the legal consequences of aggression. Southern racist ideology produced a moral and legal system that had only weak constraints against violence targeted at blacks. Often blacks were considered legitimate, and even deserving, objects for white wrath. 34

Therefore, we should not be surprised that it will take more than legislative initiatives to reverse a tendency to view former slaves and their descendants as fully human. Without a doubt, as Franklin’s research on race and history in the United States demonstrates, “white southerners have also summoned history to support them in their resistance to federal legislation designed to secure the civil rights of Negroes.”35 Franklin’s claim challenges us to understand how [t]he heavy hand of history has been a powerful force in the maintenance of a segregated society and, conversely, in the resistance to change. Americans, especially southerners whose devotion to the past is unmatched by that of any others, have summoned history to support their arguments that age-old practices and institutions cannot be changed overnight, that social practices cannot be changed by legislation. 36

In other words, “the way to make absolutely certain that the status of blacks would not change was to institutionalize and legalize

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their subordinate and degraded place in southern life”;37 this illustrates the complexity of the race and lynching issue in American society. Tolnay and Beck remind us that “in principle, all whites were superior to all African-Americans, and the rigidity of the caste line separating the races assured even the poorest of whites this one taste of superiority.”38 Thus, it is imperative that we remember that “lynching was a public celebration of whites’ contemptuous disregard for black lives, and all too commonly African-Americans were beyond the protective umbrella of law, stranded far outside the due process guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.”39 Armed with this historical knowledge Cannon insists we must not underestimate how “toughmindedness allows one to stand up amid a system that oppresses her/him and develop an unassailable and majestic sense of one’s own value.”40 It is important, then, that we look at some of the ways that blacks and other anti-lynching apologists coped in a society that was adamantly opposed to recognizing the humanity of its African-American citizens. Michele Wallace, a visual historian, identifies three “cultural practices that made it possible for blacks to live under the regime”41 of lynching. These strategies—“passing; integrity, beauty, and aesthetic fortitude; literature”42 —reflect a remarkable quality to survive. Indeed, as Wallace postulates, “no one knows how many black people who were sufficiently racially mixed in origin to look white passed on a periodic and strategic basis, . . . No one knows either how many black people passed over permanently into the white community to escape the constant threat of harassment and violence.”43 Wallace questions historical representations that depict recently emancipated persons as complaisant and docile. While this may certainly have been the case for some, Wallace argues that “the violent response of whites in the rural South where black populations were concentrated was a direct reaction to black people’s dogged and persistent sense of entitlement to land, to dignity, to justice.”44 As a means to survive, blacks turned to the arts in a manner that reflected an awareness of strategies that emerged during slavery as a means to communicate with and to encourage each other. From the music—most notably blues, jazz, and gospel—to visual representations—such as quilts, pottery, and wood carvings—blacks sought creative ways to move beyond imposed categorizations in order to give expression to their sense of personhood.45 Artistic expressions were a way to communicate with each other, without necessarily

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drawing attention to themselves that “trouble would not last always.” The music was not so much about the beat as it was an avenue to give expression to the particularity of the situation in which lynching was tolerated. Piecing a quilt became a communal affair whereby individuals, mostly females, gathered with their “scraps” to stitch a shared story.46 The quilts provided warmth in the winter but the creative product reflected and pointed to a collective strength that continued to surface despite often repeated attempts to diminish black representations that depicted another aspect of reality. The third strategy that Wallace mentions is literature. Regardless of the genre—from poetry to short stories to prayers to editorials— writing is an avenue for blacks and those with whom they are aligned to articulate an alternative view.47 Wells sounded an alarm regarding the tendency to classify a group of people based on unsubstantiated claims. For her, silence was not an option. Rather, she asks that we question the relationship between identity and justice in a society when extreme forms of torture become moments for public celebration.

Chapter Nine The Social Construction of Gender and Lynching

To lynch, regardless of the techniques employed, is to use terror or the threat of torture as a control mechanism. To question this practice of unmitigated denial of due process can be construed as a willingness to die for what one believes. It is quite possible that Ida B. Wells expected to encounter opposition when she questioned the veracity that “Southern apologists justify their savagery on the ground that Negroes are lynched only because of their crimes against women.”1 Her assessment about lynchings ascribed to black men’s interactions with white women antagonized Memphis’s leading white citizens. In her editorial response to the 1892 Memphis lynching, Wells suggested that a review of the facts indicates that individuals, especially white men, might want to reconsider the relevancy of rape to justify lynching. Beside the fact that white men rape black women at their discretion without risk of retaliation or fear of criminal conviction, 2 Wells suggested that many of the white women who cry rape are engaged in consensual relations with black men. Aside from the fact that her evidence showed that rape “committed by white men against Negro women and girls, is never punished by mob or the law,”3 she also disputed the allegation that suggested that “Southern white women have been slandered because, in defending the Negro race from the charge that all colored men, who are lynched, only pay penalty for assaulting women.” As Wells’s analysis makes clear, however, “it is certain that lynching mobs have not only refused to give the Negro a chance to defend himself, but have killed their victim with a full knowledge that the relationship of the alleged assailant with the woman who accused him was voluntary and clandestine.”4 Contrast

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this with John Nerone’s analysis on violence against the AfricanAmerican media that reveals that “assertive African-American newspapers were attacked, by mainstream whites, especially in the South, for challenging white hegemony; consistent with prolynching arguments, the crucial rhetorical justification for violence was the rape of white women.”5 If this is the case, Wells’s account of the correlation between the social construction of gender and lynching also suggests that a deconstructive analysis of the “myth of womanhood,” which is perhaps best described as a fatal attraction to white women,6 is warranted. Scholar and civil rights activist Angela Y. Davis’s work on women, race, and class is helpful to anyone who wants to understand the ramifications associated with practices that foster a sense of white female deification that are contingent on human objectification. Davis unabashedly asserts that [r]acism has always drawn strength from its ability to encourage sexual coercion. While Black women and their sisters of color have been the main targets of these racist-inspired attacks, white women have suffered as well. For once white men were persuaded that they could commit sexual assaults against Black women with impunity, their conduct toward women of their own race could not have remained unmarred. Racism has always served as a provocation to rape, and white women in the United States have necessarily suffered the ricochet fire of these attacks. This is one of the many ways in which racism nourishes sexism, causing white women to be indirectly victimized by the special oppression aimed at their sisters of color.7

In a 1993 essay “The Anatomy of a Lynching,” Robyn Wiegman addresses the circumstances from which gender segregation emerged. I concur with her position that the nineteenth century’s determination of public and private along strict gender lines thus provided a definitional structure through which social space and familial roles were shaped for a population no longer denied the right (and privilege) of maintaining family bonds. But while the patriarchalization of the black family served to institutionalize it within the gender codes prevalent in white bourgeois ideology, thereby securing the black family to the formal dimensions of white social behavior, many whites were decidedly threatened by the definitional sameness accorded former slaves. The loss of one patriarchal organization of social life—that of slavery—and its replacement by

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the seeming egalitarianism of a male-dominated black family, then, has the effect of broadening the competitive dimensions of interracial masculine relations, especially as the black male’s new property governance of black women threatens to extend to women of the dominant group as well.8

To minimize the threat of lynching where “the racial and sexual mythology of southern apartheid demanded that even consensual sex between a black man and a white woman be punished by death,”9 Lynn Olson points out that “black males were raised never to look a white woman in the eye, to step off the sidewalk when she came near, to avoid any close proximity to her—in short, never to do anything that would give her (or anybody else) the pretext for crying ‘Rape.’ Any violation of the taboo could bring terrible retribution.”10 Patricia Hill Collins also points out another aspect of the interconnectedness of race and gender. Collins explains that “motherhood and racism were symbolically intertwined, and controlling the sexuality and fertility of both African-American and white women was essential in reproducing notions of ‘race’ as a social and cultural entity.”11 Because of this historical reality, Arthur Raper’s insight on gendered racialization merits consideration. According to Raper, in the postslavery South, with their own women placed at an emotional and sexual remove, and black women less and less available (one reason blacks preferred sharecropping to other labor arrangements was that it made black women less vulnerable to ravishment by white planters and overseers), frustrated white men developed a powerful fear of being overwhelmed by black men’s alleged sexual insatiability. The black man’s real “crime,” no doubt, was that he was burdened with no historic guilt about sex with either black or white women, and it was because he possessed this “freedom” that he was so feared and detested. The hypocrisy of the situation couldn’t have been more blatant, as Southern whites feverishly held the line against insatiable “brute Negroes” and miscegenation—a race-mingling they themselves had perpetrated, and whose result was daily evident in the faces of the region’s great number of mixed-race children.12

The irony in how the majority culture perceives black people is evidenced in the progeny of men who adopted, as Gilmore explains, “a conspiracy of silence that obscured biracial people of the time from their white contemporaries and from the historical record.”13 Although Dyson pointed out, in response to a caller’s question about differences

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in ethnic European groups in the United States, that “[whiteness] has a kind of pulverizing homogeneity; it makes people of similar skin the same despite those internal differences,”14 he did not address the dynamics of race that cut across genealogical intersections when lineage is traced to plantation property logs that reveal double standards associated with racial classifications. We cannot, therefore, disregard the fact that the tendency of whites to assign race often contradicted visual attributes that were typically antithetical to notions of blackness. To address this dilemma that complicates racial classifications of individuals who intersect constructions of black and white, Franklin remarks that “if their color and race, their condition of servitude, and their generally degraded position did not set them apart, the laws and customs surrounding them more than accomplished that feat.”15 To understand the dynamics associated with the social construction of gender and lynching we must be able to identify the design and intent of warnings that are intentionally constructed to instill fear as a means by which to regulate human response. Since desired outcomes are predetermined and rarely documented in writing, doers of justice must learn how to determine what the major designers of disguised socially deviant behavior are at risk of losing. Thus, it is extremely important that we gain proficiency in how to assess cultural nuances. In other words, we must, as Wells insisted, “think and act on independent lines, remembering that after all, it is the white man’s [sic] civilization and the white man’s [sic] government which are on trial.”16 Of course, this will most certainly require that we identify central figures so that we can understand how manipulation is used to create subcultures and stratified layers of interpersonal interaction. To accomplish this, Wells encourages us to establish working relationships for she recognized that “there are many agencies which may be enlisted in our cause,”17 such as human rights organizations or religious institutions, in order to solicit support in the “crusade for justice.”

Chapter Ten The Intersection of Economics and Lynching

At the root of the mob’s action is a desire to exploit the black community by using violent acts in order to control the distribution of goods and services. Ida B. Wells’s determination to critique southern horrors associated with mob rule and legally sanctioned acts of domestic terror led to the destruction of her newspaper, The Free Speech. While typical acts linked to mob rule—denial of due process, lynching, burning, maiming—were not foreign to Wells, it took a personal encounter with violence to awaken her to the reality of the complexity of counterresponses to injustice in a multifaceted fragmented system that fuels economic exploitation. Wells explained that her investigation of lynching led her to believe that “the more I studied the situation, the more I was convinced that the Southerner had never gotten over his [sic] resentment that the Negro was no longer his [sic] plaything, his [sic] servant, and his [sic] source of income.”1 In her evaluation of the events leading up to the March 9, 1892 Memphis lynching, Wells provided details to substantiate this claim. For instance, Wells noted that the People’s Grocery, owned and managed by three black men, was financially backed by approximately ten shareholders. She also stated that this business was located in a predominantly black suburb, a few miles outside Memphis’s city limits and thus outside the stated boundaries for services provided by the city’s law enforcement officials. In addition to this basic demographic information, Wells said that this black-owned business “flourished, and that of Barrett, a white grocer who kept store there before the ‘People’s Grocery’ was established, went down.”2 In a provocation initiated by Barrett, in which he subsequently alleged that he was assaulted by an owner of the People’s Grocery,

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Wells indicated that “Barrett then threatened (to use his own words) that he was going to clean out the whole store.”3 The owners, according to Wells, “knowing how anxious he (Barrett) was to destroy their business, consulted a lawyer who told them they were justified in defending themselves if attacked, as they were a mile beyond city limits and police protection.”4 It would not matter that when these black men discovered “they had fired upon officers of the law, they threw away their firearms and submitted to arrest, confident they should establish their innocence of intent to fire upon officers of the law.”5 Moss, McDowell, Stewart, and other black Memphians soon realized that their “confidence and pride in their city and the majesty of its laws”6 did not exempt them from the far-reaching arm of the mob that had already resulted in “lynchings and brutal outrages of all sorts”7 in Tennessee. In researching the events leading up to the aforereferenced lynching, Wells collected enough evidence to conclude that racist attitudes regarding fair business practices was a major factor in the mob’s actions. According to Tolnay and Beck, “poor whites lynched AfricanAmericans because they represented a threat to economic well being.”8 At the same time, Tolnay and Beck suggest that there is no doubt that “the white elite also had economic motives for encouraging, or minimally not discouraging, mob violence.”9 Although their study focuses primarily on the role of “king cotton” in the dominant southern producing states from 1882 to 1930, Tolnay and Beck provide helpful insight into the intersection of lynching and economics. From their research, they determined that “lynchings helped preserve the hierarchical arrangement that ordered relations between white employers and black workers. Whenever that arrangement was challenged, it threatened the economic hegemony of the white elite and increased the probability of mob violence to restore racial order.”10 Tolnay and Beck also reported that “there is ample reason to believe that AfricanAmericans may have been lynched because they represented an economic threat to white southerners. It is also very likely that poor whites and the white elite alike attempted to neutralize these threats by resorting to mob violence, although their specific motivations were quite different.”11 Angela Davis explains that “lynching was undisguised counterinsurgency, a guarantee that Black people would not be able to achieve their goals of citizenship and economic equality.”12 In other words, as Wells’s account of the 1892 Memphis lynching revealed, “these men

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were murdered, their stock was attached by creditors and sold for less than one-eighth of its cost to that same man Barrett, who is to-day running his grocery in the same place. He had indeed kept his word, and by aid of the authorities destroyed the People’s Grocery Company root and branch.”13 When this tactic is employed, the intimidators’ success is usually contingent on the ability to thwart minority aspirations by consistently relying on law enforcement officials to sanction the mob’s destructive behavior. In the case of her friend’s lynching, we glean some insight into how law officials consciously participate in deciding the continuance of a business and/or in responding to the disruption of business operations. Instead of ignoring or dismissing the tension that often accompanies issues related to social inequities, Wells suggests that it is important that we realize that the intersection of economics and lynching is designed to deter minority business development. She noted that “although these men were peaceable, law-abiding citizens of this country, we are told there can be no punishment for their murderers nor indemnity for their relatives.”14 This response by elected law officials to vigilantism represents what Wells described as a “first object lesson in the doctrine of white supremacy; an illustration of the South’s cardinal principle that no matter what the attainments, character or standing of an Afro-American, the laws of the South will not protect him against a white man [sic].”15 To mitigate mob reign there were few options that blacks could exercise without fear that they would not only jeopardize their safety but subject their families and communities to vicious displays of barbarism. Consequently, for some, the only choice was to limit their purchases, as an act of resistance, at white-owned businesses that sanctioned lynching. In this way, blacks could determine ways in which to challenge prevailing practices without being perceived as openly defiant. Wells understood that this course of action could contribute to a reduction in lynching. She was very much aware, as she observed, that to Northern capital and Afro-American labor the South owes its rehabilitation. If labor is withdrawn capital will not remain. The AfroAmerican is thus the backbone of the South. A thorough knowledge and judicious exercise of 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.16

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For others, relocation is a viable act of resistance. According to Wells, many black Memphians exercised this option. In response to the city’s inability to prosecute anyone connected with the lynching of Moss, McDowell, and Stewart, Wells reports that “in two months, six thousand persons had left the city and every branch of business began to feel this silent resentment of the outrage, and failure of the authorities to punish the lynchers. There were a number of business failures and blocks of houses were for rent.”17 To address this economic situation precipitated by a lynching, Wells came to realize that in order “to restore the equilibrium and put a stop to the great financial loss, the next move was to get rid of the Free Speech,—the disturbing element which kept the waters troubled; which would not let the people forget, and in obedience to whose advice nearly six thousand persons had left the city.”18 The aforementioned statement clearly demonstrates that Wells was not beyond the reach of the mob. This was substantiated in interviews conducted by Dr. Floyd Crawford more than seventy years after the threat was uttered. In his 1963 correspondence with Alfreda M. Duster, Crawford stated that information that he received from Mr. Matthew Thornton, “who was about nineteen in 1892,” and Mr. Fred Hutchins, “who was four years old in 1892, but whose parents had told him a plenty about it,” was “different from what he had been given heretofore.”19 Crawford told Wells’s daughter that Thornton and Hutchins shared with him that “after her stinging editorial appeared, she left town for safety upon the advice and urging of her colored friends; and that the mob which destroyed her plant really had intended also to seize her, take her into the heart of Memphis, tie her, and whip her to death.”20 There is little doubt that Wells recognized that this declaration also expressed the extreme measures that individuals would employ to “subject to a condition of civil and industrial dependence, those whom the Constitution declares to be free men [sic].”21 Furthermore, Wells’s assessment of the situation suggests that “persons unfamiliar with the condition of affairs in the Southern States do not credit the truth when it is told them. They cannot conceive how such a condition of affairs prevails so near them with steam power, telegraph wires and printing presses in daily and hourly touch with the localities where such disorder reigns.”22 Given this reality, Wells reminds us that “the appeal to the white man’s [sic] pocket has ever been more effectual than all the appeals ever made to his [sic] conscience.”23 Yet, the solution to lynching is not as simple as this statement might lead

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individuals who are unfamiliar with this aspect of U.S. history to believe. Davis brings attention to the fact that [t]he colonization of the Southern economy by capitalists from the North gave lynching its most vigorous impulse. If Black people, by means of terror and violence, could remain the most brutally exploited group within the swelling ranks of the working class, the capitalists could enjoy a double advantage. Extra profits would result from the superexploitation of Black labor, and white workers’ hostilities toward their employers would be defused. White workers who assented to lynching necessarily assumed a posture of racial solidarity with the white men who were really their oppressors. 24

In the urban South, African-American entrepreneurs in direct competition with Caucasian businesses were frequently seen as a threat to an existing standard. Tolnay and Beck stress that this oppositional stance “created a dissonance for poor whites, who could see little difference between themselves and blacks in terms of basic standards of living although their caste membership told them that they were socially, morally, biologically, and intellectually superior. Without a clear economic claim to superiority, the caste division became even more important as a source of status differentiation.”25 Wells’s analysis of what occurred in New Orleans during a five-day lynching spree in 1900 also confirms that this financially motivated correlation to lynching was not isolated to rural areas. She found that “when the reign of mob law exerts a depressing influence upon the stock market and city securities begin to show unsteady standing in money centers, then the strong arm of the good white people of the South asserts itself and order is quickly brought out of chaos.”26 Her cultural analysis of practices designed to control behavior indicates a critical awareness of the interconnectedness of economics and power in a society sustained and maintained by human exploitation and subjugation. Wells understood lynching not only as a physical act most commonly symbolized by the rope and fagot but she also viewed lynching as a way to maintain and sustain a way of life. The antidote that Wells articulated in Southern Horrors, her first publication on lynching, is still applicable to address ethical implications associated with domestic-based terror tactics in the twenty-first century. While her three-part solution addressed the aftermath of a Memphis, Tennessee, lynching in which her goddaughter’s father, Thomas Moss, was viciously killed, Wells’s call to boycott, migrate, and write are tools that can and must be used to assess the impact of

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contemporary forms of lynching. This requires, however, a broader understanding of race, gender, and economics and the role of each in lynching in order to understand the manner in which this moral problem continues to impact a Christian commitment to justice. Each of these interrelated themes in Wells’s work provides insight into the insidious nature of lynching and the manner in which we respond in a post–9/11 society to national security concerns. Her analysis of lynching demonstrates her realization that repeated attacks on the life, liberty and happiness of any citizen or class of citizens are attacks on distinctive American institutions; such attacks imperiling as they do the foundation of government, law and order, merit the thoughtful consideration of far-sighted Americans; not from a standpoint of sentiment, not even so much from a standpoint of justice to a weak race, as from a desire to preserve our institutions. 27

For Wells, lynching was more than the rope and fagot. This recognition of the diverse ways in which people deliberately employ inhumane practices as a prescriptive for desired outcomes can influence the manner in which we examine the contemporary relevance of modern-day expressions of lynching. Whether we evaluate sentencing guidelines or nooses strategically displayed in public spaces, the very presence of these moral dilemmas demand that we must, at some point, determine whether we will make a commitment to participate in a dismantling of racially genderized economic systems. Perhaps then we can appreciate the sacrifices of individuals, such as Ida B. Wells, who jeopardize(d) their own safety in order to present another explanation of justice-motivated actions in an increasingly globalized society.

Part Four

A Paradigm Shift: Resources for a Christian Ethic of Resistance in the Works of Ida B. Wells We must become more conscious of the ways in which God reveals God’s self. —Angela D. Sims

Ida B. Wells was not the only person to use lynching statistics compiled by the Chicago Tribune and other newspapers in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth century as a primary source from which to develop an analysis of southern horrors and mob rule. This text references the work of sociologist James Elbert Cutler. As previously noted Cutler, who earned his doctorate from Yale University, employed a research method that modeled aspects of the approach that Wells used more than a decade prior to his 1905 publication on the investigation of lynching.1 Wells’s lynching assessment also emerged from and was informed by her confrontation with the effects of lynch law during this gruesome era in American history. A March 1892 experience of racially motivated hatred prompted her to reconsider her position on lynching. In response to this vigilante execution, she employed her journalistic skills to critique brutal acts of cruelty. At issue for her was

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how to come to terms with the realization that innocent individuals were lynched. To address this dilemma, she illustrated that lynching pointed to a level of depravity in the United States that contradicted attributes recognized as civilized behavior. Encouraged by Frederick Douglass to “go, my child; you are the one to go, for you have the story to tell,” and in response to an 1893 invitation to “air this intolerable condition” in the United States of “burning human beings alive in the nineteenth century,”2 Wells presented her interpretation of the facts to an international audience during two separate trans-Atlantic speaking engagements.3 Wells met Catherine Impey, editor of Anti-Caste, a magazine in England that focused on segregationist issues and other human rights violations,4 in Philadelphia in 1892 at a meeting in which Wells was the keynote speaker. This public talk prompted Impey, a Quaker, to arrange a private conversation with Wells about lynching. Wells recalled that “Impey was shocked over the lynching stories I told, also the indifference to conditions which she found among the white people in this country. She was especially hurt that this should be the fact among those of her own sect and kin.”5 As a result of this interview, Wells and Impey concluded that they must both continue, in their own way, to “plug away at the evils both of us were fighting.”6 What transpired was an invitation to England for Wells and the beginning of her worldwide campaign against lynching.7 In a letter to Frederick Douglass dated March 13, 1894, Wells mentioned that she had “already addressed an audience of 1500 persons”8 in Liverpool during the first week of her second speaking tour to England, Scotland, and Wales. The guest of Rev. C. F. Aked,9 whom Wells described as “the most popular pastor in Liverpool with the largest congregation,”10 Wells, at Aked’s request, asked Douglass to provide letters of introduction on her behalf.11 Recognized internationally and respected by many for his work several decades earlier on the moral dilemma of slavery in the United States, Wells communicated to Douglass that Aked suggested that “if you wish for the splendid success of the work to write letters to all your friends in Great Britain commending me to others.”12 In response to Wells’s request, Douglass thanked Aked for “opening the doors of your church, and otherwise assisting her in obtaining a hearing in England.”13 On the issue of lynching and Wells’s ability to counter claims that the “negro race is a brutish one, deserving death,”14 Douglass told Aked that “Southern papers have denounced Miss Wells and have assailed her as an unworthy person, but I give no credit to their denunciation.

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The motive for their assaults is simply to destroy the effect of her disclosures.”15 Wells was also not the only African American to write editorials that provided a vicarious depiction of human interaction that challenged portrayals of justice. J. C. Dukes, editor and owner of the Montgomery Herald, a Montgomery, Alabama, black-owned newspaper offered a scathing analysis in 1887, five years prior to Wells’s editorial in response to the lynching of her friend Thomas Moss and his two business partners in Memphis, Tennessee, that questioned the validity of race-based rape as a justification for lynching. What distinguishes Wells from others who provided an analysis of the cause and effect of lynching is the tripartite pragmatic strategy she recommended that an oppressed group implement, in part or whole, as an antidote to counter the effects of inhumane viciousness. Although designed to address a specific moral problem and ethical dilemma—lynching— Wells’s proposal in 1892 to boycott, migrate, and write functions as a constructive resource for a twenty-first-century Christian ethic of resistance to systemic violence.

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Chapter Eleven Re-Orientation: Viewing Justice in a Racially Violent World

There is a tendency by some whites to view African Americans as insignificant and nonthreatening.1 At the same time, examinations of black/white racial relationships in the United States call forth questions about black invisibility as a tool of resistance. In an editorial titled “Affirmative Action,” Santa Clara University English Professor Jeff Zorn, quoting Cornel West, said that every major institution in American society—churches, universities, courts, academies of science, governments, economies, television, film, and others—attempted to exclude black people from the human family in the name of white supremacist ideology. This unrelenting assault on black humanity produced the fundamental condition of black culture—that of black invisibility and namelessness. 2

Due to the pervasiveness of black invisibility, attention must be given to how this imposed status of nonexistence can be employed as a strategic device whereby vital information can be disseminated within communities in which the dominant culture assumes primary control. Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poem “We Wear the Mask”3 emphasizes this feature of adaptability that is often crucial to marginalized people’s ability to survive. Dunbar proclaimed in the first two lines of the opening stanza: We wear the mask that grins and lies, It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes, . . . 4

Dunbar’s poem points to a concept that theologian Kelly Brown Douglas terms white culture. In Sexuality and the Black

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Church: A Womanist Perspective, Brown Douglas explains that “white culture is distinguished by its ability to promote the sanctity of whiteness by devaluing that which is non-White.”5 Brown Douglas goes on to say that “this culture asserts the supremacy of whiteness and is accompanied by social, political, and economic systems that also privilege whiteness.”6 Based on Brown Douglas’s working definition, we can conclude that proponents of white culture dictate the terms on which they interact with blacks. Architects of this social pathology,7 often leaders across various sectors of the private and public domain, determine the basis for interracial interaction. But to be invisibly present can contribute to a climate that allows white bankers, educators, lawyers, physicians, entrepreneurs, and other prominent citizens to openly discuss tactics of terror.8 Wells observed that “so bold have the lynchers become, masks are laid aside, the temples of justice and strongholds of law are invaded in broad daylight and prisoners are taken out and lynched, while governors of states and officers of law stand by and see the work well done.”9 As one example of many, consider this public threat issued in response to Wells’s June 1892 article. She recalled that telegraphing for news, I received telegrams and letters in return informing me that the trains were being watched, that I was to be dumped into the river and beaten, if not killed; it had been learned that I wrote the editorial and I was to be hanged in front of the court-house and my face bled if I returned, and I was implored by my friends to remain away. One prominent insurance agent publicly declares he will make it his business to shoot me down on sight if I return to Memphis in twenty years, while a leading white lady has remarked that she was opposed to the lynching of those three men in Memphis, but she did wish there was some way by which I could be gotten back and lynched.10

Wells’s ability to defy normative portrayals of being is intricately connected to her ability to redefine that which constitutes meaning. As she recounted in her autobiography: Like many another person who had read of lynching in the South, I had accepted the idea meant to be conveyed—that although lynching was irregular and contrary to law and order, unreasoning anger over the terrible crime of rape led to the lynching; that perhaps the brute deserved death anyhow and the mob was justified in taking his life. But Thomas Moss, Calvin McDowell, and Lee Stewart had been lynched in Memphis, one of the leading cities of the South, in which no lynching had taken place before, with just as much brutality as other victims of the mob; and they had committed no crime against white women.11

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This required a re-orientation on her part that was necessitated by historical circumstances. Wells explained how the tortuous and cruel death of her friends at the hands of persons unknown, although “the papers told how Tom Moss begged for his life, for the sake of his wife, his little daughter and his unborn infant,”12 impacted her sense of justice. She declared that “this is what opened my eyes to what lynching really was. An excuse to get rid of Negroes who were acquiring wealth and property and thus keep the race terrorized and ‘keep the nigger down.’ ”13 This shift in her thinking about lynching required Wells to think long and hard about Moss’s last utterance to move West and resettle in territory where African Americans would not be treated as harshly as they were in Memphis and other southern locales. As Wells’s analysis of lynching makes clear, re-orientation can facilitate the manner in which we view justice in a racially violent world. By explicitly demonstrating that the work of justice is a continual process, re-orientation required Wells to expend the energy to raise questions while she simultaneously articulated a response that reflected an awareness of the multiplicity of views on the issue of lynching. From this life-altering event, Wells “began an investigation of every lynching she read about.”14 Wells examined how power dynamics can shape cultural values. Born to slave parents, Wells demonstrated an ability to appreciate gifts of power that emerge when we begin to rethink our sense of being in connection with the various contexts in which we participate. In other words, knowledge about the relationship between public authority and lynching contributed to her ability to look beyond tolerated behavior in order to perceive ethical complications of lynching on/in society. Wells understood that coercive factors are often elusive and subtle. But she was also very much aware that power dynamics are also dependent on the creation of social classifications designed to produce a desired outcome. In fact, one way this predetermined objective is accomplished is to exercise terror as a means of control. In his 1944 essay, “The Negro Issue in America,” Reinhold Niebuhr hypothesized that “if a community desires to keep a race in permanent subjection, it can only do so by consistent Nazi methods. It must destroy the capacity to resist injustice among those who suffer from it.”15 Thus it is important to recognize that a nonretaliatory response to lynching fifty-two years prior to Niebuhr’s assessment of the black-and-white issue in the United States may be best described as compelled obedience. I coined this phrase to describe behavior that advocates a clever use of terminology as an essential ingredient to

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manufacture a culture of fear. Sometimes the targeted audience, unable to articulate a rebuttal, will comply with the oppressor’s demands in order to avoid further retaliation. Of course, it should be noted that manipulated responses are not necessarily indicative of a respondent’s felt sense but may instead reflect an awareness that noncompliance could result in greater injustices. Far from passive submission, Wells realized that black response to the March 1892 lynching in Memphis reflected an awareness of their cultural reality. In “Lynch Law in All Its Phases” she said that “vengeance was whispered from ear to ear, but sober reflection brought the conviction that it would be extreme folly to seek vengeance when such action meant certain death for men, and horrible slaughter for women and children, as one of the evening papers took care to remind us.” Recourse for African Americans, and black Memphians in particular, required a counterresponse that did not ignore the fact, as Wells articulated clearly, that “the power of the State, country and city, the civil authorities and the strong arm of the military power were all on the side of the mob and of lawlessness.”16 Phillip Dray, concurring with Wells, noted that this reaction to racialized fear is unfortunately not an isolated response. The ability of African Americans to comprehend the magnitude of racialized fear could counter the devastating effects of the mob. For instance, in At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America, Dray said that this socially conditioned response was problematic. He especially noted that “in small, isolated towns, agreeing after the fact that a lynching had been good and proper was also a sound survival strategy—best to allow the lynch mob’s fury to end with its original victim than spread to the whole black community, as too often happened.”17 At any rate, the nonexistence of checks and balances designed to promote just practices gave way to systems based on false constructions of race as a means to exert force. Like Wells, Niebuhr is attentive to dynamics of morality and power. In some of his selected works,18 attention is given to the relationship of love, justice, and power. Niebuhr stressed the importance of differentiating between moral and social behavior of individuals and groups. And though he emphasized that the possibility exists that individuals may occasionally be able to give priority to someone else’s interest, Niebuhr suggested that the probability that this will occur in a group is highly unlikely. This line of thought indicates that in groups the possibility always exists that pertinent information might not be disclosed or that

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motives may not be easily detected in order to determine the needs of others and subsequently the most appropriate strategy to foster a morally principled response. Or, as Niebuhr contended, what eventually determines group interaction is the amount of power possessed by each group. As a matter of fact, it is almost impossible to disagree with Niebuhr that “the oppressed, whether they be the Indians in the British Empire, or the Negroes in our own country or the industrial workers in every nation, have a higher moral right to challenge their oppressors than these have to maintain their rule by force.”19 However, in response to the 1954 Supreme Court ruling on the classaction lawsuit commonly referred to as Brown v. Board of Education Niebuhr said, “[O]ne may hope that ultimately the Negro people will have the same advantages that all our children have. But there must be a measure of sympathy for those who are afraid of the immediate effects of present educational plans.”20 This concept of gradual adjustment suggests that it is equally hard to accept unconditionally Niebuhr’s position that minority group members exercise what I term moderate reason when they determine what constitutes a just act. I use this descriptor, moderate reason, to point to what I see as a fallacy in Niebuhr’s analysis that shifts responsibility from the oppressor to the oppressed. In other words, members of marginalized communities are asked to allow sufficient time, as determined by the other, to dismantle inequitable structures. This subjective factor—how long is long enough—grants time for the status quo to adapt to proposed changes, and suggests that love is never sufficient in the quest for justice since power is required to obtain and maintain some sense of equilibrium as determined by the majority group. At issue is the manner in which gradualism with regard to race in the United States can be used as a tool to promote continued practices of injustice when the oppressed are always asked to make allowances for the actions of those whose points of privilege are being challenged. Of course, we want to believe that this is an exception and not the norm. However, in her critique of the response of the United States to lynching Wells helps us to understand that it is perhaps no coincidence that “the South spares nobody else’s feelings, and it seems a queer logic that when it comes to a question of right, involving lives of citizens and the honor of the government, the South’s feelings must be respected and spared.”21 Thus, Niebuhr’s suggestion to grant time for the other to adjust to a recommended change and its associated socio-ethical implications is not a novel concept.

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However, Wells would, and rightfully so, push him on this issue of moderate reason. From Wells’s perspective, oppressed members should not only expect, they should demand that their oppressors be required to account for their actions. Her stance on social justice required that “a public sentiment strong against lawlessness must be aroused.”22 Though brief, this statement suggests that there is a correlation between individual and communal response to moral problems. Wells also insisted that the actualization of a just society could not become a lived reality if responsibility was not shared across multiple points of community intersections that included, but were not limited to, race. Wells emphasized that Every individual can contribute to this awakening. When a sentiment against lynch law as strong, deep and mighty as that roused against slavery prevails, I have no fear of the result. It should be already established as a fact and not as a theory, that every human being must have a fair trial for his [sic] life and liberty, no matter what the charge against him [sic]. When a demand goes up from fearless and persistent reformers from press and pulpit, from industrial and moral associations that this shall be so from Maine to Texas and from ocean to ocean, a way will be found to make it so. 23

I would be remiss if I did not point out that Niebuhr offered suggestions, which mirror those articulated by Wells in 1892, to address America’s race problem.24 In particular, Niebuhr suggested that “boycotts against banks which discriminate against Negroes in granting credit, against stores which refuse to employ Negroes while serving Negro trade, and against public service corporations which practice racial discrimination, would undoubtedly be crowned with some measure of success”25 to dismantle racial apartheid in the United States. He goes on to say that “non-payment of taxes against states which spend on the education of Negro children only a fraction of the amount spent on white children, might be an equally efficacious weapon.”26 And although Niebuhr provided a rather thorough analysis of disproportionate power, he neglected to shift primary responsibility for social action to the dominant group.27 Thus, justice demands that we assess multiple aspects of an issue. To move in this direction requires intentionality to foster dialogue that will not only dispel myths but that will also raise suspicions regarding traditions that reflect societal fragmentations. Re-orientation, as an act of resistance, requires that we pay attention to and give voice to the ways in which God reveals God’s self.

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This idea, though, should not be accepted as a given. Rather, as discussed throughout this text, Wells’s response to the 1892 lynching of Moss, Stewart, and McDowell illustrates the necessity to evaluate cultural practices that contradict notions of justice. More specifically, Wells’s writings on lynching make clear that re-orientation is a deliberate act of positioning that requires both a self-evaluation of held assumptions as well as a broader evaluation of behaviors that impede the actualization of justice. At the same time, this turning toward something necessitates a shift in our way of thinking that can result in new questions that may contradict previously held beliefs. For example, although Wells was educated by Northern missionaries at Rust College in Holly Springs, Mississippi, during the early years of emancipation, and during the same period engaged in family and church bible study, she did not question the socio-ethical implications of southern horrors and mob rule until someone she knew was lynched. As I mentioned earlier and will discuss in greater detail later, Wells assumed that the reasons given for lynching were valid and did not question the motives of the lynchers. Based on this pre-March 1892 stance, she did not voice any concern about collusion between elected officials and mob members who were sometimes one and the same. Before she was personally affected by the mob’s actions, Wells did not raise concerns about moral implications associated with this country’s infatuation with terror. Evidence suggests, as mentioned earlier, that black journalists did question lynch allegations and the mob’s subsequent action. What Wells’s anti-lynching apologetic makes clear is that the act of re-orientation can result in a rethinking of foundational doctrines. In the case of lynching, Wells asks us to consider what our actions communicate about our faith. In this regard I draw upon the research of historian of religion Charles H. Long, as well as my own research, to explore more thoroughly re-orientation as an act of resistance. Long, recognized for his scholarship and contributions to an interdisciplinary approach to the study of religion, asks that we take seriously the meaning of religion in the life of a people whose history suggests, or rather demands, a re-interpretation. Long’s interpretative explanation regarding the introduction of religion in the new world is vital for anyone who wants to understand religion and its resulting theological ethical implications. He posits that in order to understand religion, and in particular the history of religion in the United States, we must return to the world of the Atlantic and ask some pertinent

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questions. For, as Long emphasizes, an understanding of religion in this nation is intricately connected to whether we view the world from the upper deck or from the bowels of the slave vessel. In other words, religion emerges from and is shaped by our worldview. In Significations: Signs, Symbols and Images in the Interpretation of Religion, Long provides a definition of religion to differentiate his work from that of theologians. Religion, according to Long, is first and foremost orientation. It is “orientation in the ultimate sense.”28 It is this awareness of being that subsequently enables us to “come to terms with the fundamental meaning of our place in the world,”29 Long contends. In a sense, then, to engage in the act of re-orientation is to debunk truth misrepresentations that promote the suppression of other expressions of reality. Unless we understand this need to identify with that which is essential to naming concrete contextual realities we cannot comprehend the significance of Long’s work as it relates to re-orientation and solidarity with persons often described as “the least” of God’s children. At the very least intentionality in crafting questions from the perspective of those chained in the bowels of ships christened “John the Baptist,” “Grace,” “Mercy,” “Hope,” “Jesus,” can serve as a lens by which we can recognize strategies employed to perpetuate a lie or, to quote Long, to signify.30 We can use this exercise to view multiple sides of a shared story and in so doing assess some broader implications related to an unquestionable endorsement of the dominant culture’s historical construction of a universal reality as normative and its associated consequences for slaves who did not stand on the ship’s deck to image a “brave new world.” This act of re-orientation as an act of resistance demands that we confront deliberately designed practices that are rarely more than exploitative systems whose primary objective is to erect structures to maintain the perceived privileges of a select few at the expense of people often least equipped to challenge the validity of these assumptions. In other words, re-orientation implies, “the past must be viewed as the conditioning circumstance of the present.”31 For Wells, this required seeing the connections between slavery and her current context in order to recognize that lynching was a skillfully devised practice to safeguard the lifestyle of a few at the expense of many. She recognized that lynching was more than the horrifying rope and fagot. While the hanging of lifeless bodies from branches was, and remains, a prominent symbol of America’s insatiable thirst for terror, people were brutally slaughtered in diverse ways. At any given moment

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any technique or a combination, thereof, could be employed by the mob. Imagine, and I borrow from Wells and other scholars’ descriptions to describe various techniques used by lynchers: “Lynching victims, nailed inside whiskey barrels, subjected to death by rolling. Envision others, with hands and legs secured, as objects of target practice as bullets wrenched through their bodies. Picture some, chased for sport, when upon capture they were dismembered while their bodies roasted over a campfire.” Wells arrived at a point where she knew that mob rule had a tenor of absoluteness. But more importantly, she understood that re-orientation demanded of her the courage to examine lynching’s causal effect and to be aware of the associated risk to herself and to the community on whose behalf she spoke. Long’s analysis of the creation and implementation of religion in America suggests that if we are serious about developing a Christian ethic of resistance, we need, as Wells and others engaged in the work of justice demonstrate, to look at how individuals have gone and continue to go to great lengths to safeguard a perceived privileged existence. In other words, to view justice in a racially violent world we must be, in some instances, compelled to recognize how re-orientation influences the manner in which we examine exploitative schemes of those who stood on the decks of slave ships to imagine prosperous futures. If we accept this notion as a given, there are some things that we simply have to come to terms with in order to assess the interconnectedness of history. Wells’s graphic depiction of the similarity between the Antebellum South and the New South exemplify Long’s hypothesis. As Wells explained, [H]er (America’s) white citizens are wedded to any method however revolting, any measure however extreme, for the subjugation of the young manhood of the race. They have cheated him out of his ballot, deprived him of civil rights or redress therefore in the civil courts, robbed him of the fruits of his labor, and are still murdering, burning and lynching him. 32

Wells’s observation demonstrates two things. First, it illustrates measures individuals will employ in order to avoid acknowledging the humanity of a people whose heritage is informed by chattel slavery. More than that, it serves as a reminder that a conscious awareness of issues mandates a response. Hence, a second step in articulating a Christian ethic of resistance is the intentional creation of space(s) that promotes a collaborative effort by any who commit to do the hard

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work of self-reflection that is necessary if we are to hear opposing views that contradict prevailing interpretations. Following this line of thinking, to view justice in a racially violent world requires that we recognize that signification, “a very clever language game,”33 names and dictates reality from a dominant perspective as a means to maintain an appearance of control. One way to understand how this works, especially as it relates to lynching, is to look at the excuses that were offered to justify lawlessness in the United States. Frederick Douglass, Wells, and Cutler addressed three alleged reasons that masked and disguised motives that fueled the torturous mutilation of thousands of individuals. 34 Wells recognized that the linguistic brokers’ “excuses have adapted themselves to the emergency, and are aptly outlined by that greatest of all Negroes, Frederick Douglass, in an article of recent date, in which he shows that there have been three distinct eras of Southern barbarism, to account for which three distinct excuses have been made.”35 In summary, lynching was justified on the following grounds: ●

●

●

The first excuse given to the civilized world for the murder of unoffending Negroes was the necessity of the white man to repress and stamp out alleged “race riots.” The second excuse, the fear of Negro domination, had its birth during the turbulent times of reconstruction. The third excuse was that Negroes had to be killed to avenge their assaults upon women. 36

In a speech delivered at the Metropolitan A.ME Church in Washington, D C on January 9, 1894, Douglass told his audience that insurrection, black supremacy, and sexual assault, the “three distinct periods of persecution of negroes in the South came along precisely in the order in which they were most needed.”37 What resulted was a shrewd use of language to create a climate of fear that allowed its principal architects “to justify their own barbarism”38 with little concern about police or other legal intervention. Thus, it is imperative that a Christian ethic of resistance identify connections between signification and discourse analysis, 39 or the study of text in context, which is necessary to explore effectively the relationship between misrepresentations of justice and verbal misdirection(s). A primary objective of discourse analysis in the development of a Christian ethic of resistance to combat systemic violence that is informed by the history of lynching in the United States is to make

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explicit the ways in which majority group members use textual talk about minorities to construct assumptions about minorities that are subsequently promoted as factual. Through an examination of the role of exchanges and surpluses, a Christian ethic of resistance can illustrate the ramifications associated with the role of discourse 40 as it relates to re-orientation and the manner in which we view justice in a racially violent world. In one sense, exchanges, through a variety of means, are the result of the process of substituting one thing for another. Quite often this is accomplished through the construction of a dual standard of value assignment in order to create a façade that absolves certain individuals of responsibility. Wells exposed a public sentiment about “lynch law in all its phases” indicating that “the general government is willingly powerless to send troops to protect the lives of its black citizens, but the state governments are free to use state troops to shoot them down like cattle, when in desperation the black men attempt to defend themselves, and then tell the world that it was necessary to put down a ‘race war.’ ”41 Subsequently, racial modes of speaking regarding the creation of distinct cultural indicators contribute to the crafting of a society that perceives itself as innocent. How we view justice in a racially violent world can be a catalyst to facilitate the necessary work to promote interpretations from the underside in order to evaluate creative uses of surpluses. For instance, the utilization of surpluses, the remains after a stated need is satisfied, can result in a response that indicates that those who live with the consequences of historical and contemporary manifestations of lynching can ingeniously imagine and actualize an existence that is not characterized by horror. Perhaps the profoundest result of re-orientation as an act of resistance in a racially violent world is reflected in Wells’s 1892 assessment of boycott as a necessary effort to combat lynching. In essence, as stated previously, Wells realized that “the appeal to the white man’s [sic] pocket has ever been more effectual than all the appeals ever made to his conscience.” Wells stressed that “nothing, absolutely nothing, is to be gained by a further sacrifice of manhood [sic] and self-respect.” Instead, Wells emphasized that “by the right exercise of his [sic] power as the industrial factor of the South, the Afro-American can demand and secure his [sic] rights, the punishment of lynchers, and a fair trial for accused rapists.”42 While the actualization of Wells’s advice regarding the impact of economic solidarity as a means to address barbaric practices has not been realized by all, what her correlation suggests is that a change

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of perspective in how we view justice in a racially violent world is informed by an act of re-orientation that requires, as sociologist John H. Stanfield II writes in the Introduction to Race and Ethnicity in Research Methods, that we “think critically in epistemological and theoretical veins about methodologies.”43 For as long as the dominant culture, especially those granted powerbroker status, can obscure the mode of verbal communication without being held accountable for their actions, they can, in effect, minimize the importance of a Christian ethic of resistance to address legally sanctioned forms of terror in America.

Chapter Twelve Re-Evaluation: Demythologizing Hegemonic Structures

Ida B. Wells encouraged an oppressed people to execute a collective strategy to communicate a message to their tormentors. In response to the March 1892 lynching of three black Memphis entrepreneurs, Wells explained that [a]lthough the race was wild over the outrage, the mockery of law and justice which disarmed men and locked them up in jails where they could be easily and safely reached by the mob—the Afro-American ministers, newspapers and leaders counseled obedience to the law which did not protect them. Their counsel was heeded and not a hand was lifted to resent the outrage; following the advice of the Free Speech, people left the city in great numbers.1

Her endorsement of this countermeasure should not be construed as a racist response. Instead, we should consider how a refusal to support systems that directly or indirectly endorse vigilante violence inspired Wells to exercise moral courage to write and speak her mind. She understood that to respond to violence with violence would only exacerbate an already horrendous situation. The ability to effect change, then, depended on a re-evaluation of existing rules of social engagement. This was realized through a group effort that captured the attention of members of the ruling majority. As Wells made clear, “the men who make these charges encourage or lead the mobs which do the lynching.” The architects of mob rule and lynch law, according to Wells, “belong to the race which holds Negro life cheap, which owns the telegraph wires, newspapers, and all other communication with the outside world.” In other words, the masterminds behind

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lynching, as Wells points out, “write the reports which justify lynching by painting the Negro as black as possible and those reports are accepted by the press associations and the world without question or investigation.”2 It can be argued that Wells’s proposal was a life-saving technique. She recognized that any attempt to bargain with the powerbrokers would be futile. To continue to support the oppressor was not an option. Hence, her critique of whiteness refuted assumed compliance to practices that were fueled by hatred. Far from passive submission, Wells said, “it becomes a painful duty of the Negro to reproduce a record which shows that a large portion of the American people avow anarchy, condone murder and defy the contempt of civilization.”3 Eventually, migration, whether realized through a physical relocation or by a change in perspective, impacted Memphis in its refusal to condemn the lynching of Moss, McDowell, and Stewart but not without personal consequences to Wells. According to Wells, Black men [sic] 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, [and] 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.4

While the recommendation to migrate was certainly warranted, Wells’s suggestion does not address how to exist in a hostile environment when relocation is not an option. In order to move while remaining in place it stands to reason that an ontological shift can facilitate a reaction to a specific situation. 5 In other words, the manner in which self is understood in relationship to a broader context can result in an ability to reassess moral problems and ethical dilemmas in order to extract from and subsequently reassign value to sources typically attributed to a nonmajority population sector. As a component of the remedy that she proposed to prevent lynching, Wells asked people in 1895, especially African Americans and those with whom they were aligned, to think and act on independent lines in this behalf, remembering that after all, it is the white man’s [sic] civilization and the white man’s [sic] government which are on trial. This crusade will determine whether that civilization can maintain itself, or whether anarchy shall prevail.

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Whether this Nation shall write itself down a success at self government, or in deepest humiliation admit its failure complete; whether the precepts and theories of Christianity are professed and practiced by American white people as Golden Rules of thought and action, or adopted as a system of morals to be preached to, heathen until they attain to the intelligence which needs the system of Lynch Law. 6

For Wells, it was evident that the language endorsed by the mob and its supporters did not adequately speak to the plight of blacks in America. Thus, in light of her shared story with a people whose ancestors’ sense of personhood was often diametrically opposed to tenets endorsed by most white citizens, Wells challenges us to consider how an understanding of faith and reason might inform the problem of lynching and racism. However, when events from the past reflect history as terror, the ability to adjust to new environments is often a prerequisite to a socioethical critique that challenges suppositions about human behavior. For if history is a record of major events based on explanations that seek to justify behavior, this act of migration or transition can contribute to the maintenance of a sense of authenticity that is essential if we are to determine the manner in which we will name our reality. It is then imperative that questions regarding this country’s heritage be framed in a manner that evokes and invokes the emergence of another version of the facts about what occurred during and subsequent to the trans-Atlantic crossing as individuals journeyed and continue to move toward that which often denotes a new beginning. Wells explicitly demonstrated that issues of equality articulated in the founding documents of the United States were dependent upon subjective interpretation and application. A challenge that emerges from her analysis of lynching demands that we think long and hard about implications associated with an unquestioned acceptance of accusations that adversely impact how we depict a specific group to a broader audience. Even if we are unable to believe that every version of history is, to some extent, invariably flawed, Wells asks that we take a personal inventory in order to determine the ways in which we passively or actively condone practices that advance a preferred way of life for a specific group without considering the devastating residual effects on those deemed other and therefore insignificant. Furthermore, she says it is essential that “individuals, organizations, press and pulpit should unite in vigorous denunciation of all forms of lawlessness and earnest, constant demand for the rigid enforcement of the law of the land. Nay, more than this, there must spring up in all sections of

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the country vigilant, aggressive defenders of the Constitution of our beloved land.”7 To appropriate Wells’s 1892 suggestion as a viable source to address contemporary forms of violently destructive acts we must address the modern world in all of its complexity. What this implies is that we must reclaim history that has been relegated to the margins in a manner similar to that experienced by those with whom Wells was racially and ethnically aligned. Furthermore to engage and encourage others to read texts from the underside, that is, from the perspective of the marginalized in society, can be viewed as an act of resistance.8 If we take seriously Wells’s mandate to investigate moral problems, her analysis of lynching necessitates that we think long and hard about the implications of her claim as it relates to a Christian understanding of love, neighbor, community, and church. Notwithstanding the historical and contemporary negativity that must be associated with lynching, to agree with Wells is to acknowledge that central to understanding the importance of a Christian ethic of resistance, that emerges from a marginalized community, is the significance of the work and life of Jesus the Christ to a church that lives in hope-filled expectation of the salvific promise for all humans in every culture. As a result, a Christian ethic of resistance will challenge many assumptions of what are widely accepted as definitive theological positions. That is, a Christian ethic of resistance demands we critically examine presuppositions of its foundational doctrines— Christology, ecclesiology, eschatology, soteriology, anthropology—if we are to hear and to embrace truth in the diverse ways in which it is expressed and, in so doing, actively engage in the work of justice. At the heart of Wells’s apologetic is an understanding of a God who acts on behalf of the least and often visibly invisible persons in society. In her 1909 essay, “Mob Murder in a Christian Nation,” of primary concern for Wells is how faith informs the condoning of lynching. Sociologist and civil rights activist Arthur F. Raper noted as follows in his analysis of more than twenty lynchings that occurred in 1930: Generally speaking, preachers and church officers, like other citizens, were compromised into letting things take their course. The most common view expressed by ministers was that the lynching, though unfortunate, was inevitable. The ministers, and especially the Southern Methodists and Southern Baptists, usually felt that they would be faced with a serious division among their members should they actively support indictment and conviction of the lynchers.9

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Michael Pfeifer adds additional insight into the question of lynching and Christianity. His investigation found that “occasionally, Christian churchmen openly endorsed mob murder.”10 He offers, as an example, an account in which a Wilmington, Delaware, Presbyterian pastor “incited the June 1903 lynching by several thousand of George White, an African American who had allegedly raped and murdered a young white woman, Helen Bishop.”11 Pfeifer also provides examples of pastors who “determinedly tried to dissuade their young workingclass male parishioners from joining a lynch mob of several thousand that would lynch three African American circus employees on a spurious accusation of rape.”12 For Wells, lynching was an anathema that resulted in many Christians subverting concepts of love and justice. As a result, she contended that lynching was not a southern problem. Instead, she insisted that lynching “is now national—a blight upon our nation, mocking our laws and disgracing our Christianity.”13 And, as Raper pointed out, “the most fundamental way in which the church is related to mob violence is that, not infrequently, the local church leaves unchallenged the general assumption that the Negro is innately inferior and of little importance. Upon this assumption ultimately rests the justification of lynching.”14 To which Wells replied, “ ‘With malice toward none but with charity for all,’ let us undertake the work of making the ‘law of the land’ effective and supreme upon every foot of American soil—a shield to the innocent; and to the guilty, punishment swift and sure.”15 Wells also provided a convincing illustration to support the distorted relationship between lynching and a Christian understanding of righteousness. She correctly noted that in a context where [h]umanity abhors the assailant of womanhood, this charge upon the Negro at once placed him beyond the pale of human sympathy. With such unanimity, earnestness and apparent candor was this charge made and reiterated that the world has accepted the story that the Negro is a monster which the Southern white man [sic] has painted him. And today, the Christian world feels, that while lynching is a crime, and lawlessness and anarchy the certain precursors of a nation’s fall, it can not by word or deed, extend sympathy or help to a race of outlaws, who might mistake their plea for justice and deem it an excuse for their continued wrongs.16

Due to the sentiment expressed in the aforementioned statements, a Christian ethic of resistance not only demands that we reexamine the

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interlocking cycle of oppression based on race but re-evaluation also specifically calls us to demythologize hegemonic structures designed to counter factors that should influence an understanding of community that is called to model the one who is the way and the truth. Indeed, following this line of thinking, to participate in the work of justice requires that we become proficient in evaluating the oftenhidden motives of the signifier. In particular, skills must be acquired so that new meaning ascribed to existing symbols reflects a Christian ethic of resistance designed to address and counter the effects associated with the cruel manipulation of words. This second requirement, re-evaluation and the demythologization of hegemonic structures, is important for a number of reasons. In one sense, demythologizing hegemonic structures, as an act of resistance, involves recovering stories about this nation’s infatuation with terror. Another important aspect of demythologizing hegemonic structures is a requirement to identify survival strategies that are crucial if we are to understand how to navigate a world that is still based on fragmentary constructs. A Christian ethic of resistance also asks that we broaden our awareness regarding the connection between language control and semiotics or signs and symbols. In many respects, re-evaluation places us in a position so that we can better understand how the tendency to speak from a universal impersonal perspective rather than from a particular personal viewpoint can hinder our ability to demythologize hegemonic structures designed to subvert justice.

Chapter Thirteen Re-Interpretation: Defining Hope from a Minority Perspective

Ida B. Wells crusaded for justice in a world that was shaped during a period characterized as a search for self-actualization that was contingent on the dehumanization of others. Her maturation as a person committed to justice was shaped by a period of multiple transitions for people of African descent.1 For recently emancipated persons, freedom, for many, was complicated by illiteracy and a dependency on former “owners” for employment and bare essentials, such as food and shelter, needed for survival. Reconstruction offered a measure of hope. This short-lived initiative that enabled black men to vote, while women of all races remained disenfranchised, quickly led to the rise of Jim Crow. In this climate of legalized racial segregation and discrimination, freedom for African Americans during the years 1892–1910 was accompanied by the shadow of lynch law, which functioned as a constant reminder that black citizens’ decisions to own property, to vote, to challenge formal and informal customs could place them, their family, and their community at risk. In 1893, Wells wrote that lynch law “continues in force to-day in some of the oldest states of the Union, where courts of justice have long been established, whose laws are executed by white Americans. It flourishes most largely in the states which foster the convict lease system, and is brought to bear mainly, against the Negro.”2 Seventeen years later, Wells sadly pointed out in her 1910 essay “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynching” that “the Negro’s only weapon of defense has been taken from him by legal enactment in all of the old confederacy—and the United States Government, a

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consenting Saul stands by holding the clothes of those who stone and burn him to death literally and politically.”3 This national ethos is the background from which Wells embarked upon a critical engagement with the controversial issue of lynching. She raised questions about an inability, or refusal, on the part of those who could work to minimize subjective applications of due process, to understand that justice should not be determined on the basis of race, gender, or class. A quote that Wells credits to the August 5, 1893 issue of the InterOcean 4 reinforces her position on judicial equity. Although Wells did not identify the editor, she concurred with the writer that the real need is for a public sentiment in favor of enforcing the law and giving every man [sic], white and black, a fair hearing before the lawful tribunals. . . . But the Negro has as good a right to a fair trial as the white man [sic], and the South will not be free from these horrible crimes of mob law so long as the better class of citizens try to find excuse for recognizing Judge Lynch. 5

Nonetheless and not at all surprising, Wells’s ability to substantiate her claim with information collected and disseminated by leading Euro-American newspapers met with resistance. In a letter to Frederick Douglass dated December 20, 1893, Wells expressed concern about a personal threat that appeared in the black-owned American Citizen 6 the previous week. The author of the editorial alleged that “we never fight women and children, but really, Brother Bird, you had better put a muzzle on that animal from Memphis. We are onto her dirty sneaking tricks. If we get after her, we will make her wish her mother had changed her mind ten months before she was born. We have been to New York. Are we understood?”7 In direct opposition to the prevailing perception, Wells’s publications and speeches pointed to a tendency on the part of the majority to discredit minority perspectives that called into question endorsements of horrific displays of inhumanity. Instead of drawing commonly held conclusions, Wells discovered that perception is a process of comprehension that emerges from a critical engagement on controversial issues. This awareness led her to acknowledge that the majority’s perspective was in many cases, as illustrated earlier, intentionally distorted. More to the point, Wells articulated a position that was grounded in the particularity of the fascination of the United States with lynching. Her anti-lynching campaign provided an opportunity for some to discern the ways in which a failure to evaluate existing standards

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contradicted notions of justice. Not only did she remove the mask of deception associated with excuses used to justify extralegal killings, her interpretation of lynching functioned as a vehicle to inform and to educate others about a reality that was not consistent with depictions of civilized behavior. In order to come to terms then with the ultimate sense of her place in the world, Wells had to position herself to actively engage in a countercultural transformation. An honest assessment about the importance of her social location was intricately connected to Wells’s ability to determine how to effect change even when imposed conditions indicated otherwise. Indeed, if we follow this line of thinking, there is little doubt that this conceptual understanding contributed to her pragmatic approach to the lynch abomination. Wells analyzed implications of a broader story and her investigation of this country’s red record resulted in a different version of causes, techniques, and effects associated with lynching. One way that she accomplished this was to explore the limits to which some would go in order to manufacture a culture that automatically excluded some, most notably former slaves and their offspring, from that which constituted the common good. Wells realized, for example, the press’ enormous influence to shape public opinion. She commented that “those who commit the murders write the reports, and hence these lasting blots upon the honor of a nation cause but a faint ripple on the outside world. They arouse no great indignation and call forth no adequate demand for justice. The victims were black, and the reports are so written as to make it appear that the helpless creatures deserved the fate which overtook them.”8 These statements imply that lynching was an accepted practice. Thus, through a systematic deconstruction of prevailing myths, narratives became a tool that Wells used to reconstruct another representation of reality. In this way, she understood how language could be used to provide multiple views of contextual encounters. Unequivocally Wells stated that her research indicated that “the press contains unreliable and doctored reports of lynchings, and one of the most necessary things for the race to do is to get these facts before the public.”9 In addition, she emphasized that “the people must know before they can act, and there is no educator to compare with the press.”10 Accordingly, Wells reminds us that to write is to name reality. In a conversation with a young woman about her involvement in the anti-lynching campaign, Wells realized that sources about her life, as well as many other African-American shapers of history, were nonexistent.11 Although she had authored several publications—beginning

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with Southern Horrors in 1892—to address lynching, Wells decided in 1928, according to Alfreda Duster’s Introduction to Crusade for Justice, to pen her life story.12 Tremendous strides have been made to increase the number of works published by and about African Americans. And yet, more than threequarters of a century since Wells addressed a specific question about historical accessibility, diversity in source documents continues to be problematic in many sectors of American life. Take, for example, a myth held by one too many persons descended from slaves that black people do not publish. One way that members of the academic community can address this misrepresentation is to become more intentional to include the works of African-American scholars as required resources. This approach may signal an institutional awareness that mis-education is a contemporary problem complicated by value systems based on the intricacies of what constitutes knowledge. Furthermore, Wells’s anti-lynching publications illustrate that to name reality is to expose a lie. She was a master rhetorician. With her vivid use of language, Wells painted a verbal picture that continues to encourage readers to consider the ways in which we understand civilization. Wells asked “the thinking public”13 to remember the inhumanity associated with southern horrors and mob rule. She couched her appeal with references to freedom and education that are cornerstones to an ability to actualize the tenets upon which the United States was founded. In essence, Wells asked that intelligent people reconsider what is required to create a society that strives to honor the fact that all people are “created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” With the stroke of her pen or typewriter keys, Wells signaled that if freedom and education are more brutalizing than slavery then life, liberty, and the pursuit of property is an illusion for African Americans and for all who consider themselves intelligent. This, in turn, highlights the fact that Wells’s actions and her critique of ethical complications of lynching indicate that to expose a lie is to risk alienation. Although hatred can result in the destruction of buildings, rarely can deeply entrenched contempt completely obliterate that which it abhors. Although Wells received word, while on vacation in New York, not to return to Memphis following the publication of her June 1892 editorial in which she questioned the reasonableness of race-based lynch rape allegations, her voice was not silenced. Wells continued to write about the atrocity of lynching. Her exposure was broadened. Venues in which to express her

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views expanded beyond the African-American press. The point here is that even though Wells was alienated or separated from all that was familiar she used her imposed exile as an opportunity to provide yet another example of southern horrors and the urgency to further her anti-lynching campaign. Almost thirty years elapsed before Wells returned to Memphis. She explained that “born and reared in the South, I had never expected to live elsewhere.”14 Yet, forced from her geographical region of birth, Wells demonstrated that legally sanctioned cowardly acts can serve to remind us that when we are separated from that with which we are most acquainted we can and perhaps must learn how to depend upon a power that is greater than we are. In the introductory paragraph of an 1893 essay, Wells stated that “I am before the American people today through no inclination of my own, but because of a deep-seated conviction that the country at large does not know the extent to which lynch law prevails in parts of the Republic, nor the conditions which force into exile those who speak the truth.”15 While Wells does not make a direct reference to the correlation between faith and social justice, she was attending a general conference of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME)16 when her friend Thomas Moss and his two business partners were lynched on March 16, 1892 in Memphis. And as noted in chapter six, Wells was influenced by social justice initiatives that characterized the work of AME Bishop Reverdy Ransom. It is perhaps no coincidence that her reaction to gross misrepresentations of justice suggests that to depend on that which might be beyond our comprehension is to be receptive to new understandings of truth. She confessed that prior to the lynching of a personal acquaintance she “was one among those who believed the conditions of the masses gave large excuse for the humiliations and proscriptions under which we labored; that when wealth, education and character became more general among us,—the cause being removed—the effect would cease, and justice be accorded alike.”17 In response to a personal threat, Wells expressed how fresh insights about a specific moral issue can influence an understanding of that which is promoted as truth. She said, I have been censured for writing that editorial, but when I think of the five men who were lynched that week for assault on white women and that not a week passes but some poor soul is violently ushered into eternity on this trumped-up charge, knowing the many things I do, and part of which I tried to tell in the New York Age of June 25,

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(and in the pamphlets I have with me) seeing that the whole race in the South was injured in the estimation of the world because of these false reports, I could no longer hold my peace, and I feel, yes, I am sure, that if it had to be done over again (provided no one else was the loser save myself) I would do and say the very same again.18

Wells embodied these words. She took advantage of multiple opportunities to give oral and written descriptions of human barbarity and in so doing gave voice to a distinct particularity. Consequently it stands to reason that when minority voices participate in theological ethical discourse, it is imperative that we rethink the ways in which we use language to speak about others. To substantiate her position to abolish lynch law Wells referred in a most appropriate manner to the humanitarian response of the United States to human rights violations against “Russian Jews and Armenian Christians, the laboring poor of Europe, the Siberian exiles and the native women of India.”19 Yet, in the same paragraph she made derogatory references to Native Americans in the development of her anti-lynching apologetic. Wells went on to state, “[I]f it were known that the cannibals or the savage Indians had burned three human beings alive in the past two years, the whole of Christendom would be roused, to devise ways and means to put a stop to it.”20 A word of caution—it is important to remember that Wells’s terminology is reflective of the era in which she wrote. However, attention must be given to the ambiguity associated with vocabulary employed by an oppressed group who in turn subjugate another minority population sector without drawing parallels and, in so doing, could perpetuate a cycle of imposed dehumanization. Since there are multiple views on what constitutes justice, attention can be given to how to analyze correlations between historical and contemporary manifestations of lynching through critical conversations with seminal thinkers whose concepts continue to influence significantly ethical discourse. For example, I find the work of Charles H. Long to be of immense value to assess what constitutes the common good. In particular, Long’s ability to ferret out the intricacies of various dynamics at play during the origin of religion in the United States points to the detailed attention required to analyze moral problems and Christian responses. A second concern related to representations of justice is how to present statistical information and data interpretation in a manner that will benefit the community(s) most impacted by policies whose implications are not broadly publicized

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but that can have catastrophic results. I raise this as a point for several reasons. First, Tuskegee Institute, a major archival site for lynch statistics, discontinued updating its records in approximately 1968. Second, the more general category of hate crimes, under which lynchings are classified, does not fully convey the historical underpinnings of a violently destructive act committed without fear of judicial recourse. This ignorance or insensitivity to the viciousness against which Wells crusaded is reflected in responses that suggest that the hanging of nooses from a tree on a public high school campus in LaSalle Parish, a district in Northeast Louisiana, that overwhelmingly endorsed David Duke, 21 a former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan’s bid for president, was a practical joke. In light of a tendency by some to suggest that America is becoming a postracial society, it is important to stress that, to view justice in a racially violent world, to demythologize hegemonic structures, and to define hope from a minority perspective is not simply a theoretical exercise. It demands the hard work of re-orientation, re-evaluation, and re-interpretation that requires a commitment to identify pragmatic solutions to concrete ethical dilemmas. What this suggests is that it is imperative that a Christian ethic of resistance be an integral curricular component that actively seeks to fill in current gaps in knowledge concerning African-American contributions to religious studies. In this regard, Wells’s recommendations to boycott, migrate, and write, when reformulated as re-orientation, re-evaluation, and re-interpretation, function as constructive resources for a Christian ethic of resistance to systemic violence in America in the twenty-first century.

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Chapter Fourteen Just Act: A Mandate to Talk about the Lynched We recover stories from our past in order to identify survival strategies that are crucial to developing insight into how to navigate systems sustained on the interlocking cycle of race, gender, class, and other fragmentary constructs. —Angela D. Sims

Some who read this publication might assert, and correctly so, that a Christian ethic of resistance is not contingent on an evaluation that considers the connection between historical representations of lynching and twenty-first-century injustices in the United States. I am convinced though, especially given recent events in which nooses were hung in public places, such as the door of an African-American faculty member at Columbia University in New York City in October 2007, that a study of lynching can function as a platform or a basis to ferret out ethical issues that are inherent in a system built on and sustained by tyranny in order to avoid a dismantling of the master’s house. To borrow Audre Lorde’s often-quoted concept1 is to remember that the work of resistance necessitates a change in perspective. To become acquainted with lynching—its meanings, its justifications, its techniques, its culture—is to gain a broader understanding of this country’s past and present and in so doing to become intentional in eradicating behaviors that threaten to permeate the future. In many respects, I write from a pain-filled place that is informed by a re-orientation in a race-gender-class conscious society. I write as an African-American female with multiple labels—some self-applied and others culturally or otherwise imposed. I speak from a place that

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has been turned upside down by inequities in systems that are anything but just. I give voice from a space of re-discovery of personhood that emerges from a stark reality that in twenty-first-century America black men, irrespective of degrees, professional standing, community involvement, or financial position, are still “boys” in these United States. As a daughter, niece, cousin, wife, mother, sister of many multihued brothers, I recognize that to re-tell the reality of historical and contemporary manifestations of lynching is an act of justice. In this regard, a Christian ethic of resistance addresses theological ethical implications of legally sanctioned acts of terror in order to discern the common good. After spending more than six years with Ida B. Wells, lynching, for me, is more than a southern experience. This deliberate act to kill people without fear of retribution or accountability to legal authorities reflected an accepted national practice. Although “lynchings are virtually non-existent”2 today, the magnitude of this sadistic act is overwhelming and lynching’s historical and contemporary implications are far-reaching. Wells, like theologian Kelly Brown Douglas, realized that “with the support of sexual discourse, lynching became an effective way to prevent Black people from gaining power politically, economically, or socially.”3 Wells’s social justice advocacy was far-reaching. Her ability to maneuver in international circles is admirable. But her capacity to interpret motives greatly enhanced her ability to communicate effectively her position on lynching as well as her views on franchise and racial discrimination on public carriers and in employment.4 Wells was instrumental in launching the women’s club movement in America and was a founding member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). But her directness and outspokenness often contributed to moments of ostracism and misunderstandings. 5 Along with her numerous accomplishments a distinctive characteristic of Wells was her willingness to challenge dominant perspectives, irrespective of race or gender. From her we gain an appreciation for an unrelenting determination that is often a prerequisite to explore the intricacies of practices that contribute to the perpetuation of legally sanctioned forms of terror. The ability to offer an alternative viewpoint requires a commitment to assess a situation accurately, to be cognizant of our biases and lesser strengths, to be willing to accept constructive criticism, to make the necessary personal sacrifices, to document our findings, and to articulate our position. In addition,

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Wells’s evaluation of the causes of lynching in the United States points to several major themes that continue to warrant further investigation. In particular, her research suggests that there is a direct correlation between murders committed by mobs and the economics of racism, the myth of womanhood, and the power of collective strength. In 1892 vigilante justice was primarily an unchecked aspect of American civilization. There are those who will disagree with this claim and insist that mob rule was primarily an indicator of southern culture. I contend, however, that silence from other geographical sectors can be construed as a form of compliance or at least an unquestioned acceptance of lynching. The rope and fagot, coupled with bulleted dismembering, were visible displays of lynching. This very public dehumanizing event often attracted mass crowds.6 The spectators stood on the sidelines with many cheering as they waited for an opportunity to collect souvenirs, in the form of human body parts, and to pose for the photographer. During the late nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries, the coercive nature of this practice created an ethos of fear that transcended the southern states’ borders. When he endorsed her description of lynching and its consequences, Frederick Douglass suggested two other audiences that would benefit from critically engaging Wells’s treatise on lynching—the American church and clergy.7 The identification of these specific groups suggests that there are ambiguities operative that allow southern horrors and mob rule to coexist with Christianity without a loud outcry against this destructive practice. Reflecting on the movie production of her Pulitzer Prize–winning novel The Color Purple Alice Walker asserts, in The Same River Twice: Honoring the Difficult, that “nobody talks about the lynched.”8 While she is referring to the biological father of the novel’s protagonist, Walker’s statement suggests that there is a tendency to advance a conspiracy of silence that ignores the pain associated with trauma. Wells concurred with Walker and offered the following reason for this inability to bring discussions about lynching into the public sphere. According to Wells, [i]t is the easiest way to get along in the South to ignore the question altogether; our American Christians are too busy saving the souls of white Christians from burning in hell-fire to save the lives of black ones from present burning in fires kindled by white Christians. The feelings of the people who commit these acts must not be hurt by protesting against this sort of thing, and so the bodies of the victims of

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mob hate must be sacrificed, and the country disgraced because of that fear to speak out.9

For Wells, the American church and clergy’s silence on the lynch abominations signaled validation of the behavior of those involved in the actual act of terror. For her, another paradigm was required to address mandates to ensure lawmakers and law enforcers recognize that convention or conformity to dehumanizing cultural dictates is not representative of the common good. When legal and civil authorities conspire with vigilantes and one too many Christians participate in lynching, vigilante justice becomes a formula to market oppressive behavior as normative. When this occurs, domestic forms of orchestrated terror become standard practices. When confronted with the effects of the subjective aspect of due process in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries, Wells allowed a personal experience of racially motivated hatred to galvanize her to critique practices in the “land of the free and the home of the brave” in public venues. As she explained in Southern Horrors “my business has been destroyed and I am an exile from home because of that editorial,10 the issue has been forced, and as a writer of it I feel that the race and the public generally should have a statement of the facts as they exist.”11 Her ability to interpret motives, coupled with her sense of self, contributed to Wells’s ability to communicate effectively a viewpoint on lynching that raised concerns about this country’s obsession with horrific displays of cruelty. Prior to March 1892, Wells acknowledged that she did not question the justifications attributed to lynching. In other words, she had no reason to doubt the validity of the claims offered and assumed that the punishment meted reflected the victim’s guilt. Yet, the murder of three African-American businessmen in Memphis, including Thomas Moss, the father of her goddaughter, prompted her to reconsider her stance on lynching. In other words, when the universal did not comport with the particular, Wells had to re-evaluate how to respond when the impersonal became personal. The death of individuals whose only crime was protecting their property ignited within Wells a passion to search for truth with the hope that her efforts would subsequently result in a more just society. Her consciousness level had been raised. No longer could she accept the opinion of the status quo regarding actions that used fear as a weapon to regulate behavior in order to sustain a disguised form of slavery predicated on an interlocking system of oppression. She worked

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to perfect her data-gathering and analytical skills in order to present “a red record,” that is, a graphically detailed account of lynching, in order to appeal not only to American citizens but to the international community, especially human rights advocates in Scotland, Wales, and England, for intervention. Wells’s sociocultural critique was instrumental in highlighting America’s proclivity to use fear as a weapon to achieve a desired outcome and its tendency to promote its myth of an innocent nation while ignoring the bloodletting upon which it was sustained. Consequently, Wells’s position on justice is shaped by and reflective of the particularity of a contemporary location that is informed by this country’s historical reality. A major aspect of her cultural assessment is that she challenged the world’s view of life in nineteenth-century America. When we situate her work within the broader context of this liberal era, we gain an appreciation for the manner in which she used language to challenge the sensitivity of people and at the same time to heighten their awareness on issues of hatred, inequality, and subordination. More than a century since she began her anti-lynching campaign, her work demands that we take seriously the account and subsequent recommendation that this woman, who self-identified as a journalist, advanced. Wells’s ability to read the social landscape of the “land of the free and the home of the brave” during the period 1892–1910 suggests that responses to social issues are intricately connected to the meanings ascribed to symbols. She had no choice but to work and her work was to speak truth to any who would read or hear her message regarding illegal and heinous practices of mob rule and lynch law. The public stance that she took regarding a national issue illustrates that commitment to a cause is frequently accompanied by personal risk. As I discuss throughout this text, Wells’s work on lynching is valuable for a number of reasons. First, she offered a solution to combat lynching. That is, she realized that victims could directly affect lynching proponents through business transactions, relocation, and communication strategies. Next, an examination of her assessment calls forth questions about America’s use of lynching as a tool to regulate behavior and the manner in which public opinion is shaped and lived out in the private sector. Finally, the manner in which she used multiple sources and methods to reconstruct particular lynching events underscores a continued need to reclaim stories. From a Christian ethics perspective, her interpretation of America’s red record during the years 1892–1910 challenges us to reassess our value systems in order

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to better understand how social practices often determine concepts of justice. In an examination of the black church during what is perceived by many as the lowest point in the life of this particular institution in the late nineteenth century, Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham observes that “by 1890, it had become preeminently clear that the black community would have to devise its own strategies of social and political advancement.”12 And in 1892, Wells “maintained, that, in every section of our land, the accused should have a fair, impartial trial, so that a man who is colored shall not be hanged for an offense, which, if he were white, would not be adjudged a crime.”13 As Wells saw it, [i]f the Southern people in defense of their lawlessness, would tell the truth and admit that colored men and women are lynched for almost any offense, from murder to a misdemeanor, there would not now be the necessity for this defense. But when they intentionally, maliciously and constantly belie the record and bolster up these falsehoods by the words of legislators, preachers, governors and bishops, then the Negro must give to the world his [sic] side of the awful story.14

Hence, her analysis of southern horrors and mob rule is a gateway through which we can assess the resilience of individuals who, through an intentional adaptation to new environments, can position themselves to critique situations. This change in perspective requires, though, that we become proficient in interpreting symbolic representations of injustice in order to maintain a sense of authenticity that is essential if we are to name accurately that which constitutes our reality. A refocus of energy can then translate into a commitment to evaluate survival strategies with a goal to mitigate violence. In this regard, Wells’s social critique can function as a guide to demonstrate how we can give voice to personal pain that is reflective of a larger problem that emerges from and is informed by a shared story. Wells communicated the effects of lynching that were silently condoned by those deemed to possess the requisite expertise required to implement and maintain order. In essence, she questioned the validity of the parameters that determine what contributes to the common good. In Southern Horrors, Wells listed four immediate effects of lynching. In particular, she identified (1) the lives it takes, (2) the rank cruelty and outrage to the victims, (3) the prejudice it fosters, and (4) the stain it places against the good name of a weak race.15 These consequences are both independent factors but at the same time intertwined to provide a more comprehensive picture of conditions that

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fostered an environment where blacks were hung, shot, decapitated, and/or burned on a routine basis with rarely any objection. As Wells’s assessment of lynching illustrates, an analysis of statistical data can provide a framework against which we can explore terror’s impact on human behavior. Historical lynch statistics are indeed daunting. Yet sitting with the records, graphing the data, analyzing the information, and raising questions are necessary first steps for anyone who is serious about gaining insight into the extent of the problem of legally sanctioned domestic terror. To examine the causes of lynching from both an historical and contemporary perspective is one way to articulate theological-ethical implications associated with southern horrors as well as to assess its devastating effects. Crucial insights on survival techniques can also be gleaned when we evaluate responses to mob rule. The questions that emerge from this ethical interrogation can, in turn, function to guide an examination into the methods associated with lynching. Attention is therefore directed not only to cause and effect ascribed to lynch practices but also to the grotesqueness that characterizes this pattern of injustice. Wells presented both an analysis of the atrocities of lynch law and a guide to understand the pervasiveness of mob rule and its associated propaganda and tactics. Her argument suggests that failure to think critically and to raise pertinent concerns may result in diminished liberties that quickly become accepted practice. Thus, it is important to remember that a response to an encounter with injustice can become a catalyst to promote justice. For, as Wells stated, “the awful death-roll that Judge Lynch is calling every week is appalling,”16 and although bodies are not displayed from trees on a regular basis,17 the denial of due process of law in one too many jurisdictions to people of color suggests that perhaps lynching, the malicious taking of an alleged criminal’s life without benefit of due process of law, is still used to disrupt lives.18 And when we take into account the societal impact of contemporary forms of lynching, most notably the subjective interpretation of statutes by law enforcement officials, Wells’s 1892 recommendation continues to function as a viable resource from which to articulate an effective response to advocate for justice. Wells reminds us that it is important that we search for meaning in historical treasures and that we articulate that the noose, a sign of white supremacy and terror, should not be viewed lightly by any American committed to justice. Her reconstruction of remembrances,

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of data, of reality, is indeed, as she observed, “a contribution to truth, an array of facts, the perusal of which it is hoped will stimulate this great American Republic to demand that justice be done though the heavens fall.”19 From Wells, we gain a greater appreciation for risks that are often associated with truth telling. She also reminds us that it is important to become more intentional in questioning general assumptions. When we are purposeful in our fact-finding, it is possible that we too will arrive at a similar juncture as Wells and recognize, as she did, that while it is “with no pleasure that we have dipped our hands in the corruption here exposed,”20 southern horrors, though disguised to reflect twenty-first-century practices, 21 are still very much an aspect of American culture.

Notes

Prologue 1. I wrote this epigraph, as well as others used at the beginning of each part, to represent what I term cautionary lessons and ethical motifs contained in Ida B. Wells’s works. 2. Using the genre biomythography defined by Audre Lorde, this story describes the meanings of identity within the structure of personal, social, cultural, and historical life. For an example, see Audre Lorde, Zami: A New Spelling of My Name (Freedom, CA: Crossing, 1982). 3. Jonathan Markovitz, Legacies of Lynching: Racial Violence and Memory (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), xvi. 4. Ida B. Wells married attorney Ferdinand L. Barnett in 1895 and began to publish as Wells-Barnett, though she did not consistently hyphenate her name. For example, her 1909 essay “Mob Murder in a Christian Nation” was written under her maiden name. Throughout this document, I use her maiden name as an indicator to symbolize that an awareness of self can often function as a catalyst to shape the manner in which we respond to issues both within and beyond our communities of origin. Information on her life is derived primarily from Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells, ed. Alfreda M. Duster (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1970). See Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Selected Works of Ida B. Wells-Barnett compiled with an Introduction by Trudier Harris (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 3–13; Ida B. Wells, The Memphis Diary of Ida B. Wells: An Intimate Portrait of the Activist as a Young Woman, ed. Miriam Decosta-Willis with a Foreword by Mary Helen Washington and Afterword by Dorothy Sterling (Boston, MA: Beacon, 1995); Ida B. Wells-Barnett, On Lynchings with an Introduction by Patricia Hill Collins (Amherst, NY: Humanity, 2002), 5–6. For a timeline of significant events in Wells’s life, see the chronology in Ida B. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings: The Anti-Lynching Campaign of Ida B. Wells, 1892–1900, ed. Jacqueline Jones Royster (Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1997), 209–212. I refer to the text edited by Royster. 5. Ida B. Wells, “Lynch Law” (Ida B. Wells papers [Box 10, Folder 5], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library), 27–28.

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6. While this was Memphis’s first recorded lynching since the Civil War, in his study of Reconstruction historian Eric Foner provides a brief account of the city’s 1866 race riot. Foner writes, In May, an altercation that began when two horse-drawn hacks, one driven by a white man, the other by a black, collided on a Memphis street, escalated into three days of racial violence. White mobs, aided and abetted by the city police, assaulted blacks on the streets and invaded their neighborhoods. By the time order had been restored, at least forty-eight persons, nearly all of them black, had been killed and hundreds of dwellings, schools, and churches looted or destroyed. (Eric Foner, Forever Free: The Story of Emancipation & Reconstruction [New York: Vintage, 2006], 118)

Introduction 1. Although Wells’s anti-lynching publications serve as the primary basis from which a Christian ethic of resistance is delineated in this study, the following works indicate the broad range of sources that address the topic of lynching. James Cutler, Lynch Law: An Investigation into the History of Lynching in the United States (New York: Longmans, Green, 1905); W. Fitzhugh Brundage, ed., Under Sentence of Death: Lynching in the South (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1997); Michael J. Pfeifer, Rough Justice: Lynching and American Society, 1874–1947 (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2004); William Pinar, The Gender of Racial Politics and Violence in America: Lynching, Prison Rape and the Crisis of Masculinity (New York: Peter Lang, 2001). 2. Kate Tuttle, “Lynching,” ed. Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, 2nd ed., volume 3 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 663. 3. Arthur F. Raper, The Tragedy of Lynching (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1933; reprint, Mineola, NY: Dover, 2003), 47. 4. C. Vann Woodward and Kenneth Stampp provide historical analysis of this concept. See C. Vann Woodward, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, 2nd rev. ed. (London: Oxford University Press, 1966); Kenneth Stampp, The Peculiar Institution: Slavery in the Ante-Bellum South (New York: Vantage, 1956). 5. W. Fitzhugh Brundage, Lynching in the New South: Georgia and Virginia, 1880–1930 (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 2. 6. Cf. Federal Bureau of Investigations, Hate Crime, http://www.fbi.gov/hq/ cid/civilrights/hate.htm (accessed June 20, 2007). 7. Ida B. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings: The Anti-Lynching Campaign of Ida B. Wells, 1892–1900, ed. Jacqueline Jones Royster (Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1997), 133. 8. Ida B. Wells, Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells, ed. Alfreda M. Duster (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1970). See Ida B. WellsBarnett, Selected Works of Ida B. Wells-Barnett compiled with an Introduction by Trudier Harris (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 47.

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9. As noted in the chronology compiled by Royster, in 1899 Wells became coowner with Rev. Taylor Nightingale and J. L. Fleming, of the Free Speech and Headlight, Royster, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 210. 10. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 52. 11. Wells’s commitment to live out her understanding of justice was based on her belief “that we should defend the cause of right and fight wrong wherever we saw it.” Wells, Crusade for Justice, 47–48. 12. Valuable discussions on the media’s ability to influence social views include Martin E. Dann, ed., The Black Press, 1827–1890: The Quest for National Identity (New York: Putnam, 1971); Carl Senna, The Black Press and the Struggle for Civil Rights (New York: African-American Experience, 1993); and Charles A. Simmons, The African-American Press: A History of News Coverage during National Crises with Special Reference to Four Black Newspapers, 1827–1965 (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1998). 13. John Hope Franklin, “Introduction,” ed. Alfreda M. Duster, Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1970), ix. 14. Franklin, “Introduction,” ix. 15. The Chicago Tribune and New Orleans Times Picayune are examples of newspapers from which Wells extracted data to articulate a counterassessment of the alleged causes of lynchings. Wells specifically stated in A Red Record that a primary reason to write was to give the record which has been made, not by colored men, but that which is the result of compilations made by white men, of reports sent over the civilized world by white men in the South. Out of their own mouths shall the murderers be condemned. For a number of years the Chicago Tribune, admittedly one of the leading journals of America, has made a specialty of the compilation of statistics touching upon lynching. The data compiled by that journal and published to the world January 1st, 1894, up to the present time has not been disputed. In order to be safe from the charge of exaggeration, the incidents hereinafter reported have been confined to those vouched for by the Tribune. (Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 82) 16. Franklin, “Introduction,” x. 17. Franklin, “Introduction,” ix. 18. Franklin, “Introduction,” ix. 19. Franklin, “Introduction,” x. 20. Franklin, “Introduction,” x. 21. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 51. 22. Cutler, Lynch Law, 155–192 and 229–230. 23. Cheryl Jeanne Sanders, “Womanist Ethics: Contemporary Trends and Themes,” Annual of the Society of Christian Ethics (1994): 299–305. Cannon appropriated Alice Walker’s concept and definition in relation to black women’s traditions of biblical interpretation. Katie Geneva Cannon, Black Womanist Ethics (Atlanta, GA: Scholars, 1988). 24. See Alice Walker, In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens: Womanist Prose (Orlando, FL: Harcourt Brace, 1983) for her complete four-part definition of womanist.

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25. Selected works by Grant, Williams, and Townes, reflect the depth and breadth of intellectual contributions to theological education by individuals who selfidentify as womanist. Jacqueline Grant, White Women’s Christ and Black Women’s Jesus: Feminist Christology and Womanist Response (Atlanta, GA: Scholars, 1989); Delores S. Williams, Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1993); Emilie M. Townes, In a Blaze of Glory: Womanist Spirituality as Social Witness (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1995). 26. A womanist historiographical process must take seriously the limitations and in-built biases of existing documentation while simultaneously examining alternative data sources such as lynch statistics and photographs. This strategy, along with a rereading of previously used materials, can be employed to recover and construct more adequate narratives of shared stories. For additional information, see Katie Geneva Cannon, Alison P. Gise Johnson, and Angela D. Sims, “Living It Out: Womanist Works in Word,” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 21, no. 2 (2005): 135–146; Stacey M. Floyd-Thomas, Mining the Motherlode: Methods in Womanist Ethics (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2006), 104–168. 27. Wells extracted data collected by newspapers, such as the Chicago Tribune and New Orleans Times Picayune, to articulate a counter-assessment of the causes attributed to lynchings. This publication evaluates the statistical data to examine long-term implications based on human response to a specific moral problem. 28. Lynching imagery can be used as a way to both illustrate and understand culture. Examples of this are provided by James Allen et al., Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America (Santa Fe, NM: Twin Palms, 2000); Dora Apel, Imagery of Lynching: Black Men, White Women, and the Mob (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2004); Chapter five of Jacqueline Goldsby, A Spectacular Secret: Lynching in American Life and Literature (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2006). 29. Each document is discussed in detail later in this book. 30. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 1. 31. Mildred Thompson, “Ida B. Wells-Barnett: An Exploratory Study of an American Black Woman, 1893–1930” (Ph.D. diss., The George Washington University, 1979); and Ida B. Wells: An Exploratory Study of an American Black Woman, 1893–1930 (Brooklyn, NY: Carlson, 1990). 32. For example, the first doctoral dissertation about Wells, written by Mary Magdelene Boone Hutton in 1975, explored the significance of Wells’s rhetoric in shaping a movement. Hutton’s project emphasized events that compelled Wells to become an anti-lynching crusader. See Shirley W. Logan, “Rhetorical Strategies in Ida B. Wells’s ‘Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases,’ ” Sage 8, no. 1 (Summer 1991): 3–9. 33. Emilie M. Townes, Womanist Justice, Womanist Hope (Atlanta, GA: Scholars, 1993). 34. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 72. 35. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 154.

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36. For instance, Spike Lee, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts; Final Call Incorporating (FCI) Broadcasting, The Unmasking of New Orleans: Documentary on Hurricane Katrina. 37. Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers’ Project, 1936–1938 contains more than 2,300 first-person accounts of slavery and 500 black-and-white photographs of former slaves. These narratives were collected in the 1930s as part of the Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and assembled and microfilmed in 1941 as the seventeen-volume Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves. This online collection is a joint presentation of the Manuscript and Prints and Photographs Divisions of the Library of Congress and includes more than 200 photographs from the Prints and Photographs Division that are now made available to the public for the first time. Born in Slavery was made possible by a major gift from the Citigroup Foundation; see The Library of Congress, http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ ammem/snhtml/ (accessed May 15, 2007). 38. Brundage’s multidisciplinary approach highlights the importance of engaging in a theological ethical analysis of lynching, while Dray in very unambiguous language names the motives, perpetrators, supporters, and victims of lynching. See their award-winning books Lynching in the New South and At the Hand of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America (New York: Modern Library, 2003). 39. For additional information on womanist ethical frameworks see Katie Geneva Cannon, Katie’s Canon: Womanism and the Soul of the Black Community (New York: Continuum, 1995); Delores S. Williams, “Womanist/Feminist Dialogue: Problems and Possibilities,” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 9 (Spring–Fall 1993): 67–73.

Part One

Identity and Formation

1. For information on historiography see Darrell L. Whiteman, “Traditional Historiography and Ethnohistory: Strange Bedfellows, or Necessary Companions in Missiology?” Mission Studies 6, no. 1 (1989): 96–98; W. D. Wright, Black History and Black Identity: A Call for a New Historiography (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2002); Benjamin Quarles, Black Mosaic Essays in Afro-American History and Historiography (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 1988). 2. See Stephen B. Bevans, Models of Contextual Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1992). 3. On African-American identity, see e.g., Patrick Rael, Black Identity and Black Protest in the Antebellum North (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2002); Kenneth Mostern, Autobiography and Black Identity Politics: Racialization in Twentieth-Century America (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 4. The nature and extent of slavery during the Civil War can be ascertained from the following: Ira Berlin, Barbara J. Fields, Steven F. Miller,Joseph P. Reidy,

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and Leslie S. Rowland, eds., Free at Last: A Documentary History of Slavery, Freedom, and the Civil War (New York: New, 1992); Ira Berlin and Leslie S. Rowland, eds., Families & Freedom: A Documentary History of AfricanAmerican Kinship in the Civil War Era (New York: Press, 1997); Jacqueline Jones, Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow: Black Women, Work and the Family, from Slavery to the Present (New York: Vintage, 1995); Julius E. Thompson, Black Life in Mississippi: Essays on Political, Social and Cultural Studies in a Deep South State (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2001). 5. The documentation on Reconstruction is extensive. For example Robert Cruden, The Negro in Reconstruction (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1969); Emma Lou Thornbrough, ed., Black Reconstructionists (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1972); Vernon Lane Wharton, The Negro in Mississippi, 1865–1890 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1947; New York: Harper and Row, 1965); Forrest G. Wood, Black Scare: The Racist Response to Emancipation (Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 1970).

One

Black Slave Family’s Moral Situation

1. John W. Blassingame, The Slave Community: Plantation Life in the Antebellum South (New York: Oxford University Press, 1972), 78. Blassingame’s chapter on “The Slave Family” is extremely helpful in analyzing the black family’s moral situation, especially when detailed information about a particular family is not included in biographical source documents. 2. Wells said her parents who “were slaves and married as such, were married again after freedom came,” (Wells, Crusade for Justice, 7). Blassingame points out that “because they were denied all protection which the law afforded, slaves had an almost mythological respect for legal marriage” (Blassingame, The Slave Community, 87). Based on information in Wells’s autobiography, Elizabeth Wells, classified as a slave for about twenty-six years, “was not forty when she died” in 1878. See Duster, Crusade for Justice, 9. From this minute detail, we can estimate Wells’s mother was born between 1837 and 1839. Wells’s father’s gravestone records 1840 as James Wells’s birth year. Thus he was a slave for approximately twenty-five years. See Wells, The Memphis Diary, 22. 3. For additional information on slave marriages in Mississippi, see Noralee Frankel, Freedom’s Women: Black Women and Families in Civil War Era Mississippi (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1999), 8–14. 4. Ben Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War: A Narrative History (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2006), 13. This trend continued in Mississippi and by 1862, “the midpoint of the war, slaves made up a majority of the state’s population,” 140–141. Wynne evaluates reasons for preserving the Union and protecting a way of life from both a northern and southern perspective. In his analysis, Wynne compares and contrasts various military strategies through biographical sketches of some of the key Union and Confederate military leaders. Some attention is given to the socioeconomic impact of the

Notes

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

141

Civil War. However, a distinguishing feature of Wynne’s research is the evidence he presents to refute some common myths promoted by Confederate sympathizers. One of the main ways in which he deconstructs commonly held misconceptions is to analyze motives presented to solicit support for the war as well as to examine claims used to justify the shift from an all-volunteer to a draft-dependent Confederate army. His investigation of property owners and their role in determining military enlistment criteria, e.g., is an evaluation of class dynamics. With this knowledge of class distinctions Wynne examines (1) the role of the slave as servant to owners or lessees; (2) the role of freedmen in the service to the Union; and (3) the South’s position on slaves bearing arms. Although Wynne assesses a number of perspectives to determine the Civil War’s impact on Mississippi, he relies quite extensively on John K. Bettersworth, Confederate Mississippi: The People and Policies of a Cotton State in Wartime (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1943; Philadelphia: Porcupine, 1978). Bettersworth’s research was written with the express purpose “to present as completely as possible the local economic, social, and political scene in the state during the war years,” vi. His analysis of the history of secession, class issues regarding military service, justification for war or the Negro problem, and the economic impact of war on Mississippi’s way of life is written from the perspective of the slaveholder. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 12. But “by the midpoint of the war, the state’s economy was already in a downward spiral from which it would never recover” (140). The research of numerous scholars, as well as my own research on lynching, draws similar parallels about race-based lynching and economics, which I explore in part three. Wells had three sisters Eugenia, Annie, and Lily and four brothers James, George, Eddie who died of spinal meningitis, and Stanley who died in 1878. See Wells, Crusade for Justice, 15. Wynne, providing some background information on Holly Springs, tells us that this city, about forty miles from Memphis, Tennessee, “settled since the 1820s, it became Marshall County’s seat of government when the state organized the old Chickasaw holdings in 1836. Almost from the time it was officially founded until the war broke out, Holly Springs was a boomtown and a major hub of North Mississippi’s cotton economy,” Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 83. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on August 10, 1814, Pemberton was an 1837 graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. His loyalty to the South is attributed to his wife, a native of the commonwealth of Virginia, and to his many years of military service in the southern states prior to the Civil War. For additional information on Pemberton see Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 95–146; Michael B. Ballard, “Misused Merit: The Tragedy of John C. Pemberton,” ed. Steven E. Woodworth, Civil War Generals in Defeat (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1999), 141–160; Michael B. Ballard, Pemberton: A Biography (Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 1991). Grant, a member of the United States Military Academy’s class of 1843, is recognized by many as the symbol of Union Victory during the Civil War.

142

10. 11.

12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

Notes He became the eighteenth president of the United States in 1869. See Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 59–146; A. L. Conger, The Rise of U.S. Grant (New York: Century, 1931); William S. McFeely, Grant: A Biography (New York: Norton, 1981). Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 82. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 83. Wynne also notes that “while the December 19, 1862 raid on Holly Springs was a stirring victory for the Confederates . . . who loaded as many supplies as they could take with them and then set fire to the rest, . . . it represented an embarrassing defeat for the federals, . . . and a critical loss from a strategic standpoint,” 85–87. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 2. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 3. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 172. Even though Wells indicates that her paternal grandmother was married (Duster, Crusade for Justice, 9), we are not given any additional information to date this marriage. We also know that “Miss” Peggy had at least two other children, a son and a daughter. See Duster, Crusade for Justice, 11–17. Of interest also is the fact that while Wells associates titles, “Mr. and Miss,” with references to her father’s former slave owners, this same deference is not applied in the one statement in which she provides her paternal grandmother’s name. The fact that Wells does not identify her paternal grandmother’s last name reflects a phenomenon that Alison P. Gise Johnson sees as a pathology that reveals the depth of cultural indoctrination imposed on persons of African descent during slavery that is tantamount to a form of “social suicide as all of their heritage and beginnings are whisked away with the erasure of their names.” For additional information about “specific examples of women known simply by a first name,” Gise Johnson notes that historian “Betty Collier-Thomas makes reference to and discusses the phenomenon as it is evinced in slave women preachers and prophetesses of whom there is no substantial record.” Gise Johnson emphasizes that “as observable a phenomenon as it is for slaves of African descent, no record suggests the same for those who would be identified as racially white.” Alison P. Gise Johnson, “Dissenting Opinions: An Ethical Examination of the Impact of Historiography on Theorizing Violence and Constructing Social Justice as Exemplified in the Gaddis/Sims Oral Memories, 1858–1998,” (Ph.D. diss., Temple University, 2001), 115. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 139. Charles Sackett Sydnor, Slavery in Mississippi (The American Historical Association, 1933; Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1965), 248. Blassingame, The Slave Community, 97. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9–10. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 180.

Notes 26. 27. 28. 29.

30. 31. 32. 33.

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Stampp, The Peculiar Institution, 356. Blassingame, The Slave Community, 98. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. James F. Childress, “Autonomy,” ed. James F. Childress and John Macquarrie, The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Ethics (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1986), 51–53. Blassingame, The Slave Community, 79. Blassingame, The Slave Community, 99. Blassingame, The Slave Community, 103. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9–10. Although this remark refers to the conversation between her father and his mother, it is indicative of how Wells’s understanding of justice was strongly influenced by a heightened awareness of American chattel slavery.

Two Freed-Person of Color’s Moral Situation 1. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 179. 2. Mississippi officially reentered the Union in 1870 under Republican control (Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 183). 3. Implemented by former confederate states during the brief years that spanned the end of the Civil War and the initiation of Reconstruction, black codes functioned as a mechanism to limit ways in which individuals transitioned from slavery to freedom. Designed to minimize disruption to former slave owners and others who benefitted directly from a free labor pool, black codes imposed restrictions that often resulted in the arrest of unemployed freed persons of color who were, in turn, released to the custody of Caucasian property owners. This practice contributed to an oppressive system of sharecropping that, in many cases, guaranteed a system of unending indebtedness and systemic poverty. In addition, imprisoned vagrants comprised labor pools, known as chain-gangs, upon which America’s prison industrial complex—a privately controlled complex business economic network—is based. Chattel slavery may have been abolished legally but enacting black codes ushered in an era of nuevo slavocracy and its associated inhumane labor practices, denial of due process, extortion, and juvenile legal processes, for example. For additional information on black codes, see Foner, Forever Free, 95–100 as well as a succinct analysis offered by historian John Hope Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 2nd ed. (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1994), 47–56. Wynne also offers a summary of Federal Reconstruction as well as the shift to state reconstruction in the mid-1870s with emphasis on the black codes. See Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 181–204. 4. Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 47. 5. Woodward, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, 23. 6. W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America 1860–1880 (New York: Free, 1935, 1962), 177.

144 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.

12.

13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.

19.

20.

21.

Notes Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 48. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 181. Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 49. Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 51. While the black codes were developed to restrict the rights of emancipated persons of color, the Freedmen’s Bureau was established to assist African Americans in their transition from slaves to citizens. Foner correctly describes the responsibilities of this agency as overwhelming. Individuals who worked for the Bureau provided services to freed-persons that included “diplomat, marriage counselor, educator, sheriff, judge, and jury.” In addition, Bureau employees were responsible for “establishing schools, providing for the destitute, adjudicating disputes between whites and blacks and among the freedpeople, and securing former slaves and white Unionists equal treatment before the courts.” Foner, Forever Free, 97. See Jones’s analysis of the impact of the contract system and the challenges it imposed on freed-women of color during Reconstruction. Cf. Jones, Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow, 55–78. Wynne, Mississippi’s Civil War, 179. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. Foner, Forever Free, 94. Foner, Forever Free, 94. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8, FN4. Although the Fourteenth Amendment was approved by Congress in 1866, Foner explains that none of the measures of 1866 accorded black men the right to vote. The Fourteenth Amendment finessed that issue by leaving suffrage qualifications to be determined by the states but providing that if a state deprived any group of men of the franchise, it would lose some of its representatives in Congress. (The penalty did not apply, however, if the state denied women the right to vote.) (Foner, Forever Free, 118) Foner, Forever Free, 122. This provision would remain in place “until the fall of the last southern Republican governments in 1877” when black men were disenfranchised. Almost a century would pass before President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the 1964 Voting Rights Act recognizing the right of black men and black women to vote, though not without a struggle. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Republicans retained political control in Mississippi during the first ten years after the Civil War. Foner explains that “in 1875 . . . as the fall legislative elections approached, armed Democratic bands terrorized black communities throughout Mississippi.” The failure of the federal government to intervene was correctly interpreted as a “license by the president (U. S. Grant) to intimidate and Democrats intensified their campaign.” But many blacks were not so easily discouraged from voting. “Braving the campaign of intimidation,” Foner writes, “blacks turned out to vote in most parts of Mississippi. Where the violence was most intense, however, the Republican vote declined precipitously.” And, “in the end, Democrats swept control of the legislature.” Foner, Forever Free, 195–196. Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 79.

Notes 22. 23. 24. 25. 26.

27. 28. 29.

30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35.

36.

37.

38. 39. 40.

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Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 79–80. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 8. Woodward, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, 28. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. For background information on this organization see John Moffatt Mecklin, The Ku Klux Klan: A Study of the American Mind (New York: Russell & Russell, 1963); Arnold S. Rice, The Ku Klux Klan in American Politics (Washington, DC: Public Affairs, 1962). Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 153. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. Sally G. McMillen, To Raise Up the South: Sunday Schools in Black and White Churches, 1865–1915 (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 2001), 45–46. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. For a profile of Historically Black Colleges and Universities see Juan Williams and Dwayne Ashley, I’ll Find a Way or Make One: A Tribute to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (New York: Harper Collins, 2004). In addition to Rust College, the Freedmen’s Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church founded Bennett College, Clark University, Clafin College, Meharry Medical College, Morgan College, Philander Smith College, and Wiley College. See Williams and Ashley, I’ll Find a Way or Make One, 320 and 425; James D. Anderson, The Education of Blacks in the South, 1860–1935 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1988), 239–240. Black denominations were also actively involved in establishing schools. In particular, the African Methodist Episcopal and The African Methodist Episcopal Zion churches, two of the earliest denominations established by blacks, were primary rivals with the Methodist Episcopal Church. Daniel W. Stowell, Rebuilding Zion: The Religious Reconstruction of the South, 1863–1877 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998). Stowell, Rebuilding Zion, 137. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 9. In 1882, the college was named in honor of the Rev. Richard S. Rust, the founder of the Freedmen’s Aid Society and its secretary for more than three decades. As an abolitionist, Rust amassed considerable renown for his role in the antislavery crusade. He played a major role in founding Wilberforce University, the nation’s oldest private AfricanAmerican university. A collaborative effort of the Methodist Episcopal Church and African Methodist Episcopal Church, Rust served as chair of the board of trustees and the institution’s first president, a position he held until the African Methodist Episcopal Church became sole owner of the university in 1863. Information on Richard S. Rust and Rust College is derived from Ralph S. Morrow, Northern Methodism and Reconstruction (East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 1956); Williams and Ashley, I’ll Find

146

41. 42. 43. 44. 45.

46. 47.

48. 49. 50. 51.

Notes a Way or Make One, 389; W. Michael Born, “Richard S. Rust, a Minister with a Mission,” United Methodist News Service, October 3, 2000, http://archives. umc.org/umns/news_archive2000.asp?ptid=2&story=%7B18DCCA89BD5E-49AF-A4A6-CCA11062024D%7D&mid=3366 (accessed November 9, 2006). Morrow, Northern Methodism and Reconstruction, 167. Morrow, Northern Methodism and Reconstruction, 167. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 22. Morrow, Northern Methodism and Reconstruction, 236. Morrow, Northern Methodism and Reconstruction, 236. This statement raises questions about racial divisions among denominations and what problems and/or concerns this raised regarding educational plans on behalf of recently freed persons of color. For additional information on educational and social apartheid see William H. Watkins, The White Architects of Black Education: Ideology and Power in America, 1865–1954 (New York: Teachers College Press, 2001); for information on African-American participation in educational initiatives see Heather Andrea Williams, Self-Taught: African American Education in Slavery and Freedom (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2005). Christopher J. Lucas, American Higher Education: A History (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1994), 160–161. Lucas, American Higher Education, 161; Anderson, The Education of Blacks in the South, 1860–1935, 241. Without the establishment of these institutions, we cannot begin to estimate the number of African Americans who would not have had access to a college education. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 21. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 21. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 22. Stowell, Rebuilding Zion, 96.

Three

Head of Family’s Response

1. Information on this event is derived from Molly Caldwell Crosby, The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, the Epidemic that Shaped Our History (New York: Berkley, 2006). Crosby’s analysis on preparation and response to this particular event has remarkable parallels to reactions to Hurricane Katrina. About this particular outbreak of yellow fever, Crosby said, “[I]t was a plague intrinsically tied to the worst and best in humanity, brought on by the mistreatment of others and conquered only by selfless sacrifice.” Crosby, The American Plague, viii. At some point, additional research and analysis that compares and contrasts two Mississippi port towns’ (Memphis and New Orleans) response to disease and hurricanes might prove beneficial in delineating the characteristics of an ethic of disaster response. For additional information see Stephen Cresswell, Rednecks, Redeemers, and Race: Mississippi after Reconstruction, 1877–1917 (Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi for the Mississippi Historical

Notes

2. 3.

4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.

14. 15.

16.

147

Society, 2006), 176–183; Katherine Sherwood Bonner McDowell, A Sherwood Bonner Sampler, 1869–1884, ed. Anne Razey Gowdy (Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press, 2000), 179–192; Edward J. Blum, “The Crucible of Disease: Trauma, Memory, and National Reconciliation during the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1878,” Journal of Southern History 69, no. 4 (2003), http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5002568923 (accessed October 10, 2006). Crosby, The American Plague, 9. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 10. Crosby notes that during the past ten years, “two yellow fever epidemics, cholera and malaria had given Memphis a reputation as a sickly city and a filthy one.” Recognized as the leading city for carnival or Mardi Gras activities, Memphis lagged behind other cities of comfortable size in investing in its infrastructure, especially its sewage and sanitary systems. Lack of industrial foresight would ultimately prove to be a fatal decision as the 1878 yellow fever would be significantly more catastrophic than the 1867 or 1873 plagues. Crosby describes this 1878 epidemic as the greatest urban catastrophe of that period. In the aftermath of the plague, the federal government created the National Board of Health. See Crosby, The American Plague, 21–24. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 10. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 10–11 and 18. McDowell, A Sherwood Bonner Sampler, 1869–1884, 183. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 11. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 16. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 11. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 11. Nine-month-old Stanley died before Wells arrived in Holly Springs. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 12. Absalom Jones was ordained an Episcopal priest and served as pastor of the first African-American Episcopal parish in the United States. Richard Allen, a friend and contemporary of Jones, established the African Methodist Episcopal Church. For information on Jones and Allen’s compassionate acts during this epidemic see J. H. Powell, Bring Out Your Dead: The Great Plague of Yellow Fever in Philadelphia in 1793 (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993), 98–101; W. E. B. Dubois, The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study with a new Introduction by Elijah Anderson (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996), Chapter three. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 13. This has a 2007 relative value, of approximately $79,000. This is the “average” per-person output of the economy in the prices of the current year. See http:// www.ask.com/bar?q=current+value&page=1&qsrc=2417&zoom=%3CKW %3ECurrent+Value%3C%2FKW%3E+of+a+Troy+Ounce+of+Silver|TY+Bea nie+Babies+Pricing+Guide|%3CKW%3ECurrent+Value%3C%2FKW%3E+o f+TY+Beanie+Babies&ab=4&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ex.ac.uk%2F~RDa vies%2Farian%2Fcurrent%2Fhowmuch.html (accessed February 8, 2009). For information on black Masons see David T. Beito, From Mutual Aid to the Welfare State: Fraternal Societies and Social Services, 1890–1967 (Chapel

148

17. 18. 19.

20. 21. 22. 23.

24. 25.

Notes Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2000); Maurice Wallace, “Are We Men? Prince Hall, Martin Delany, and the Masculine Ideal in Black Freemasonry, 1775–1865,” American Literary History 9, no. 3 (1997), http:// www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=96441573 (accessed May 13, 2007). Wells, Crusade for Justice, 16. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 16. Alfreda Duster explains that as an educator, Wells “took advantage of every opportunity to improve her own academic skills with private lessons from older teachers and those skilled in elocution and dramatics. She attended summer sessions at Fisk University and traveled on excursions for teachers to places of interest and value.” Alfreda Duster, “Introduction,” Ida B. Wells, Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells, ed. Alfreda Duster (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1970), xviii. Wells taught in Holly Springs, Mississippi; Memphis, Tennessee; Visalia, California; and Kansas City, Missouri. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 22–23. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 23 FN 2. Wells does not provide an explanation about why she wrote under this pseudonym. However, she knew Frances Ellen Watkins Harper personally. Born a free black woman in Baltimore, Harper is recognized by many as the most popular poet of the late nineteenth- and early twentieth century. In particular, she is credited with introducing the tradition of AfricanAmerican protest poetry. Active in social causes, such as abolition and temperance, Harper used her prestige and writing to fight racism and to make strong feminist statements. It is quite possible that Wells identified with the consistent theme of self-reliance in Harper’s work, depicted, e.g., by the protagonist “Iola Leroy,” a mulatto who becomes an advocate for her people and a critic of race mixing. For additional information on Harper see Iola Leroy (Boston, MA: Beacon, 1999); John Ernest, Resistance and Reformation in Nineteenth-Century African-American Literature: Brown, Wilson, Jacobs, Delany, Douglass, and Harper (Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 1995), Chapter six; Sarah Robbins, “Gendering the Debate over African Americans’ Education in the 1880s: Frances Harper’s Reconfiguration of Atticus Haygood’s Philanthropic Model,” Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers 19, no. 1 (2002), http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5001902822 (accessed October 10, 2006). Wells, Crusade for Justice, 37. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 44.

Part Two

A Matter of Perspective

1. Tremont Temple Baptist Church was established in 1839 as “a church with free seats where everyone, rich or poor, black or white, should be on the same religious level,” and as “the sabbath home for the stranger and the traveler,” cf. The Pluralism Project at Harvard University, “Tremont Temple Baptist Church,” http://www.pluralism.org/research/profiles/display. php?profile=71817 (accessed August 5, 2007).

Notes

149

2. The Boston Monday Lectureship, formed in 1875 and composed of white clergymen and lay men and women, was a spin-off of the popular Monday noon prayer meetings at Tremont Temple. Under the influence of its founder, Presbyterian orator Falvius Josephus Cook, the lectureship became a center of Boston intellectual life for over twenty years. Shirley Wilson Logan, We Are Coming: The Persuasive Discourse of Nineteenth-Century Black Women (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1999), 87. 3. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases” (Ida B. Wells Papers [Box 8, Folder 8], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library), 333. 4. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 56. 5. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, xii. 6. Cutler, Lynch Law, vii–ix. 7. Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, xiii and 17–52; Orlando Patterson, Rituals of Blood: Consequences of Slavery in Two American Centuries (New York: Basic Civitas, 1998), 171–232. 8. Cutler, Lynch Law, 241. 9. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 18. 10. Pfeifer, Rough Justice, 7. 11. Brundage provides examples of black participation in mob activity. For instance, he references black on black mob activity in Georgia and Virginia. In addition, Brundage gives evidence of interracial vigilante collaboration in Virginia. For additional information on black responses to mob types see Stewart E. Tolnay and E. M. Beck, A Festival of Violence: An Analysis of Southern Lynchings, 1882–1930 (Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1995), 93–98; Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 45–47; E. M. Beck and Stewart E. Tolnay, “When Race Didn’t Matter: Black and White Mob Violence against Their Own Color,” ed. W. Fitzhugh Brundage, Under Sentence of Death, 132–154; for accounts of black participation in lynchings see Patterson, Rituals of Blood, 176–181. 12. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 19. 13. Norman B. Wood, The White Side of a Black Subject: A Vindication of the Afro-American Race, from the Landing of Slaves at St. Augustine, Florida in 1565, to the Present Time (Chicago, IL: American Publishing House, 1897), in Ida B. Wells Papers (Box 9, Folder 9), Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library, 379–380. 14. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 344. 15. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 344.

Four Wells on Lynching 1. 2. 3. 4.

Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 57. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 57. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 337. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 333. Wells’s knowledge of literature is revealed in this quote where she draws parallels between lynch law and Shakespeare’s Macbeth.

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Notes

5. The following texts offer insights into representations of sexuality in the shaping of cultural norms. Joel Williamson, A Rage for Order: Black/White Relations in the American South since Emancipation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986); Trudier Harris, Exorcising Blackness: Historical and Literary Lynching and Burning Rituals (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1984). 6. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 333. 7. Cutler, Lynch Law, viii–ix. 8. The Charleston News and Courier, Memphis’s Daily Commercial, and the Chicago Inter Ocean were among the mainstream newspapers referenced in Wells’s publications. 9. For additional information on rhetorical strategies employed by Wells see Logan, “Rhetorical Strategies in Ida B. Wells’s ‘Southern Horrors,’ ” 70–97. 10. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 73; a copy of A Red Record’s title page is not included in the volume introduced by Collins and Harris omits personal identifiers in the text that she compiled, 138. 11. At the request of Isabelle Fyvie Mayo, a Scottish author whose “house had been a sanctuary for a long while for East Indians who wanted education and help” and Catherine Impey, a British editor of a “magazine published in England on behalf of the natives of India,” Wells accepted an invitation to speak about the atrocities of lynching in the United States as a way to “arouse public sentiment against such horrible practices.” Wells, Crusade for Justice, 82–86. 12. See Ronald E. Butchart, Northern Schools, Southern Blacks, and Reconstruction: Freedmen’s Education, 1862–1875 (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1980).

Five

Investigating Facts

1. Although Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, Mississippi did not vote to abolish slavery until August 1865. 2. Some of the African-American journalists mentioned in Wells’s autobiography are I. Garland Penn who published The Afro-American Press in 1891; T. Thomas Fortune and Jerome B. Peterson, owners and editors of the New York Age, befriended Wells in the aftermath of Memphis’s 1892 lynching; Mr. Bowser, editor of Kansas City’s Gate City Press; and Rev. William J. Simmons editor of the Negro Press Association. Wells indicated that she met Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin and Gertrude Mossell. Wells described them as “leading colored women of Boston and Philadelphia” but she neglected to mention their contributions to the field of journalism. For instance, Ruffin served as the editor and publisher of the first newspaper published by and for African-American women and, in 1885, Mossell wrote the first woman’s column published in a black newspaper. 3. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 50 and 53. 4. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 50 and 53.

Notes

151

5. In his “Epilogue,” Dray speaks to the ambiguity associated with questions about lynching statistics and trends in the number of lynchings. Worth quoting here, at length, is his opinion that statistics, those of the Tuskegee Institute and others, generally show that the main U.S. lynching epoch was from about 1890 to the Red Summer of 1919, and that thereafter lynching totals began to decline. Some historians consider the end to have come in the mid-1930s, when the annual recorded lynchings of blacks decreased, for the first time, to single digits. Others cite a specific incident such as the Duck Hill, Mississippi, blowtorch lynching of 1937, probably the last spectacle lynching in which a crowd watched victims tortured and put to death, or the Claude Neal lynching of 1934, one of the last in which advance publicity was used to attract a throng to a lynching site—and even in that instance the mob did not produce their victim but did away with him in secret. (Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, 457–463) 6. The summary data in Wells’s A Red Record reflects “241 persons lynched,” which differs slightly from the 239 persons lynched by states. See Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 87. In “The White Side of a Black Subject,” also quoting statistics from the Chicago Tribune, the author listed 236 lynchings in 1892. See Wood, The White Side of a Black Subject, 400. This slight deviation in reported lynchings by Wells and Wood illustrates one of the concerns surrounding the use of secondary sources and at the same time points to a challenge regarding the reliability of data which researchers continue to address. The numbers, as one aspect of lynching, provide evidence that the events did occur. And, as Wells wrote in 1895, not all nor nearly all of the murders done by white men, during the past thirty years in the South, have come to light, but the statistics as gathered and preserved by white men, and which have not been questioned, show that during these years more than ten thousand Negroes have been killed in cold blood, without the formality of judicial trial and legal execution. (Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 75) 7. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 87. 8. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 87. Data compiled from the lynch law statistics that Wells included in A Red Record indicated that 5 black women were among the 160 blacks reported lynched in 1892. 9. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 153. 10. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 346. 11. James W. Clarke, The Lineaments of Wrath: Race, Violent Crime, and American Culture (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 2001), 153. 12. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 62. 13. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 87. 14. Frederick Douglass, “Hon. Fred. Douglass’s Letter,” ed. Jacqueline Jones Royster, Southern Horrors and Other Writings: The Antilynching Campaign of Ida B. Wells, 1892–1900 (Boston, MA: Bedford, 1997), 51. 15. I make reference to the following texts, written by Douglass, for information about his life. My Bondage and My Freedom (New York: Miller, Orton & Mulligan, 1855); Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an

152

16.

17. 18. 19. 20.

21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

28. 29.

30.

31. 32.

Notes American Slave, Written by Himself, ed. William L. Andrews and William S. McFeely (New York: W. W. Norton, 1997). Referencing a property book belonging to the slave master who owned the plantation on which Douglass was born, editors of The Norton Anthology of African American Literature recognize February as Douglass’s birth month; Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Nellie Y. McKay, general eds. (New York: W. W. Norton, 1997), 299. Frederick Douglass, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (Reprinted from the revised edition of 1892; London: Collier-MacMillan, 1962), 261. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 116. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 51. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 53; John Nerone, Violence against the Press: Policing the Public Sphere in U.S. History (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 138–142. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 51. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 51. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 51. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 51. Clarke, The Lineaments of Wrath, 145. Kelly Brown Douglas, What’s Faith Got to Do with It?: Black Bodies/ Christian Souls (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2005), 4. Barbara Welter, “The Cult of True Womanhood: 1820–1860,” (1966), http:// www.pinzler.com/ushistory/cultwo.html for an online copy of Welter’s essay (accessed May 22, 2007). Additional information on this concept can also be found at http://www. litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=242 (accessed May 22, 2007). Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching, Southern Women Look at Lynching (Atlanta, GA: Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching, 1937). Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 59. Brundage refers to the work of Daniel J. Singal, The War Within: From Victorian to Modernist Thought in the South, 1919–1945 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1982); Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, Revolt against Chivalry: Jesse Daniel Ames and the Women’s Campaign against Lynching (New York: Columbia University Press, 1979); Joel Williamson, The Crucible of Race: Black-White Relations in the American South since Emancipation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1984). Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 58. Darlene Clark Hine and Kathleen Thompson assert that black women, “in the peculiar morality of the South,” were “unrapeable,” Hine and Thompson, A Shining Thread of Hope: The History of Black Women in America (New York: Broadway, 1998), 171. For additional information on the concept that black women are not raped, see, e.g., Gerda Lerner, ed., Black Women in White America: A Documentary History (New York: Vintage, 1972), 149–193; Hazel Carby, “ ‘On the Threshold of Woman’s Era’: Lynching, Empire, and Sexuality in Black Feminist

Notes

33. 34. 35. 36.

37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43.

44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55.

56. 57. 58. 59.

153

Theory,” ed. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Kwame Anthony Appiah, “Race,” Writing, and Difference (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1985), 301–316; Anne Goodwyn Jones, “The Work of Gender in the Southern Renaissance,” ed. Christopher Morris and Steven G. Reinhart, Southern Writers and Their Worlds (College Station, TX: Texas A & M Press, 1996), 41–56. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 55. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 62. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 63. Anne P. Rice, “Introduction: The Contest over Memory,” ed. Anne P. Rice, Witnessing Lynching: American Writers Respond (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2003), 16. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 61. I examine miscegenation and the construction of black female sexuality in relation to lynching in more detail in part three. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 61. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 61. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 136. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 164. Terrence Finnegan, “Lynching and Political Power in Mississippi and South Carolina,” ed. W. Fitzhugh Brundage, Under Sentence of Death: Lynching in the South (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1997), 199. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 61. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 62. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 63. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 63. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 64. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 65. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 66. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 66. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 66. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 66. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 68. Tolnay and Beck researched lynchings in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee from 1882 to 1930. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 25. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 50. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 50–51. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 53. For information on anti-lynching legislative initiatives see Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, 46–47, 258–273, 336–344, 355–362, 433–434, 439–443, 448–450; Goldsby, A Spectacular Secret, 12–42; Christopher Waldrep, ed., Lynching in America: A History in Documents (New York: New York University Press, 2006), 216–228; for examples of initiatives at

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Notes a state level see Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 189–196. To date, a federal anti-lynching law has not been enacted.

Six 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

8. 9.

10. 11. 12.

13. 14. 15.

16.

Interpreting Data

Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 81–82. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 75. Markovitz, Legacies of Lynching, xvi. Markovitz, Legacies of Lynching, xvi. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 19. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 75. Cornel West, “The Prophetic Tradition in Afro-America,” ed. Cornel West and Eddie S. Glaude Jr., African American Religious Thought (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2003), 1040. West, “The Prophetic Tradition in Afro-America,” 1040. Ida B. Wells-Barnett, “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings” (Ida B. Wells Papers [Box 8, Folder 8], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library), 43. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 80. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 80–81. Information on Ransom is derived from the following sources, Randall K. Burkett and Richard Newman, eds., Black Apostles: Afro-American Clergy Confront the Twentieth Century (Boston, MA: G. K. Hall, 1978); C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya, The Black Church in the African American Experience (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1990); Ralph E. Luker, The Social Gospel in Black and White: American Racial Reform, 1885–1912 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1991); August Meier, Negro Thought in America, 1880–1915: Racial Ideologies in the Age of Booker T. Washington (Ann Arbor, MI: Ann Arbor Paperbacks, 1966); Anthony B. Pinn and Victor Anderson, eds., Making the Gospel Plain: The Writings of Bishop Reverdy C. Ransom (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity, 1999); Milton C. Sernet, ed., Afro-American Religious History: A Documentary Witness (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1985). Ransom’s papers are archived at Payne Theological Seminary in Wilberforce, Ohio. Reverdy Ransom, “The Negro and Socialism,” ed. Anthony B. Pinn and Victor Anderson, Making the Gospel Plain, 187. Sam W. Haynes and Christopher Morris, eds., Manifest Destiny and Empire: American Antebellum Expansionism (College Station, TX: Texas A & M University Press, 1997), 10, http://www.questia.com/ PM.qst?a=o&d=89139430 (accessed June 9, 2007). Haynes and Morris, eds., Manifest Destiny and Empire, 10, http://www. questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=89139430 (accessed June 9, 2007); for a comprehensive study of Manifest Destiny see Albert K. Weinberg, A Study of Nationalist Expansionism in American History (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Press, 1935).

Notes

Seven

155

Challenging “Alleged Causes”

1. Information extracted from a detailed account provided by Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 160, 166, 169, 173. 2. Edward L. Ayers, Vengeance & Justice: Crime and Punishment in the 19thCentury American South (New York: Oxford University Press, 1984), 243. 3. Ayers, Vengeance & Justice, 243. 4. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 166. 5. Ayers, Vengeance & Justice, 240. 6. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 13. 7. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 160. 8. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 181–182. 9. In addition to mass mobs, Brundage identifies and supports, with extensive examples, two additional typologies that he names terrorist mobs and private mobs. See Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 17–48. 10. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 36. 11. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 184. 12. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 169. 13. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 184–190. 14. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 166. 15. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 188–189. 16. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 188–189. 17. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 188–189. 18. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 159. 19. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 163. 20. Cutler, Lynch Law, 159. 21. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 163. 22. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 197. 23. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 193. 24. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 193. 25. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 208.

Part Three Beyond Rope and Fagot 1. Duster, “Introduction,” xiii. Wells’s daughter, Alfreda M. Barnett Duster, references an 1897 observation made by Norman B. Wood. I reference his response to lynching in chapter two of this book. In her introduction, historian Glenda Gilmore, Gender & Jim Crow: Women and the Politics of White Supremacy in North Carolina, 1896–1920 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), provides an assessment of middle- class black women. Of particular note is her characterization of her target audience. Although these competent and community-engaged women “did not call themselves feminists,” Gilmore notes that “equality for women grounded their thinking as they championed strategies to benefit all African Americans.” Gilmore, Gender & Jim Crow, xv–xvi. Beverly Guy-Sheftall’s research on early African-American feminists indicates that “when a small

156

2.

3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.

12.

Notes group of free black ‘feminist-abolitionists’ in the North surfaced during the early nineteenth century, among whom were Maria Stewart, Sojourner Truth, and Frances E. W. Harper, the history of African American feminism began,” Guy-Sheftall, Words of Fire: An Anthology of African-American Feminist Thought (New York: New, 1995), 1. Duster, “Introduction,” xiv. Linda O. McMurry’s research indicates that “until 1893 only white newspapers in Boston praised Wells; the slanderous insults from Memphis won Wells far more attention in the black press. In England, however, Wells got glowing reviews from English papers. Such attention made Wells possibly the most discussed individual in the black press—aside from Frederick Douglass.” Linda O. McMurry, To Keep the Waters Troubled: The Life of Ida B. Wells (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 188–189. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 235–236. T. Thomas Fortune, editor of the New York Age and for whom Wells would work after she was “exiled” from Memphis, said, after their initial meeting in 1889, that “she has become famous as one of the few of our women who handle a goose quill with diamond point as easily as any man in newspaper work. If Iola (Wells’s pen name) were a man she would be a humming independent in politics. She has plenty of nerve and is as sharp as a steel trap,” Wells, Crusade for Justice, 33. Wells established herself as a journalist prior to the advent of her crusade against lynching. Referred to as “the Princess of the Press, no writer, the male fraternity not excepted, has been more extensively quoted, none struck harder blows at the wrongs and weaknesses of the race. She reaches the men by dealing with the political aspect of the race question, and the women she meets around the fireside.” Wells, Crusade for Justice, 33. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 311. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 311 Wells, Crusade for Justice, 313. Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 44–45. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, ix. Cannon, Black Womanist Ethics, 2. For current scholarship on the connection between historical lynching and contemporary forms of disguised representations of mob rule, see Eliza Steelwater, The Hangman’s Knot: Lynching, Legal Execution, and America’s Struggle with the Death Penalty (Boulder, CO: Westview, 2003); Clarke, The Lineaments of Wrath, Chapter eleven. I find the analysis on the economics of racism and the resulting social implications offered by Mark Lewis Taylor and Dorothy Roberts helpful in explaining the intricacies of policies that are often disguised to promote acts of justice. See their respective works, Mark Lewis Taylor, The Executed God: The Way of the Cross in Lockdown America (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2001); Dorothy Roberts, Shattered Bonds: The Color of Child Welfare (New York: Basic, 2002). For instance, art historian Dora Apel argues that “the appropriation of the term lynching for increasingly diverse forms of perceived injustice threatens

Notes

13. 14. 15.

16.

157

to trivialize the historically specific content of the term. In this way, the appropriation of lynching for other causes represents an attempt to create a continuum by which one injustice is figured in terms of another and bears the moral weight of the original referent,” Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 18. Because lynching was not limited to the traditional rope and fagot and the burning of human flesh, but also represented a prescribed method to control human behavior of the oppressor and the oppressed, the term has contemporary relevance with yet-to-be-determined consequences. To her credit, Apel does provide examples of what she terms “legal lynchings” that illustrate the degree to which prosecutors are given the latitude to ignore evidence that might lead to an acquittal. Clarke, The Lineaments of Wrath, 167. Steelwater, The Hangman’s Knot, 229. For information on wrongful convictions in the United States see, Andrew D. Leipold, “How the Pretrial Process Contributes to Wrongful Convictions,” American Criminal Law Review 42, no. 4 (2005), http://www.questia. com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5012264630 (accessed May 12, 2007); Erik Luna, “System Failure,” American Criminal Law Review 42, no. 4 (2005), http:// www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5012264638 (accessed May 12, 2007); Andrew M. Siegel, “Moving Down the Wedge of Injustice: A Proposal for a Third Generation of Wrongful Convictions Scholarship and Advocacy,” American Criminal Law Review 42, no. 4 (2005), http://www.questia.com/ PM.qst?a=o&d=5012264642 (accessed May 12, 2007). See, e.g., Samuel R. Gross, “Exonerations in the United States 1989 through 2003,” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 95, no. 2 (2005), http:// www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5009798219 (accessed May 12, 2007); Jerome M. Maiatico, “All Eyes on Us: A Comparative Critique of the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission,” Duke Law Journal 56, no. 5 (2007), http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5021641141 (accessed May 12, 2007).

Eight The Issue of Race and Lynching 1. Walker, In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens, 257. 2. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 70. 3. For example, Wells’s refusal to sit in a segregated rail car, although she had purchased a first-class fare, resulted in a lawsuit that was the first case in which a colored plaintiff in the South had appealed to a state court since the repeal of the Civil Rights Bill by the United States Supreme Court. The gist of that decision was that Negroes were not wards of the nation but citizens of the individual states, and should therefore appeal to the state courts for justice instead of to the federal court. The success of my case would have set a precedent which others would doubtless have followed. (Wells, Crusade for Justice, 20) 4. A typed and handwritten copy of this article is archived in Wells’s papers. Spelling corrections are noted in brackets.

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Notes

5. Ida B. Wells, “The Reign of Mob Law: Iola’s Opinion of Doings in the Southern Field” (Ida B. Wells papers [Box 8, Folder 8], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library), 1. 6. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 17. 7. In A Red Record, Wells summarized an article written by Frederick Douglass in which he noted “three distinct eras of southern barbarism.” Lynching was attributed first to a need to manage race riots, then as a means to discourage full participation in government, and finally as a retaliatory response in defense of white women. See Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 76–79. 8. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 81–82. 9. Wells-Barnett, “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings,” 46. 10. Wells-Barnett, “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings,” 46–47. It is important to note that the governor did, however, find the sheriff negligent in this 1907 Springfield, Illinois lynching. As a result, this move signaled, as Wells quoted the governor, that “mob violence has no place in Illinois. It is denounced in every line of the Constitution and in every Statute. Instead of breeding respect for the law it breeds contempt” (51). 11. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 2. 12. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 333. 13. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 75. 14. John Hope Franklin, Race and History: Selected Essays 1938–1988 (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1989), 132. 15. Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 1. 16. Henry Campbell Black, Black’s Law Dictionary, Revised Fourth Edition (St. Paul, MN: West, 1968), 1423. 17. Clarke, The Lineaments of Wrath, 143. 18. Brundage, Lynching in the New South, 2. 19. Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 37. 20. Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 38. 21. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 20–21. In her analysis of lynching as art, Dora Apel addresses the “white control of the black gaze,” Imagery of Lynching, 10. A lack of familiarity with these undocumented social customs led to the 1955 lynching of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till in Mississippi. Tills’s mother, Mamie Till Mobley, in an unprecedented act, allowed her son’s lynched body to be viewed and photographed so that the world could see that southern horrors and mob rule was still an aspect of American justice. See Mamie Till Mobley and Christopher Benson, Death of Innocence: The Story of the Hate Crime that Changed America (New York: Random House, 2003). 22. Wells’s six-week account of an 1899 lynching spree in Georgia illustrates that “the real purpose of these savage demonstrations is to teach the Negro that in the South he [sic] has no rights that the law will enforce.” Ida B. WellsBarnett, Lynch Law in Georgia (Chicago, IL: Chicago Colored Citizens, 1899), 1, http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query (accessed October 15, 2003). 23. Michael Eric Dyson, Debating Race with Michael Eric Dyson (New York: Basic Civitas, 2007), 115. Dyson is currently university professor at Georgetown University.

Notes

159

24. Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 44. This was further compounded when the Supreme Court’s 1896 ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson became the basis by which states employed the separate but equal doctrine to justify caste systems. In a June 1910 essay, Wells noted that the social practice of lynching “made the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments to the Constitution playthings, a mockery and a byword; an absolute dead letter in the Constitution of the United States.” Wells-Barnett, “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynching,” 43. 25. Dyson, Debating Race with Michael Eric Dyson, 120. 26. Dyson, Debating Race with Michael Eric Dyson, 121. Peggy McIntosh is perhaps best known for her work on deconstructing white privilege. She is also the founder of the National SEED (Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity) Project on Inclusive Curriculum. During this radio broadcast, Dyson also pointed out additional ways in which race functions. For instance, he noted that race “functions as an identity; it functions as an institutional expression of supremacy, or defense to that supremacy; and it functions as an ideology of superiority in a culture where . . . this constellation of relations makes sure that brown and black are rendered inferior to white and so on.” Dyson, Debating Race with Michael Eric Dyson, 123. 27. Gilmore, Gender & Jim Crow, 61. For sources on the “scientific” basis for preconceived ideas about non-Europeans see Albert Somit and Steven A. Peterson, Darwinism, Dominance, and Democracy: The Biological Bases of Authoritarianism (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997); Janis Faye Hutchinson, “The Resurgence of Genetic Hypotheses to Explain Social Behavior among Ethnic Minorities,” ed. Janis Faye Hutchinson, Cultural Portrayals of African Americans: Creating an Ethnic/Racial Identity (Westport, CT: Bergin & Garvey, 1997), 5–25. 28. Hine and Thompson, A Shining Thread of Hope, 194. 29. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 71. 30. Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 25. 31. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 27. 32. Franklin, Race and History, 148. 33. For information on segregationist policies see Gregory Mixon, The Atlanta Riot: Race, Class, and Violence in a New Southern City (Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2005); Paul Gordon Lauren, Power and Prejudice: The Politics and Diplomacy of Racial Discrimination (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1996). 34. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 159. 35. Franklin, Race and History, 149. 36. Franklin, Race and History, 149. 37. Franklin, Race and History, 360. 38. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 75. 39. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 28. While most lynchings occurred in southern states, this in no way absolved northern states nor the federal government of its silence that sanctioned acts that denied African Americans equal protection under the law. 40. Cannon, Black Womanist Ethics, 23.

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Notes

41. Michele Wallace, “Foreword,” ed. Anne P. Rice, Witnessing Lynching: American Writers Respond (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2003), xii. 42. Wallace, “Foreword,” xii–xiii. 43. Wallace, “Foreword,” xii. 44. Wallace, “Foreword,” xiii. 45. On music and black identity see, Guthrie P. Ramsey, Race Music: Black Cultures from Bebop to Hip-Hop (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2003); Charley Gerard, Jazz in Black and White: Race, Culture, and Identity in the Jazz Community (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1998); Samuel A. Floyd, The Power of Black Music: Interpreting Its History from Africa to the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996). 46. For sources on quilting as an artistic expression of African-American distinctiveness see, Olga Idriss Davis, “The Rhetoric of Quilts: Creating Identity in African-American Children’s Literature,” African American Review 32, no. 1 (1998), http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5001337970 (accessed September 14, 2007); Jontyle Theresa Robinson, Bearing Witness: Contemporary Works by African American Women Artists (New York: Rizzoli International, 1996). 47. Prayers, e.g., depict the literary richness of African Americans. See James Melvin Washington, ed., Conversations with God: Two Centuries of Prayers by African Americans (New York: Harper Perennial, 1995).

Nine The Social Construction of Gender and Lynching 1. Wells-Barnett, “Lynch Law in Georgia,” 1. 2. For accounts of what she termed “color line justice” see Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 128–130. As an example of the types of assaults against black women by white men, Wells described the acquittal of a “gang of white ruffians” who raped an African-American female in Baltimore, Maryland. Cf. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 128. 3. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 127. 4. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 117–118. 5. Nerone, Violence against the Press, 130. 6. See, e.g., Martha Hodes, White Women, Black Men: Illicit Sex in the Nineteenth-Century South (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999); Stephanie Cole and Alison M. Parker, eds., Beyond Black and White: Race, Ethnicity, and Gender in the U. S. South and Southwest (College Station, TX: Texas A & M University Press, 2004); Mary Frances Berry, “Judging Morality: Sexual Behavior and Legal Consequences in the Late NineteenthCentury South,” Journal of American History 78 (December 1991): 835–856; Calvin C. Hernton, Sex and Racism in America (New York: Doubleday, 1965; New York: Anchor, 1988). 7. Angela Y. Davis, Women, Race & Class (New York: Vintage, 1983), 177.

Notes

161

8. Robyn Wiegman, “The Anatomy of Lynching,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 3, no. 3 (1993): 457–458, http://www.questia.com/ PM.qst?a=o&d=96396809 (accessed June 20, 2007). 9. Anne P. Rice, ed., Witnessing Lynching: American Writers Respond (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2003), 16. 10. Lynne Olson, Freedom’s Daughters: The Unsung Heroines of the Civil Rights Movement from 1830 to 1970 (New York: Touchstone, 2001), 39. 11. Patricia Hill Collins, Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment (New York: Routledge, 1991), 50. 12. Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, 71–72. 13. Gilmore, Gender & Jim Crow, 68. 14. Dyson, Debating Race with Michael Eric Dyson, 127. 15. Franklin, Race and History, 325. 16. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 155. 17. Wells specifically encouraged developing partnerships with anti-lynching leagues. Cf. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 157.

Ten The Intersection of Economics and Lynching 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11.

12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.

Wells, Crusade for Justice, 70. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 335. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 335. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 335. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 335. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 334. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 334. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 72. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 72. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 74–75. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 75. The authors also state that “the white aristocracy could benefit economically from mob violence against blacks in at least two ways. First, in some situations racial violence may have been an instrument that white planters and employers used to maintain control over African-American laborers. Second, the white elite may have used racial violence to maintain a sharp cleavage between black and white labor,” 72. Davis, Women, Race & Class, 185. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 337. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 337. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 337–338. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 68. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 338. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 338. Floyd W. Crawford to Alfreda M. Duster, March 27, 1963. Dr. Floyd W. Crawford, then a member of the Department for Social Science, Norfolk Division, Virginia State College (Dr. Crawford is deceased; the institution is currently known as Norfolk State University), shared that during a visit

162

20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.

Notes to Memphis he learned “that ‘The Curve,’ where the three men who were victims of the mob had their store, was at the intersection of Walker Avenue and Mississippi Boulevard” (Ida B. Wells Papers [Box 8, Folder 2], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library). Crawford to Duster. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 344. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 344. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 69. Davis, Women, Race & Class, 190. Tolnay and Beck, A Festival of Violence, 76–77. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 173. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 333.

Part Four

A Paradigm Shift

1. For a description of the approach Cutler used to evaluate the justifications and conditions attributed to lynching, see Lynch Law, 155–226. 2. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 85–86. 3. For an account of Wells’s visits to England and Scotland in 1893 and 1894 see Wells, Crusade for Justice, 87–113 and 125–223; McMurry, To Keep the Waters Troubled, 188–199. 4. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 82 and 85; “In 1888, Impey launched this magazine which was ‘devoted to the interests of the coloured race.’ She wrote a substantial part of it herself, but relied on correspondents in America and different parts of the British Empire to supply her with first-hand information and newspaper cuttings about the maltreatment of black people by white.” Vron Ware, “To Make the Facts Known: Racial Terror and the Construction of White Femininity,” ed. Reina Lewis and Sara Mills, Feminist Postcolonial Theory: A Reader (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2003), 107. 5. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 82. 6. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 82. 7. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 82. 8. The attendance is listed at 1,200 in Wells’s autobiography, see Duster, “Introduction,” Crusade for Justice, 129 and as 1,300 by McMurry, To Keep the Waters Troubled, 208. 9. Charles F. Aked pastored the Pembroke Chapel in Liverpool from 1890 to 1906. Aked, after whom Wells named her oldest son Charles Aked Barnett, pastored John D. Rockefeller’s Fifth Avenue Baptist Church in New York and the First Congregational Church of San Francisco before he accepted Henry Ford’s invitation in 1916 to participate in the European Peace Conference in New York, an initiative “where representatives of neutral nations would appoint a commission to work unremittingly (‘continuous mediation’) for a peace acceptable to all belligerents.” Allan Nevins and Frank Ernest Hill, “Henry Ford and His Peace Ship,” American Heritage Magazine, February 1958, http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ ah/1958/2/1958_2_65.shtml (accessed June 21, 2007).

Notes

163

10. Ida B. Wells to Frederick Douglass, March 13, 1894, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/douglass_ corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 11. See Wells’s letters to Douglass dated March 13, 1894, April 6, 1894, May 6, 1894, May 10, 1894, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/douglass_corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 12. Ida B. Wells to Frederick Douglass, March 13, 1894, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/douglass_ corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 13. Frederick Douglass to Rev. C. F. Aked, March 27, 1894, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/ douglass_corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 14. Ida B. Wells to Frederick Douglass, May 6, 1894, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/douglass_ corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 15. Frederick Douglass to Rev. C. F. Aked, March 27, 1894, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/ douglass_corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007).

Eleven Re-Orientation 1. For a description of racial invisibility and its cultural implications see Lewis R. Gordon, Existentia Africana: Understanding Africana Existential Thought (New York: Routledge, 2000); bell hooks, “Representing Whiteness in the Black Imagination,” ed. Ruth Frankenberg, Displacing Whiteness: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997), 165–179; Sally Robinson, Marked Men: White Masculinity in Crisis (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000). 2. Jeff Zorn, “Affirmative Action,’ Commentary, January 2004, http://www. questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5002056491 (accessed June 10, 2007); Paget Henry, professor of Sociology and Africana Studies at Brown University, offers a more extensive definition that addresses the phenomenological aspect of black invisibility in Caliban’s Reason: Introducing Afro-Caribbean Philosophy (New York: Routledge, 2000), 149–151, http://www.questia. com/PM.qst?a=o&d=103351611 (accessed June 10, 2007). 3. Paul Laurence Dunbar, Selected Poems (New York: Penguin, 2004), 54. “We Wear the Mask” was originally included in Dunbar’s 1895 publication From Majors and Minors. 4. Dunbar, Selected Poems, 54. 5. Kelly Brown Douglas, Sexuality and the Black Church: A Womanist Perspective (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999), 16. 6. Douglas, Sexuality and the Black Church, 16–17. 7. Mary Elizabeth Hobgood argues in Dismantling Privilege: An Ethics of Accountability (Cleveland, OH: Pilgrim, 2000), that “privilege [white] people are morally damaged, spiritually impoverished, and physically at risk

164

8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24.

25. 26. 27.

28.

29.

Notes by a society structured to give unfair advantages to the few while it dismisses everyone’s needs for respect, affection, just communal relations, and a healthy ecosphere,” vii. She develops her position in Chapters two and three, “Dismantling Whiteness” and “An Economic Ethics of Right Relationship,” 36–106. For other studies of whiteness see Valerie Babb, Whiteness Visible: The Meaning of Whiteness in American Literature and Culture (New York: New York University Press, 1998); Mike Hill, ed., Whiteness: A Critical Reader (New York: New York University Press, 1997); George Yancy, ed., What White Looks Like: African American Philosophers on the Whiteness Question (New York: Routledge, 2004). To give just one example of this, see Herbert Shapiro, White Violence and Black Response: From Reconstruction to Montgomery (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts, 1988), 5–29. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 344. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 340–341. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 64. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 336. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 64. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 64. Reinhold Niebuhr, Love and Justice: Selections from the Shorter Writings of Reinhold Niebuhr, ed. D. B. Robertson (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox, 1957), 143. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 337. Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, 146. See especially Niebuhr’s analysis of coercion in relation to power in Moral Man and Immoral Society (New York: Touchstone, 1932), 231–256 as well as his general essays on love and justice and race relations in Love and Justice, 125–132, 142–145, 152–154. Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society, 234. Niebuhr, Love and Justice, 153–154. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 346. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 346. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 346. For additional information on Niebuhr’s position on civil disobedience as a strategy to promote a just response, see Moral Man and Immoral Society, 231–256. Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society, 254. Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society, 254. For critiques of Niebuhr’s gradualism, with regard to race in America, see Stephen G. Ray Jr., Do No Harm: Social Sin and Christian Responsibility (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Fortress, 2003), 37–74; Traci West, Disruptive Christian Ethics: When Racism and Women’s Lives Matter (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2006), 3–35. Charles H. Long, Significations: Signs, Symbols, and Images in the Interpretation of Religion (Aurora, CO: Davies, 1999; Fortress, 1986), 7. Long, Significations, 7.

Notes

165

30. For a detailed explanation of signification as one way to further an understanding of religion in America, see Long’s Introduction in Significations, 1–10. 31. Sidney W. Mintz and Richard Price, “The Birth of African-American Culture,” ed. Timothy E. Fulop and Albert J. Raboteau, African-American Religion: Interpretive Essays in History and Culture (New York: Routledge, 1997), 50. 32. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 66. 33. Long, Significations, 1. 34. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 75–82; Frederick Douglass, “The Lessons of the Hour” (Baltimore, MD: Press of Thomas & Evans, 1894); also see Cutler, Lynch Law, 193–226. 35. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 76. 36. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 76–78. 37. Frederick Douglass, “The Lessons of the Hour,” 13. 38. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 80. 39. For additional information on discourse analysis, see Dutch linguist Tuen A. van Dijk’s essay “Analyzing Racism through Discourse Analysis: Some Methodological Reflections,” ed. John H. Stanfield II and Rutledge M. Dennis, Race and Ethnicity in Research Methods (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1993), 92–134. 40. For additional information on the role of discourse as a mechanism by which racial prejudice is manufactured and proliferated see Chapter two in Tuen A. van Dijk, Communicating Racism: Ethnic Prejudice in Thought and Talk (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1987), 30–118. 41. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 344. 42. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 69–70. 43. John H. Stanfield II, “Methodological Reflections: An Introduction,” ed. John H. Stanfield II and Rutledge M. Dennis, Race and Ethnicity in Research Methods (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1993), 3.

Twelve 1. 2. 3. 4.

Re-Evaluation

Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 65. Wells, “Lynch Law,” 26. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 82. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 68. In his essay “The Roar on the Other Side of Silence: Black Resistance and White Violence in the American South, 1880–1940,” Brundage points out that migration, for blacks, was an act of agency. He states that “flight was one of the few responses to white violence which at once was independent of whites and yet typically did not inspire retaliation.” Brundage, Under Sentence of Death, 275. Concurring with Brundage, Dray’s research “estimated 1.5 million black people migrated from South to North between 1900 and the mid-1920s, with many more to come in the decades following, and during the years 1914–1917 the northward movement accelerated to between five thousand and ten thousand

166

5.

6. 7.

8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13.

Notes people per month.” Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, 223. It should be noted that Dray’s statistical information does not include the number of individuals who responded to Wells’s 1892 recommendation. Wells’s safety was jeopardized and her character subjected to vicious distortions as a result of her public stance on lynching. More than two centuries later, the Texas Beef Group’s lawsuit against Oprah Winfrey on charges that comments about “mad cow disease” during a 1996 production of her talk show highlights the energy required when an alternative view threatens the perceived point of privilege of a group that is not accustomed to having its practices challenged. For additional information on the Texas Beef Group v. Oprah Winfrey see LegalCaseDocs.com, “Texas Beef Group v Oprah Winfrey,” http://www.legalcasesdocs.com/120/246/531.html (accessed June 26, 2007); Bob Janis, “Cattlemen Nervous as Battle with Oprah Looms,” Reuters North America, January 12, 1998, http://www.mad-cow.org/ Constitution.html (accessed June 26, 2007). Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 155. Wells-Barnett, “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynching,” 52. While this connection, to my knowledge, has not been made explicitly in recent civil rights cases, such as the December 2006 incident in Jena, Louisiana that was resolved in June 2009, involving the prosecution of six African-American juveniles as adults on initial charges of attempted second-degree murder for a fight with a Caucasian classmate, the issue for Wells is not one of preferential treatment or an erroneous glamorization of the ongoing plight of black Americans whose heritage is traced to slave ship and slave plantation logs. Rather, what she passionately insists is that all Americans should recognize that the failure to apply the same standard in similar situations can result in anarchy, the long-term implications of which we have yet to realize. Some examples of contributions to biblical studies by scholars who read scripture from the underside include Brian K. Blount, general ed., True to Our Native Land: An African American New Testament Commentary (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2007); Musa W. Dube, ed., Other Ways of Reading: African Women and the Bible (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature; Geneva: W. C. C. Publications, 2001); Vincent L. Wimbush, The Bible and African Americans: A Brief History (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2003); Rodney Steven Sadler Jr., Can a Cushite Change His Skin?: An Examination of Race, Ethnicity, and Othering in the Hebrew Bible (New York: T & T Clark, 2005); Allen Dwight Callahan, The Talking Book: African Americans and the Bible (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006); Michael Joseph Brown, Blackening of the Bible: The Aims of African American Biblical Scholarship (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 2004); Robert Hood, Begrimed and Black: Christian Traditions on Blacks and Blackness (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1994). Raper, The Tragedy of Lynching, 22. Pfeifer, Rough Justice, 60. Pfeifer, Rough Justice, 60. Pfeifer, Rough Justice, 61. Wells, “Mob Murder in a Christian Nation,” http://www.infoplease.com/t/ hist/mob-murder/ (accessed July 20, 2006).

Notes

167

14. Raper, The Tragedy of Lynching, 22. 15. Raper, The Tragedy of Lynching, 22. 16. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 78.

Thirteen

Re-Interpretation

1. For additional information on characterizations of blacks during three distinct periods in American history see Winthrop D. Jordan, The White Man’s Burden: Historical Origins of Racism in the United States (London: Oxford University Press, 1974); Jerrold M. Packard, American Nightmare: The History of Jim Crow (New York: St. Martin’s, 2002); Robin D. G. Kelley and Earl Lewis, To Make Our World Anew: A History of African Americans (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000); Robert Haws, ed., The Age of Segregation: Race Relations in the South, 1890–1945 (Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 1978). 2. Wells, “Lynch Law,” 25. 3. Wells, “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings,” 45. At some point attention should be given to Wells’s use of biblical imagery and analogy as moral indicators of American culture. 4. In her autobiography, Wells noted that “[t]he Chicago Daily Inter-Ocean was published from 1872 to 1914. In 1914 it merged with the Record Herald, which later became the Herald-Examiner. It is the forerunner of Chicago Today (until recently, the Chicago American).” Wells also indicated that the Inter-Ocean was the “only paper in America which had persistently denounced lynching.” In addition, Wells wrote for the Inter-Ocean “for the whole six months of my stay in England in 1894. In that way I became the first, and so far as I know, the only one of my group who was a regular paid correspondent of a daily paper in the United States.” Wells, Crusade for Justice, 125 and 127. 5. Wells, “Lynch Law,” 39. 6. A Kansas City newspaper owned by C. H. J. Taylor. McMurry indicates that Taylor “appears to have believed he should have become the foremost antilynching advocate,” which may explain why the aforementioned editorial was printed without a rebuttal response. McMurry, To Keep the Waters Troubled, 167. Wells confided in Douglass about her concern that black-owned newspapers would print a demeaning and terrifying editorial about her without offering a counterdefense. She stated that “this is only one of many and the very worst of similar attacks he has made on me. Can you not do something to aid and defend me?” Ida B. Wells to Frederick Douglass, December 20, 1893, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/douglass_corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 7. Ida B. Wells to Frederick Douglass, December 20, 1893, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/rr/mss/text/ douglass_corresp_index.pdf (accessed May 3, 2007). 8. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 341. 9. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 70. 10. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 70.

168 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16.

17. 18. 19. 20.

21.

Notes Wells, Crusade for Justice, 3–5. Duster, “Introduction,” Crusade for Justice, xxx. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 53. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 334. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 333. The official website of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME) acknowledges that it has a unique and glorious history. It was unique in that it is the first major religious denomination in the Western World that had its origin over sociological and theological beliefs and differences. It rejected the negative theological interpretations which rendered persons of African descent second class citizens. Theirs was a theological declaration that God is God all the time and for everybody. The church was born in protest against slavery—against dehumanization of African people, brought to the American continent as labor. The Mission of the African Methodist Episcopal Church is to minister to the spiritual, intellectual, physical, emotional, and environmental needs of all people by spreading Christ’s liberating gospel through word and deed. At every level of the Connection and in every local church, the African Methodist Episcopal Church shall engage in carrying out the Spirit of the original Free African Society, out of which the AME Church evolved: that is, to seek out and save the lost, and serve the needy. (http://www.ame-church.com/ [accessed June 30, 2007]). For additional information on Wells’s stance on faith and social action see Townes, Womanist Justice, Womanist Hope and Eric Gerard Pearman, “The Least of These: Ida B. Wells-Barnett’s Intraracial Critique of African-American Clergy and Lay Leadership” (Ph.D. diss., Iliff School of Theology and University of Denver, 2002). Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 334. Wells, “Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” 341. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 154. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 154. For information on historical tensions between Native Americans and African Americans see James F. Brooks, ed., Confounding the Color Line: The Indian-Black Experience in North America (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2002); Fay A. Yarbrough, “Power, Perception, and Interracial Sex: Former Slaves Recall a Multiracial South,” Journal of Southern History 71, no. 3 (2005), http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5011371799 (accessed June 30, 2007). For additional information see Douglas D. Rose, ed., The Emergence of David Duke and the Politics of Race (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1992); Charles D. Hadley, “Louisiana: The Continuing Saga of Race, Religion, and Rebellion,” ed. Robert P. Steed, Laurence W. Moreland, and Tod A. Baker, The 1992 Presidential Election in the South: Current Patterns of Southern Party and Electoral Politics (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994), 51–65.

Notes

Fourteen

169

Just Act

1. Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider: Essays & Speeches (Freedom, CA: Crossing, 1984), 110–113. 2. Dray, At the Hands of Persons Unknown, iii. One of the “last publicly acknowledged lynching in the nation took place in Mobile, Alabama, in 1981, when the Ku Klux Klan beat and hanged a teenager.” Apel, Imagery of Lynching, 15. A CNN Special Investigative Unit report on “The Noose: An American Nightmare” that originally aired on November 1, 2007 confirmed that for some whites the “noose” is viewed as a symbol of justice to punish black males accused of sexually assaulting white women. While this news feature did not reference the use of nooses in military incidents that violated the rules of engagement in combat, the special report did point out the urgency to communicate the historical reality of this symbol. 3. Kelly Brown Douglas, Sexuality and the Black Church: A Womanist Perspective (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999), 49. 4. When it appeared that black women would be excluded from efforts to participate in the political process, Wells organized, along with friends, the Alpha Suffrage club. See Wells, Crusade for Justice, 225–232; 345–353 for information on Wells’s involvement in the women’s suffrage movement. Chapter 8 FN3 references information on Wells’s response to segregated practices on public carriers. Her reaction to preferential hiring practices in the Memphis Public School System is mentioned briefly in her autobiography. See Wells, Crusade for Justice, 53. 5. Wells introduced the idea of the women’s club movement as a vehicle for African-American women to effect change. “The idea found favorable response and thus the first civic club among Negro women, the Women’s Era Club, was organized in Boston, Massachusetts, with Mrs. Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin as president.” Wells went on to “organize other clubs in New England, and in Chicago she organized the first civic club among Chicago’s Negro women.” Duster, “Introduction,” Crusade for Justice, xix; Wells, Crusade for Justice, 81. Although a founding member of the NAACP, Wells’s presence in this group was not without challenge. Initially, her name was excluded from the list of individuals elected to serve during the nascent period of this organization. It was soon discovered that W. E. B. Du Bois had deleted her name and assumed that her views would be represented by Mrs. Wooley of the Douglas Center. Du Bois “took the liberty of substituting the name of Dr. Charles E. Bentley for hers, Dr. Bentley to represent the Niagara Movement.” Wells, Crusade for Justice, 325. Wells took the position that Du Bois had made the change without consulting others and “was opposed to making any change.” Fortunately, several individuals recognized that Wells would bring value to the organization and her name was reinstated. For additional information on Wells’s involvement with the NAACP see Wells, Crusade for Justice, 321–333. 6. See Brundage, Lynching in the New South; Clarke, The Lineaments of Wrath; and Patterson, Rituals of Blood for additional information about various types of mobs and the role of the spectator crowd at a lynching event.

170

Notes

7. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 74. 8. Alice Walker, The Same River Twice: Honoring the Difficult, a Meditation on Life, Spirit, Art, and the Making of the Film The Color Purple Ten Years Later (New York: Scribner, 1996), 50. 9. Wells, Crusade for Justice, 154–155. 10. Ida B. Wells, “Exiled,” New York Age, June 25, 1892. Wells revised this editorial, which was subsequently published as Southern Horrors. 11. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 53. 12. Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, “The Black Church: A Gender Perspective,” ed. Cornel West and Eddie S. Glaude Jr., African American Religious Thought (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2003), 189. Higginbotham is the Victor S. Thomas Professor of History and of African and African-American Studies at Harvard University. 13. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 139. 14. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 78. 15. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 50. 16. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 50. 17. For an account of a lynching after 1910, see Laura Wexler, Fire in a Canebrake: The Last Mass Lynching in America (New York: Scribner, 2003). 18. While all human systems are inherently flawed, Wells’s critique of lynching, its cause and effect, is particularly helpful in pointing out disparities in prosecutorial conduct and sentencing guidelines. Her contribution to the ethical discourse is apparent when analyzing rape convictions. Take, e.g., Darryl Hunt whose rape conviction was recently overturned. HBO’s award-winning documentary investigates a brutal rape/murder case and a wrongly convicted man, Darryl Hunt, imprisoned nearly 20 years for a crime he did not commit. At once a social justice story, a decades-long courtroom drama, and a personally driven narrative, the film follows this capital case from 1984 through 2004 through exclusive footage from two decades, the film frames the judicial and emotional response to a chilling crime—and the implications that reverberated from Hunt’s conviction—against a backdrop of class and racial bias in the South and in the American criminal justice system. (HBO Documentary Films, “The Trials of Darryl Hunt,” http://www. hbo.com/docs/programs/darrylhunt/ [accessed July 15, 2007]) 19. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 50. 20. Wells, Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 50. 21. The Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama, publishes a yearly map that tracks all active hate groups in the United States. See Southern Poverty Law Center, “Intelligence Report,” http://www.splcenter. org/intel/intelreport/intrep.jsp (accessed July 15, 2007); Jewish Virtual Library, “Hate Groups in America,” http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/ jsource/anti-semitism/hate.html (accessed July 15, 2007).

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Index

Adams, Rev. Moses, 32 African American feminism, 155n–156n African American women, 8, 10, 11, 89, 127 club movement, 169n African Americans, 6, 10, 12, 20, 22, 27, 28, 30, 33, 35, 41, 42, 46, 52, 58, 59, 66, 68, 76, 79, 80, 82, 85, 92, 95, 99, 101, 103, 104, 114, 117, 119, 121, 122, 125, 127, 130 colleges and universities, 31 educational initiatives, 146n Aked, Rev. C. F., 98, 162–163n, 185n Alabama, 153n Clanton, 1891 lynching, 81 Mobile, 169n Montgomery, 99, 170n Allen, Richard, 36, 147n American Systemic (obsession with) Violence, 15, 107, 130, 108, 110, 114, 118, 120 subculture, 58 Anti-lynching legislation, 80, 153n, 154n Apel, Dora, 76, 81, 83, 158n Imagery of Lynching: Black Men, 81, 138n White Women, and the Mob, 81, 157n Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching, 55 Southern Women Look at Lynching, 152n Ayers, Edward L, 69–70

Baptists, 31 stance on lynching, 116 Tremont Temple Baptist Church, 41, 148n Barnett, Ferdinand L., 135n Barrett, Mr. 91–93 Beck, E. M., 42, 60, 76, 80, 82, 83–85, 92, 95 Benson, Christopher, 158n Death of Innocence, 158n Bettersworth, John K., 141n Confederate Mississippi: The People And Policies of a Cotton State in Wartime, 141n Bevans, Stephen B., 20 Models of Contextual Theology, 20 Biomythography, 135n Black (racial) invisibility, 101, 163n Blassingame, John W., 24, 25 Slave Community: Plantation Life In the Antebellum South, The, 140n Bolling, Mr., 23, 29 Boston, Massachusetts, 150n, 156n Boston Monday Lectureship, 41, 149n Bowser, Mr., 150n Brown v. Board of Education, 105 Brundage, W. Fitzhugh, 16, 42–43, 55, 57, 64, 70, 71, 81, 149n, 155n, 165n migration, 165n Lynching in the New South, 153n Under Sentence of Death: Lynching In the South, 153n

188

Index

Cannon, Katie Geneva, 10, 76, 79, 85, 137, 139n Black Womanist Ethics, 76 Katie’s Canon: Womanism and the Soul of the Black Community, 139n Catholic Theological Union, 20 Charles, Robert, 69–70, 72–74 Chicago, Illinois, 68 Chicago World’s Fair, 1893, 52 Childress, James, 24 Christian ethic of resistance, 3, 12, 13, 17, 99, 109, 110–112, 116, 117–118, 125, 127, 128 Jesus Christ as model, 116 Christian social ethic, 11 Christianity, 115 behavior regarding justice, 11 belief about love, 11 lynching and, 117, 129 Chronicle of Higher Education, 16 Civil rights, 7, 11, 84, 109 Civil Rights Bill, 157 Civil rights case, 157n Civil rights movement, 1960s, 12 songs, 15 Sweet Honey in the Rock, 15 workers/activists, 15, 66, 88, 116 Civil War, 20, 21–22, 23, 24, 27, 31, 136n, 140n–141n, 144n Clanton, Alabama, 81 Clarke, James W., 54, 55, 56, 77, 81 The Lineaments of Wrath, 152n, 156n Colleges and Universities, 31 Columbia University, 127 Fisk University, 37 Rust College, 31, 32, 33 107 Santa Clara University, 101 Shaw University, 31 Southern Baptist Theological Seminary of Louisville, 43 University of Pennsylvania, 82 Wellesley College, 42 Wilberforce University, 66, 145n Yale University, 42, 97 Collier-Thomas, Betty, 142n Collins, Patricia Hill, 89 Compelled obedience, 103–104 Congress, 29, 144n

Constitution, The, 52, 63, 65, 94, 116, 158n, 159n Crawford., Floyd, 94, 161n–162n Culture American, 54, 134, 167n black, 43 definition, 19 dominant/majority, 16, 61, 74, 89, 101, 108, 112, 159n and justice, 19 role, 20 southern, 74, 84, 129 and theology, 20 typologies classical, 20 empirical, 20 white, 101–102 white supremacy, 28, 30 Culture of fear/terror, 6, 12, 43, 104 Culture of lynching, 9, 127 Cutler, James Elbert, 8, 9, 42, 47, 73, 74, 97, 110, 162n Lynch Law: An Investigation into the History of Lynching in the United States, 8, 42 Davis, Angela Y, 88, 92, 95 Declaration of Independence, 6 Delaware, Wilmington June, 1903 lynching, 117 Detriments of privilege, 163n–164n Disenfranchisement, 1877, 144n Douglas, Kelly Brown, 54, 101, 102, 128 Sexuality and the Black Church: A Womanist Perspective, 101–102 What’s Faith Got to Do with It?: Black Bodies/Christian Souls, 152n Douglass, Frederick, 8, 52–54, 98, 110, 120, 129, 156n, 158n, 167n Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, 152n My Bondage and My Freedom, 151n Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself, 151n–152n

Index

189

Dray, Philip, 16, 42, 104, 139n, 151n, 165n–166n At the Hands of Persons Unknown, 104, 151n Du Bois, W. E. B., 27, 169n Black Reconstruction in America, 1860–1880, 27 Duke, David, 125 Duke, Jesse C., 53 Dukes, J. C., 99 Dunbar, Paul Laurence, 101 “We Wear the Mask”, 101 Duster, Alfreda M. Barnett, 29, 94, 122 Dyson, Michael Eric, 82–83, 89–90, 159n

Georgia, 31, 42, 149n 1899 lynching spree, 158n Gilmore, Glenda, 83, 89, 155n Gender & Jim Crow: Women and the Politics of White Supremacy in North Carolina, 1896–1920, 155n Grant, Jacqueline, 10 Grant, Ulysses S., 21, 141n–142n, 144n Great Britain, 98 Guy-Sheftall, Beverly, 155n–156n Words of Fire: An Anthology of African-American Feminist Thought, 156n

Economics of racism, 6, 76–77, 129, 156n black gold, 77 foster care system, 77 prison industrial complex, 77 Education of former slaves, 28, 30–33, 47–48, 122, 144n, 146n mis-education, 122 Emancipation, 5, 27, 65, 81, 107 Emancipation Proclamation, 21, 150n England, 52, 98, 131, 156n Liverpool, 98

Harper, Frances Ellen Watkins, 148n Hate crimes, 6, 82, 125 Higginbotham, Evelyn Brooks, 132 Hine, Darlene Clark, 83 Historically Black Colleges and Universities, 31, 145n Hobgood, Mary Elizabeth, 163n–164n Dismantling Privilege: An Ethics of Accountability, 164n Holly Springs, Mississippi, 6, 21–23, 28, 32, 35–36, 107, 141n, 142n, 147n, 148n Hunt, Darryl, 170n Hurricane Katrina, 15, 146n Hutchins, Fred, 94 Hutton, Mary Magdelene Boone, 138n

Federal Bureau of Investigation, 6 Civil Rights Division, 6 Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), 139n Fifteenth Amendment, 65, 159n Fitzgerald, Bishop Oscar B., 58 Foner, Eric, 29, 136n, 143n, 144n Fortune, T. Thomas, 150n, 156n Fourteenth Amendment, 29, 85, 144n, 159n Franklin, John Hope, 8, 27, 28, 29, 81, 84, 90 Freedmen/freed-person/freed-women reconstruction, 28, 29, 30, 143n, 144n, 146n family dynamics, 88–89 slavery, 81, 141n Freedmen’s Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 31–32 schools founded by, 145n Freedmen’s Bureau, 54n

Illinois, 76 Chicago, 68 Springfield lynching, 80, 158n state bill against mob violence, 80 Impey, Catherine, 98, 150n, 162n Editor, Anti-Caste, 98 Injustice, 6, 9, 10, 11, 12, 16, 17, 23, 39, 45, 47, 54, 64, 72, 77, 91, 103, 104, 105, 127, 132, 133 Christian ethic of resistance to, 3 Ireland, 52 Jim Crow, 119 Johannsen, Robert W., 67 Johnson, Alison P. Gise, 142n Johnson, Lyndon B., 144n Jones, Absalom, 36, 147n

190

Index

Jones, Jacqueline, 28, 144n Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow, 144n Judge Lynch, 120, 133 Just act, 105–107, 127, 129, 131, 133 Justice, 6, 7, 12, 14, 15, 16, 20, 41–42, 43, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 51, 52, 54, 58, 60, 61, 64, 68, 72, 74, 78, 79, 85, 86, 90, 96, 99, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 109, 110, 111, 112, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 158n determined by social practices, 131 double standard, 43, 46 racism disguised as, 156n Kentucky Bardwell, 1893 lynching, 81 King, Jr., Rev. Dr. Martin Luther, 61 Ku Klux Klan, 30, 125, 169n Lee, Spike, 139n Libraries Library of Congress, 14, 139n Moorland Spingarn Library, Howard University, 14 Schomburg Library, 14 Lincoln, Abraham, 21, 150n Long, Charles H., 107, 109, 124 Significations: Signs, Symbols and Images in the Interpretation of Religion, 108 Lorde, Audre, 127, 135n Zami: A New Spelling of my Name, 135n Louisiana, 153n Gretna, 72 Jena, 166n LaSalle Parish, 125 New Orleans, 15, 35, 69, 71, 72, 73, 74, 146n July, 1900 lynching spree, 69–74, 95 Lucas, Christopher J., 32 Lynch law, 7, 9, 13, 42, 43, 49, 58, 59, 63, 74, 79, 97, 106, 111, 113, 115, 119, 123, 124, 131, 133 Lynching African American apathy toward, 79 “America’s national crime”, 11, 80

children and, 81 climate of fear/terror, 5, 57, 63, 80, 91, 95, 131, 133 cross, use of, 82 culture of fear/terror, 6, 12, 43, 82, 112 definition, 5, 42, 87, 103 dynamics of race, gender and, 79 economics of, 91–93 faith and, 116 functions entertainment, 5, 80 expression of systemic violence, 10 intimidation and control of former slaves/black community, 5, 54, 56, 59, 68, 76, 81, 83–84, 95, 103, 120, 128, 130, 131, 157n preservation of certain lifestyle, 5, 42, 56, 61, 63–64, 68, 70, 74, 81, 95, 108, 109, 115, 166n gender and class manipulation, 46–47, 55, 83–84, 88–90 hypocrisy of silence, 58, 60, 72, 159n immediate effects of, 132 Illinois state bill against, 80 justifications, 110 lack of legal response, 46, 51, 56, 58, 60–61, 70–72, 82, 84–85, 102, 104, 111, 158n legal executions as, 77 legal prosecutions as, 157n metaphor for race relations, 2, 64 methods blowtorch, 151n burning, 74, 79, 98 109, 133 chasing down, 109 decapitation, 133 dismemberment, 6, 109 hanging, 6, 82, 108, 133 murder, 5 mutilation, 6 rolling, 109 shooting, 6, 109, 133 torture, 8, 86 vigilante execution, 3 mob activity, 3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 12, 13, 16–18, 41, 42, 43, 46, 51, 54, 59, 60, 63, 64, 67, 68, 69, 71, 72, 73, 76, 79, 80, 81, 83, 87, 91–93, 94, 95, 97, 102, 104,

Index 107, 109, 113, 115, 116, 117, 120, 122, 129, 131, 132, 133, 136, 149n, 151n, 155n, 156n, 158n, 161n, 169n reason to study, 127 self defense, 68 silence of the church, 129–130 “southern horrors”, 6, 50, 81, 91, 158n souvenir collection, 129 statistics, 5, 6, 8–9, 10, 15, 137n 1892, 50–52, 125 substitution of innocent victim, 76 three eras of, 158n trivialization of, 156n–157n twenty-first century manifestations, 10, 12, 96, 106, 111, 116, 119, 124, 125, 127, 128, 133, 134, 156n, 166n U.S. epoch, 1890–1919, 151n women victims, 71, 151n Manifest Destiny, 67 Markovitz, Jonathan, 2, 64 Legacies of Lynching: Racial Violence and Memory, 135n Marshall County, Mississippi, 141n Maryland, 52 Baltimore, 160n Chestertown, 57 Masons, 37 Mass Mob, 71, 155n Mayo, Isabelle Fyvie, 150n McDonald, Rev. A. C., 32 McDowell, Calvin, 7, 92, 94, 102, 107, 114 McIntosh, Peggy, 83, 159n McMillen, Sally G., 30 Memphis, Tennessee, 3, 7, 12, 13, 35, 37, 38, 56, 57, 59, 60, 87, 91, 92, 94, 95, 99, 102–103, 104, 113, 114, 120,122, 123, 130, 135, 136n, 141n, 146n, 147n, 148n, 156n, 169n 1866 race riot, 136n 1892 lynching, 87, 91–92, 95, 99, 104, 113, 162n Methodist, 31 A. M. E.’s Committee on the State of the Country, 67

191

African Methodist Episcopal Church, 33, 66, 123, 145n, 147n, 168n African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, 145n Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church, 32 Black Methodist Churches, 33 Colleges and Universities, 32 Freedmen’s Bureau, 144n Methodist Church South, 58 Methodist Episcopal Church, 31, 32, 145n Metropolitan A. M. E. Church, Washington, D.C., 110 missionaries, 30, 31, 66, 107 Northern Methodist Church, 65 schools, 32, 145n stance on lynching, 116 Miller, C. J., 81 Ministerial Alliance of Kansas City, 75 Mississippi, 20, 21–24, 49, 140n–141n, 27–29, 140n–141n, 143n, 144n, 150n, 158n Duck Hill, 151n Grenada, 21 Holly Springs, 6, 21, 22, 28, 32, 35–36, 107, 141n, 142n Marshall County, 141n Oxford, 21 Tippah County, 22, 28, 35 Water Valley, 21 Mobley, Mamie Till, 158n Death of Innocence, 158n Moderate reason, 105–106 Morrow, Ralph S., 31 Moss, Betty, 7 Moss, Maurine, 7 Moss, Thomas, 7, 57, 59, 92, 94, 95, 99, 102, 107, 114, 123, 130 Mossell, Gertrude, 150n “Myth of Womanhood”, 88, 129 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (N.A.A.C.P.), 128 National Public Radio, 82 National Security, 96 Native Americans, derogatory references by Wells, 124, 168n Neal, Claude, 151n

192

Index

Negro Press Association, 150n Nerone, John, 53, 88 Violence Against the Press: Policing the Public Sphere in U. S. History, 152n New York, 52, 120, 122 New York City, 127 Rochester, 52 Newspapers, black Afro-American Press, 150n American Citizen, 120 Free Speech, 7, 60, 91, 94, 113, 114 Gate City Press, 150n Montgomery Herald, 99 New York Age, 123, 150n, 156n North Star, The, 52 Newspapers, white, 47 Chicago Inter Ocean, 45, 120 Chicago Today, 167n Chicago Tribune, 73, 76, 97, 137n, 138n, 151n Christian Advocate, 58 Herald-Examiner, 167n Kansas City Times, 75 Montgomery Herald, 53 New Orleans Times-Democrat, 72, 73 New Orleans Times Picayune, 72, 137n, 138n Record-Herald, 167n Niebuhr, Reinhold, 103, 104, 105, 164n acts of resistance, 106 Love and Justice, 164n Moral Man and Immoral Society, 164n “The Negro Issue in America”, 103 Ohio Flushing, 66 Wilberforce, 154n Olson, Lynn, 89 O’Sullivan, John Lewis, 67 Oregon, 67 Patterson, Orlando, 42 Pemberton, General John C., 21, 141n Penn, I. Garland, 150n People’s Grocery, 91, 93 Peterson, Jerome B., 150n Pfeifer, Michael J., 42, 117 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 36, 98, 141n, 150n

Post 9/11 society, 96 Presbyterians, 31, 117 Press, Power of, 60, 106, 114, 121 Prison industrial complex, 77, 143n convict lease system, 119 Questia.com, 16 Racial Identity, 83 Racism, 76, 82–85, 115, 159n economics of, 6, 77, 92, 129. 156n gender and, 89 provocation to rape, 88 strategies to resist integrity, beauty and aesthetic fortitude (music & visual arts), 85–86 literature, 86 passing, 85 Ransom, Bishop Reverdy Cassius, 66–68, 123 Rape Black on black, 56 Black on white, 55, 57, 59, 70, 87, 88 justification for lynching, 89, 99, 102 White on black, 55–56, 58–59, 83, 87, 88, 152n, 160n Rape, false charge of, 56, 117, 122, 123, 170n “The New Cry”, 57 versus consentual sexual relationship, 87, 89 Raper, Arthur, 5, 89, 116, 117 Reconstruction, Federal, 20, 28, 29–31, 54, 110, 119, 143n, 119 Reconstruction, State, 143n black codes, 27, 28, 143n, 144n Methodist schools, 145n Mississippi Democrats, 144n Religion publication, Living Way, 38 reconstruction, 30–31 Re-orientation, 12, 101, 103, 109, 111–112, 125, 127 an act of resistance, 106–108 definition, 106–107 Rice, Anne P., 57 Witnessing Lynching: American Writers Respond, 57 Roberts, Dorothy, 156n

Index Shattered Bonds: The Color of Child Welfare, 156n Ruffin, Josephine St. Pierre, 150n, 169n Rust College, 31, 32, 33, 107 Rust, Rev. Richard S., 32, 145n Scotland, 52, 98, 131, 162n Separate but equal doctrine, 159n Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896, 159n Signification, 110, 165n Simmons, William J., 150n Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves, 139n Slavery, 6, 13, 20, 21, 22–25, 27, 28, 52, 64, 68, 72, 98, 106, 108, 109, 139–140n, 142n, 143n, 150n, 168n family dynamics, 24–25 “peculiar institution”, 6, 25 racial hierarchy, 6 Socialism, 66–67 South Carolina, 58, 153n “Southern horrors”, 6, 49, 81, 91, 107, 122, 123, 129, 132, 133, 134, 158n Southern Poverty Law Center, 170n Stanfield II, John H., 112 Editor, Race and Ethnicity in Research Methods, 112 Steelwater, Eliza, 77 The Hangman’s Knot: Lynching, Legal Execution, and America’s Struggle with the Death Penalty, 156n Stewart, Henry, 7, 92, 94, 102, 107, 114 Stowell, Daniel W., 31 Strategies to counter injustice boycott, migrate, write, 3, 7, 9, 12, 13, 17, 61, 93–95, 99, 106, 111, 113–115, 125, 131, 165n language, power of, 7, 12, 47, 60, 68, 75, 110, 118, 121–122, 124, 131 reformulation for twenty-first century, 125 relevance in twenty-first century, 95–96, 99 silence, 9 Supreme Court, 6, 105, 157n, 159n Sweet Honey in the Rock, 15

193

Taylor, Mark Lewis, 156n The Executed Good: The Way of the Cross in Lockdown America, 156n Tennessee, 30, 31, 92, 153n Texas, 67 Texas Beef Group v. Oprah Winfrey, 166n Till, Emmett, 158n Tillman, Governor Benjamin, 58 Thompson, Kathleen, 83, 152n Thompson, Mildred, 11 Thornton, Matthew, 94 Tolnay, Stewart E., 42, 60, 76, 80, 82, 83–85, 92, 95, 149n, 153n Townes, Emilie Maureen, 10, 11, 168n “Social and Moral Perspectives of Ida B. Wells-Barnett as Resources for a Contemporary Afro-Feminist Christian Social Ethic”, 11 Womanist Justice, Womanist Hope, 11 Trans-Atlantic crossing, 107, 115 Tuskegee Institute, 125, 151n Tuttle, Kate, 5 Underground Railroad, 52 United States, 3, 43, 98 racial relations, 46, 47, 52, 61, 63, 65, 67, 68, 74, 77, 81, 83, 84, 90, 98, 101, 103, 105, 106, 110, 115, 119, 120, 121, 127, 128, 129, 150n, 157n, 159n United States Government, 52, 119–120 United States Military Academy at West Point, 141n Vance Street Christian Church, 37 Vigilante justice/violence, 3, 7, 9, 10, 51, 58, 71, 97, 113, 129, 130, 149n Virginia, 23, 42, 149n Voting Rights Act of 1964, 144n Voting rights denied, 65 Walker, Alice, 79, 129, 137n Color Purple, The, 129 Same River Twice: Honoring the Difficult, The, 129 In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens: Womanist Prose, 137n Wales, 98, 131

194

Index

Wallace, Michele, 85–86 Wells, Elizabeth Warrenton, 21, 23–24, 28, 30–31, 33, 36, 38, 140n Wells, Ida B. attendance at Fisk University, 37, 148n birth, 6, 21 “color line justice”, 160n exile, 123, 130, 156n founding member of NAACP, 169n head of household, 37 higher education, 37 “How Enfranchisement Stops Lynchings”, 64 journalistic skill, 53, 76, 156n lawsuit, 157n life-altering event, 1892 Memphis, 103 lynch statistics, 6, 151n “Lynch Law in All Its Phases”, 8, 95, 104, 151n lynching, 102–103, 107 “The Malicious and Untruthful White Press”, 59 “Mob Murder in a Christian Nation”, 116 Mob Rule in New Orleans: Robert Charles and His Fight to the Death, 69 parents, 21, 22–24, 28–31, 33, 38, 140n paternal grandmother, 22–24, 28, 142n pen name, 38, 156n physical threats against, 94, 102, 120 public school teacher, 37, 148n Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynchings in the United States, 1892–1893– 1894, 5–6, 63, 151n “Reign of Mob Law, The”, 79 siblings, 141n slaveholder, 22–24 slaveholder/grandparent, 22–24 Southern Horrors and Other Writings, 122, 130, 151n strategies to counter injustice boycott, migrate, write, 3, 7, 9, 12, 13, 17, 61, 93–95, 99, 106, 111, 113–115, 125, 131, 165n

language, power of, 7, 12, 47, 60, 68, 75, 110, 118, 121–122, 124, 131 reformulation for twenty-first century, 125 relevance in twenty-first century, 95–96, 99 silence, 9 trans-Atlantic speaking engagements, 98 validation of journalistic facts, 9, 76 women’s club movement, 169n Crusade for Justice, 19, 122 Wells, Sr., James, 21, 22–24, 28–31, 33, 35–36, 38, 140n Wells, Mr. 22–24 Wells, Peggy, 22–24, 28, 142n Wells, Polly, 22–24 Welter, Barbara, 55 “The Cult of True Womanhood: 1820–1860”, 55, 152n West, Cornel, 64, 101 “The Prophetic Tradition in Afro-America”, 64 White culture, 101–102 White, George, 117 White on white oppression, 95 White supremacy, 28, 30, 42, 64, 83–84, 93, 101, 133 Wiegman, Robyn, 88 “The Anatomy of a Lynching”, 88 wikipedia.com, 16 Williams, Delores, 10 “The White Side of a Black Subject”, 151n Womanist, 10, 79, 137n, 138n Womanist Christian social ethic, 11 Womanist ethics, 10, 16, 75, 139n definition, 10 Wood, Rev. Norman B., 43, 151n Woodward, C. Vann, 27 Wynne, Ben, 22, 27–28, 140n–141n, 143n Mississippi’s Civil War: A Narrative History, 140n–141n Yellow fever epidemic 1793, 36 1878, 20, 35, 146n, 147n Zorn, Jeff, 101