Twentieth Century Negro Literature Part 13

"Where the labor unions have not prevented it, society has made the criminal pay his own bills. In the South where the people are beginning to show a keenness for money that is not surpa.s.sed in the North, but where, as yet, capital is not gathered into such immense and usable sums as in the central and eastern States, a new policy has been adopted with regard to the offender. He is generally a Negro, hence he is sent back to slavery. He is sold to a farmer, a distiller, a phosphate miner, or a manufacturer, for a term of years, and his employer pays considerably less to the State than he would otherwise lay out in wages.

"In Alabama, if a State prisoner or long-termer escapes from his employer, he must pay into the public treasury $200, and $100 if a county prisoner or short-termer escapes.

"When an inspector is present at a whipping, the turbulent convict may be given twenty-one lashes on his bare back; in the absence of the inspector, the whipping boss is limited to fifteen lashes.

"The guards are of the poor white cla.s.s, dull and illiterate, and receive from $20 to $30 per month and their 'keep.'

"In Florida shackling is seldom practiced except as a punishment for running away, as it interferes with the work of the convict. Guns and bloodhounds are much in evidence in the convict camps. Nothing is done for the betterment of the convicts intellectually or otherwise.

Missionaries are graciously permitted to distribute tracts among them.

"White convicts are generally a.s.signed to offices and cook shops, or become gang foremen. For the white prisoner, whatever his offense, there is always a hope of pardon, but the Negro prisoner, unless he be a c.r.a.p-shooter or chicken thief, congratulates himself on being consigned to open air work in the convict's camps, for he remembers how dreadfully easy in Florida it is for a Negro to be lynched."

Judge M. W. Gibbs of Arkansas said he had known white employers in the South to be in collusion with magistrates to have colored men committed on the flimsiest pretext, simply that they might obtain more free labor on their plantations by means of the convict lease system.

The eleventh census shows that in the United States there were 2,468 county jails and only 44 reformatories. There were no reformatories in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas.

Great Britain supports over 400 reformatories and inebriate schools, and they have closed 56 out of 113 prisons and jails in ten years, and thereby reduced to that extent the amount of material for the manufacture of criminals.

Said Judge Calhoun, of a recorder's court in Georgia:

"I tremble when I contemplate the future of little boys who come before me for the first time, and are sentenced to the chain-gang.

Some of them are bright-faced and intelligent; some are orphans; many thoroughly penitent; and, I believe, nearly all could be reclaimed, could they be sent to a reform school and surrounded with an atmosphere that would benefit instead of contaminate."

Mrs. Helen Cook, wife of Hon. John F. Cook, of Was.h.i.+ngton, D. C., has established an organization in the District of Columbia, known as "The Woman's League," which is doing a wonderful work in reducing the number of those who are brought into the courts to be justly or unjustly dealt with. Let the good women of the race throughout the country follow her example and do something to rescue the peris.h.i.+ng.

In conclusion, let us hope and believe with the widow of the Sage of Anacostia, that "Meanwhile Hampton and Wilberforce, Howard and Shaw and Fiske and Atlanta and Tuskegee and other like inst.i.tutions are silently setting the seal of manhood and womanhood upon a race whose face, with ours, is set toward a higher and better civilization."

SECOND PAPER.

IS THE CRIMINAL NEGRO JUSTLY DEALT WITH IN THE COURTS OF THE SOUTH?

BY ATTORNEY I. L. PURCELL.

[Ill.u.s.tration: I. L. Purcell]

ISAAC LAWRENCE PURCELL.

Isaac Lawrence Purcell, the subject of this sketch, was born July 17, 1857, in Winnsboro, S. C. His father, John W.

Purcell, by occupation a carpenter, was born in 1832 in Charleston, S. C., being one of the old free families.

Isaac Lawrence first attended a school provided by the Episcopal Church for Colored youths. He afterwards attended the public schools of his city and, in 1871, entered Brainard Inst.i.tute, Chester, S. C., where he remained one term. In 1872 he entered Biddle University at Charlotte, N. C., where he remained until in the Fall of 1873, when the color line was removed at the South Carolina University. He entered the compet.i.tive examination for the scholars.h.i.+p in the South Carolina University from his county, being the only Colored applicant. In the Fall of 1873 he entered the South Carolina University, where he remained until the Spring of 1877, when the act of the Legislature of the State went into effect again drawing the color line, so he with the other Colored boys had to leave.

Mr. Purcell returned home, and under his father's instructions learned the carpenter's trade. He went to Palatka, Fla., in 1885, where he studied law, and was admitted to practice law in the Circuit and inferior courts October 8, 1889, and at once commenced the active work of his chosen profession at Palatka, Fla.

At the first term of the Circuit Court after his admittance he represented plaintiffs in several large damage suits, two against the city of Palatka; in both he got verdict for his clients; one was appealed to the Supreme Court. He was admitted to the State Supreme Court January 19, 1891, where he has successfully represented many cases. January 19, 1897, he was admitted to the United States Circuit and District Courts, and November 8, 1901, was duly admitted to the Supreme Court of the United States. He has represented some of the most important cases coming before the courts of his State. He came to Pensacola, his present home, in February, 1899, and has by his energy and ability built up a fine and growing business.

In politics he is a Republican, and has attended as a delegate every State, congressional and county convention since coming to the State, several times presided over State and congressional conventions, was for twelve years chairman of the Republican Executive Committee of his county, Putnam.

For many years an alderman of the city of Palatka, Fla. In 1895 he was elected as a delegate to the Republican National Convention which convened in St. Louis, 1896. He has never held any office of profit, always honest and fearless in his opinions and his advocacy of right.

His private life has always been consistent; while not a member of any religious denomination, always attends the services of the Episcopal Church; is a temperate man; is generous and kind in disposition; was married October 24, 1895, to Miss E. L. Andrews, of Orangeburg, S. C.

First: What const.i.tutes a court? In the South as in the North and other parts of the country, to const.i.tute a court, there must be a judge, whose duty it is to preside over the court, a sheriff and deputies, and a State's solicitor, who looks after the interests of the State, and last, but by no means least, comes the jury, whose duty it is to discharge or pa.s.s on the innocence or guilt of the prisoner according to the law and evidence as offered; it requires all these to const.i.tute an organized court of law.

First: The judge should be a man selected on account of his n.o.bility of character, of heart, of soul and of mind; a man of experience and training, a man of affairs, learned in the affairs appertaining strictly to his branch, as also in literature and science; a man merciful, kind and generous, of a sterling character, temperate, though positive and unbiased by private opinion, in a word, he should be a man, the representative of justice, though not usurping that power as abiding in himself, but as the instrument of that power; whose moral character ought to be without blemish, a man whose habit, integrity, shrewd judgment and wise counsel place him above the average man, making him of the people and for the people.

Sheriffs and deputies ought to be honest and fearless, having the highest regard for the life and liberties of the people; they should be kind and generous, yet positive and fearless, ever ready to defend the life and liberties of the people, using their office only in consonance with the prescribed law in aiding the conviction of crime, but not as a means of revenging personal wrongs or injuries of the people whose color is their only sin.

THE JURY: The jury ought to be composed, if possible, of men of learning, whose moral character, love of truth, unbiased by racial prejudice or private opinions, being only representatives of the people, who in the name of the people adjudge, condemn or acquit according to the evidence, not from any private opinion, but governed by such law as is made in the statement of the judge bearing upon the case given previously to their retiring; if these men of learning can not be found, as in most cases, let others who, for the above qualifications minus learning, be subst.i.tuted in their stead. In the selection of the jury in the most cases they come as the most refined element of the sc.u.m and refuse of the party cla.s.s, whose labor in the election of some democratic officer, can only be rewarded under these terms; being unqualified to fill even the most inferior office of their party, in a majority of cases, not even one of these is acquainted with even the lowest element of learning, and if, perchance, one can be found, he is made foreman. The Negro is never thought of, but if, perchance, one should be selected, and in such a manner is he prominent, even his color makes him conspicuous, he also is on a par with his companions; men of influence are never selected.

Before I conclude with the jury may I say a word of those who select them? In most States they are selected by the county commissioners, in some by a jury commissioner. These commissioners, in most cases, are none other than tools, instruments who have no minds of their own, but like a reed before a gust of the mighty wind that blows n.o.body good, as serfs and pampered menials bend irrespective of that higher principle, that innate quality of man that places him above the brute creation, serving in abject slavery for the carrying out of party crime and cunning as well as subtle devices.

A court const.i.tuted of such elements as described, is an "Ideal One."

One to be desired, and the only one at whose hands justice, and only that as gold refined, shall be tried, counterpoised and mete out to every man justice, in the name of Heaven and at the hands of man.

But may I ask how are our courts of the South const.i.tuted? are any two of the above qualities to be found in the most prominent of our Southern courts of criminal jurisdiction? If Diogenes of old would seek in our Southern courts for such a man, hereto, as in Greece, such an one could not be found, for truth is no longer enthroned on its sacred altar.

Having defined the true elements of which the courts of our Southland are const.i.tuted, I shall pa.s.s to consider, THE MANNER IN WHICH THE Negro is dealt with in these courts. Is the criminal Negro justly dealt with in the courts of the South? is a question that I think is more frequently asked than words can answer, language describe, or man's wisdom unravel. Our woes have gone out to the ends of the earth and, the stagnant waters can no longer contain its contaminating germs, and now, even on the other side of the globe, we hear the re-echo of our cries from this d.a.m.nable cruelty wafted back to us by the zephyrs that sustain expectations impregnated with hope telling of some bright future.

What of the Negro in the sunny South? what of his rights as a citizen?

what of his treatment at the bar of justice? are questions also propounded on the other side and since the trial cause of the alleged rape has been made clear, we expect and are looking forth to the dawn of a brighter future.

In our civil courts, in other words, our courts where property rights are tried, I must say, that where tenement rights are concerned, justice is meted out to the Negro even against the white man when elevated to our higher courts, this is the only sphere in which a lenient form of justice is prescribed and given the Negro. The same cannot be alleged of him when his life, his liberty, or reputation or citizens.h.i.+p is at stake.

Against a fellow Negro, he is in some instances protected, as against a white man, seldom, if ever. In this latter it is not justice that is the object of our courts, but the impeachment and condemnation of a fellow man, giving vent to a vindictive racial prejudice. Be the crime of the Negro ever so trivial, when against the white man, the sheriff, having to carry out the oath; the jury, their party plans; the judge, his selfish means; and, therefore, no evidence, however palpable, however substantial and convincing can s.h.i.+eld the Negro under such instances. The skin of a white man being held sacred, cannot be violated or polluted by the touch of the Negro's hands, be it in self-defense, or in defense of his manhood, or in the defense of wife, daughter or some other female relative. On the other hand, seldom, if ever, can a white man be convicted when charged with striking a Negro, or for any insult he may offer to his wife, sister, daughter or mother; the juries being all white, they consider this no crime for a white man.

May we notice the following facts of the records of our courts; may I here testify and, without a fear of successful contradiction, that by these, as matter for the criminal statistics of the race serves no purpose.

First: Because our best citizens, the better cla.s.s of our thinking men and the most virtuous of our people are not tried at the hands of an impartial jury, and innocence made to bear the stamp of guilt, can in no way be accounted justice; for instance, in a case of a.s.sault and battery, although the party charged is able and does prove, by legal evidence, that his actions were prompted only by resistance in self-defense, however convincing, if a white man can be found, if even he does not know anything, but can allege a negative, this unjust evidence counterpoises the balance of justice and the Negro is found guilty. If, on the other hand, larceny be charged, it is almost an impossibility even to attempt to defend, if there be a white witness against you, it being taken for granted that every Negro is a thief.

Now in courts of justice according to my judgment, and according to the law, every man is presumed to be innocent until his guilt is proven beyond a reasonable doubt, by legal evidence, and such evidence must be furnished or obtained by the prosecution. But men are daily convicted in our courts, simply because they are Negroes.

In concluding, let me say, that a majority of my people labor under appalling disadvantages, but I hope that the time is not far distant when our courts will be const.i.tuted as the "Altars of Justice," the judges and their a.s.sociates, as its priests, and the American citizen, be his color what it may, can come and there receive at the hands of unblemished and unspotted servants redresses for wrongs, compensation for impeached innocence and justice for his wrongs.

The time is coming when all racial prejudice shall have pa.s.sed away, and when color will no longer impede our obtaining what is due us, and when the Negro will receive a fair and impartial trial before a jury of his peers; then will justice and equity rule sublime, and the Negro being protected in all his rights; his liberty, life and reputation will be held sacred, and virtue and worth will be considered; and man, the prince of G.o.d's creation will be crowned for doing justice unto man.

THIRD PAPER.

IS THE CRIMINAL NEGRO JUSTLY DEALT WITH IN THE COURTS OF THE SOUTH?

BY GEORGE T. ROBINSON, A. M., LL. B.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Capt. Geo. T. Robinson]

CAPTAIN GEORGE T. ROBINSON, A. M., LL. B.

George Thomas Robinson was born in Macon, Miss., January 12, 1854, of slave parents. An orphan, in 1865, he set out to fight life's battles with no one to guide and protect him.

He has risen to a place of distinction--a journalist of note, a lawyer of high standing, a learned professor of law, an orator of repute, a molder of thought, and a reformer. He received his first inspiration from a remark which he heard Hon. C. S. Smith, now a bishop in the A. M. E. Church, make to a public school of which he was a pupil. It was: "A boy can make of himself whatever he has a mind to." George said to himself, "I will make speeches, too." Since that time Captain Robinson and Bishop Smith have delivered many addresses together. They spoke at the Emanc.i.p.ation Celebration in Nashville, 1st of January, 1892, which took place in the Representative Hall of the capitol. They were the princ.i.p.al speakers.