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Volume10 Issue 44…Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race…November 2, 2007
Two Georgia Lynchings
During the late 19th and early
20th century, the United States experienced more than 3000 lynchings.
While most of these documented incidences of mob violence happened in the
South, lynching occurred across the nation. The southern states of Georgia and
Mississippi accounted for more than a third of these documented deaths with 458
and 538 lynchings, respectively over the period 1882
to 1930. At the height of the lynching epidemic, Georgia averaged more than one
mob killing per month. In 1899, twenty-seven (27) Georgians died as a result of
mob violence.
The vast majority of the victims were black Americans. These
predominantly black victims were hanged, shot, burned, drowned, dismembered, or
dragged to death. According to newspapers accounts, the victims allegedly murdered
a white person, raped or attempted to rape a white woman, violated some other
criminal law or committed some racial offense. This last category of lynching
offenses generally involved breaking some racial code of conduct governing the
social relations between blacks and whites during Jim Crow segregation.
Eli Cooper, a black leader,
committed such an offense. As reported by the Atlanta Constitution (August 29,
1919), Cooper had been "talking considerably of late in a manner offensive
to the white people." The paper reported, "The white residents were
informed that an uprising of negroes was set" for late September and
"Cooper's own remarks, it is alleged, were . . . that the negroes had been
'run over for fifty years, but this will all change in thirty days.'"
Apparently, whites in the community were concerned about the possibility of an
"uprising," which could threaten the social order.
One night in late summer 1919, a gang of fifteen or twenty white men
abducted Cooper from his home in Laurens County, Georgia and took him to Petway's Gift Church in Dodge County. The gang shot Cooper,
set the church on fire, and pitched his body into the flames.
The lynching of Sam Hose (a.k.a. Sam Holt) is one of Georgia's most
famous extralegal executions; it occurred near Newnan in Coweta County on the
Sunday afternoon of April 23, 1899. Charged with murdering a white man, Hose
was apprehended by law enforcement officials and incarcerated. Rather than
stand trial for murder, Hose was taken from jail by an unmasked mob of white
men to a site about a mile away. Hose was tied to a pine tree. The mob cut off
his ears and mutilated his body with knife cuts. They doused his body with oil
and set him on fire.
The Atlanta Constitution newspaper estimated that 2,000 people attended
Hose's lynching. It resembled a family outing in which people from Atlanta went
on two special trains to attend the event. According to newspaper accounts, the
spectators took pieces of bone and bits of flesh from the cooling ashes, along
with remnants of the pine sapling, as souvenirs of the lynching. For those who
could not attend, the Constitution devoted the first two pages of Monday's
newspaper to describing the grisly details. (Sources: http://georgecurry.com/, www.georgiaencyclopedia.org and www.strangefruit.org)
The Dark Knight-Batman/White
Ninja/Zorro decided going out to trick or treat this Halloween with his younger
siblings would be fun. Unfortunately, the notion was partially tainted when he
got egged at school. The culprit remains unknown, even though there were dozens
of witnesses, and school officials have yet to inform his parents the incident
even transpired. When queried for comments about the Halloween prank, the Dark
One/Ninja/Zorro remarked, "Grandma, getting egged isn't funny!"
Toxic Toys Update
A Reuters/Zogby poll conducted October 10-14 show a majority (75.8 percent) of the 991 likely voters responding plan to shun China-made toys this holiday season. The poll results came in the wake of the recall of millions of toxic and dangerous toys made in China. Avoiding toys made in China will not be easy. According to the Toy Industry Association, 80 percent of the toys Americans buy are Chinese imports.
On Halloween, Toys "R" Us Inc. recalled about 16,000 Elite Operations toys. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the surface coatings of the military-style toys contain excessive levels of lead. The recalled toys were made in China and sold in stores nationwide and online at www.toysrus.com for between $10 and $30.
The recalled toys were sold from July through October 2007. They include Super Rigs (#1004), Command Patrol Center (#1020), Barracuda Helicopter (#1023), and 3 Pack 8-inch Figures (#1024). No injuries have been reported.
Also on Wednesday, the CPSC announced the recall of about 43,000 Chinese-made fake teeth sold as Halloween party favors. The "Ugly Teeth" were imported by Amscan Inc and sold by retailers nationwide since 2006 for about $2. Included in the recall were about 1,500 Chinese-made SimplyFunRibbit board games because they contain unsafe levels of lead paint. The CPSC said the Ribbit board games were sold by SimplyFun independent consultants nationwide from March 2007 through October 2007 for about $18. The games each contain five frog-shaped wooden pieces that act as pawns for movement. The CPSC said the surface paint on the frogs contains excess levels of lead.
Consumers are advised to
immediately remove the frogs from the game and discontinue using them. Contact SimplyFun at (877) 557-7767 for a refund or a set of
replacement frogs. For the Elite Operations toys, consumers should immediately
take the toy away from children and return it to any Toys 'R' Us for a full refund or store credit. Consumers who bought
the fake teeth should return them to the store where they bought them for a
refund.
Lynching (1907)
Lizelia Augusta Jenkins Moorer
Have you ever heard of lynching in the great United States?
'Tis an awful, awful story that the Negro man relates,
How the mobs the laws have trampled, both the human and divine,
In their killing helpless people as their cruel hearts incline.
Not the heathen! 'Tis the Christian with the Bible in his hand,
Stands for pain and death to tyrannize weaklings of the land;
Not the red man nor the Spaniard kills the blacks of Uncle Sam,
'Tis the white man of the nation who will lynch the sons of Ham.
To a limb upon the highway does a Negro's body hang,
Riddled with a hundred bullets from the bloody, thirsty gang;
Law and order thus defying, and there's none to say them nay.
"Thus," they say, to keep their power, "Negroes must be kept at bay."
How his back is lacerated! how the scene is painted red,
By the blood of one poor Negro till he numbers with the
dead!
Listen to the cry of anguish from a soul that God has made,
But it fails to reach the pity of the demons in the raid.
To a tree we find the Negro and to him a chain beside,
There a horse to it is fastened and the whip to him applied.
Thus he pulls the victim's body till it meets a dying fate,
And to history is given a new scandal to relate.
Limb from limb he's torn asunder! See the savage lynchers grin!
Then the flesh is cut in pieces and the souvenirs begin;
Each must have the piece allotted for the friends at home to see,
Relatives will cluster round him, laughing, dancing, filled with glee.
To a stake they bind the Negro, pile the trash around him
high,
Make the fire about his body; it is thus that he must die.
Burn him slowly, hear the lynchers: "That's the
part we most enjoy!
Tell it out in all the nation how we killed a Negro
boy!"
Savage mob a Negro's chasing, and to catch him must not fail;
If it does, another's taken, there to force from him the tale
Where the fleeing man is hiding; if the facts he cannot raise,
Though his innocence protesting, for the same by death he pays.
"'Tis a Negro's blood we're craving; such will
have at any cost;
We must lynch the one in keeping, for the other one is lost!"
This they say, and when they're questioned answer like this is the why,
"To the race at large a warning here a Negro man shall die!"
O, how brave the Southern white man when, a hundred men to
one,
Lynch a lone, defenceless Negro,when each lyncher has a
gun.
If at midnight or the noonday, the result is all the same,
Law is powerless to hinder, and the nation shares the blame.
Lynchers go into the Senate and their savagery
uphold,
How they shoot and butcher Negroes is the story that
is told.
Guns and ropes they have in plenty, and, if necessary, will
Use them on an office holder, such a Negro they must kill.
How they clamor for the Philippines and Cubans far away,
While a worse thing is transpiring in this country
every day.
In the eyes of such law-breakers lives a beam of greatest size,
That will hinder all the pulling of the mote from others' eyes.
Are the candidates for lynching always found among the men?
No, the fiends of human torture lynch a woman now and then.
Yea, the Spanish Inquisition insignificant will pale,
When compared with such atrocities that in the South prevail!
'Tis a blot on Christian manhood time, itself, cannot erase;
Human blood upon the conscience centuries cannot efface.
Simply to suspect a Negro is sufficient for the band,
He must die without a hearing, in a boasted gospel land.
Sowing antedates the reaping, and the nation should beware,
That the sowers to the wind will reap the whirlwind everywhere.
Hark the cry! The blood of Negroes cries for vengeance from the dust!
How I tremble for the nation when I think that God is just!
Nooses: An American Nightmare
The noose is a symbol of lynching in the United States; it harkens back to a dark period in US history when black men, women and children were routinely murdered by white mobs. A socioeconomic and political weapon, lynching was used to keep blacks in an inferior status
There is nothing funny about the noose, even though some whites and blacks have sought to make light of its significance. The fact that it is showing up in all sorts of places with increasing frequency is cause for alarm, rather than levity. Those who see the matter differently simply do not understand its grisly history.
CNN's Kyra Phillips' special report - Nooses: An American Nightmare - should be required viewing for every American who thinks hanging nooses are just harmless pranks. Phillips uses images of lynching victims and mob scenes from James Allen's book Without Sanctuary to drive home the role nooses have played in American history.
The special is available online
at www.cnn.com, if you fail to catch several
scheduled re-runs.
Disgruntled feels:
Apocalyptic! For some time now, many of us have had a feeling of deja vu 2003. Listen closely to the Bush/Cheney
warmongering rhetoric and carefully replace Iraq with Iran, you will see why we
are positively on the edge of our seats with anxiety over the possibility that
the nuts running this country will start another war preemptively. Given the
nation's overextended military, soaring debt and declining goodwill in the
international community, the US is reduced to a coalition of the willing made
up of Pakistan, Israel and Great Britain. Yet, as crazy as another war sounds,
the words of war from Bush/Cheney make it seem
plausible. According to Bush, World
War III may be unavoidable, if Iran acquires the "knowledge" to make
a nuclear weapon. Bush and Cheney's deeply disturbing speeches are downright
apocalyptic!
Disgruntled wants to know: On last week, US Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez released an upbeat assessment of the US economy following news that the nation's "real" gross domestic product (GDP) grew at a 3.9 percent rate in the third quarter. The following day, the Federal Reserve lowered interest rates one-quarter percentage point to keep the economy going strong; stocks rose on the good news, but fell sharply the following day. Oil closed out the week at a record high above 95 dollars a barrel. Likewise, gold soared above 800 dollars a troy ounce. And, the US dollar fell to a new record low in currency markets. Home foreclosures, bankruptcies and repossessions are up. The price of everything of necessity US consumers purchase is up. Big credit card companies worry US consumers could be poised to default on some of their 915 billion dollars in unsecured household debt. Despite all this negative economic reality, we are told the economy is doing great, the US supports a strong dollar policy and unemployment continues to hover at a low historic rate of 4.7 percent. For most of us, the contradictory information is impossible to digest so that it makes sense. It must be voodoo economics; why else would the Commerce Department compute "real" GDP using an inflation rate of 0.08 percent?
Disgruntled
says: Since early summer, US consumers have been fed a steady diet of toxic
toy recalls, because of unsafe lead levels and other health hazards. Joining
the toxic toys, which are primarily imported from China, are recalls of meat
products, such as frozen pizzas and ground beef, presumably produced in the US.
According to Nancy Nord, chairwoman of the US
Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the recalls show the system is
working. So convinced of its efficiency, despite the CPSC's
lack of staffing and under-funding, Nord, whose
travels are funded by the businesses her agency regulates, opposes legislation
to beef up the agency, because it calls for stiffer penalties for violators and
greater regulation. Some members of Congress are calling for Nord's resignation, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi,
who took impeachment off the table. Calling for Nord
to resign or otherwise be removed from office is a waste of time; her departure
will not change Bush administration policy.
Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes and Telephone Calls
Email www.reuters.com...consumer sentiment hurt by housing - US consumer sentiment fell further than expected in late October to its lowest in more than a year as concerns about the housing slump darkened the economic outlook. The Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers said its late October figure on consumer sentiment was 80.9, down from its preliminary reading of 82 and the final September reading of 83.4. It was the lowest reading since May 2006 when the index stood at 79.1. Economists had expected October's figure to remain at 82. Consumer sentiment is seen as a proxy for future spending, which accounts for two-thirds of the U.S. economy.
Email http://news.yahoo.com...UN expert decries turning food into fuel...By Edith M. Lederer...A U.N. expert on Friday called the growing practice of converting food crops into bio-fuel "a crime against humanity," saying it is creating food shortages and price jumps that cause millions of poor people to go hungry. Jean Ziegler, who has been the United Nations' independent expert on the right to food since the position was established in 2000, called for a five-year moratorium on biofuel production to halt what he called a growing "catastrophe" for the poor.
Email www.startribune.com ...Ellison bill would outlaw photo ID requirements for voters in federal elections...By Kevin Diaz...WASHINGTON - In a challenge to the Bush administration, Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., introduced legislation Wednesday that would ban photo identification as a requirement for voting in federal elections. Ellison's voting initiative comes after an uproar surrounding the statement of a top Justice Department official addressing charges by civil rights activists that photo ID requirements discriminate against minorities, senior citizens or young people. John Tanner, chief of the Justice Department's Voting Rights Division, acknowledged that many elderly Americans don't have photo IDs but added: "Our society is such that minorities don't become elderly the way that white people do. They die first." Studies have shown that blacks have a shorter life expectancy than whites in America.
Email www.cnn.com/ ...E. coli fears prompt recall of millions of frozen pizzas...(AP) -- General Mills on Thursday recalled about 5 million frozen pizzas sold nationwide under the Totino's and Jeno's labels because of possible E. coli contamination. The problem may have come from pepperoni on pizzas produced at a General Mills plant in Ohio, the suburban Minneapolis-based company said. It said the pepperoni came from a separate supplier, not produced at the plant itself, but it declined to release the name of the pepperoni distributor. The voluntary recall covers pizzas containing pepperoni that have been produced since July, when the first of 21 E. coli illnesses under investigation by state and federal authorities emerged. In late September, the Topps Meat Co. recalled 21.7 million pounds of frozen hamburger patties after 40 people in eight states got sick from contaminated beef believed imported from Canada.
Email www.cnn.com/ ...Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is trying to quell a revolt among U.S. diplomats angry over attempts to force foreign service officers to work in Iraq or face dismissal. Rice plans to send a cable to all U.S. embassies and missions abroad explaining the decision to launch the largest diplomatic call-up since Vietnam, following a contentious town hall meeting, where angry diplomats raised deep concern about the "potential death sentence" of being ordered to work in Iraq.