The Deadly Contagion of Mob Law
An editorial reflection on the rising threat of lynch law in the Pacific Northwest and the necessity of the courts.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The lynching of accused criminals is not only a crime, but a frightful blunder. The machinery of the civil law in the United States is ample to do justice upon murderers. Lawless justice disgraces and demoralizes any community where it is committed. The Post-Intelligencer simply states the judgment of every intelligent, right-thinking, reflective citizen when it denounces lynching as an act of passionate, brutal, lawless vengeance which never suppresses and cannot suppress the crime against which it is directed. The Northern mind has caught the contagion, and lynchings have begun to multiply all over the country; they broke out in Oregon, in Washington, and there was a horrible case at Omaha. No state or section that desires new capital and material development can afford to suffer mob law to usurp the function of settled law and authorized justice. The state of Washington is a new state; its rapid growth to prosperity depends on its absolute reverence for the authorized machinery of public justice.
“Lawless justice disgraces and demoralizes any community where it is committed.”
This editorial highlights a period of intense instability in the frontier era, where legal institutions were fragile and 'vigilante justice' was a constant, dangerous temptation. It reflects a recurring struggle in the Pacific Northwest to balance rapid growth and economic development with the establishment of stable, trusted civic institutions.
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