Vigilante Expulsion in Yakima
After an arrest for public indecency, a mob seized a man from the town jail and forced him to leave the area.
Thursday Marshal Cock arrested a Cains man, against whom complaint had been made for exposing his person to school girls and women. That night a 'mob' of five or six surrounded Officer Steigler, took the jail keys away from him, pounded up the face of the lecherous Celestial and fired him out of town at a lively gait. The action of course was unlawful, but if ever such a course was justifiable this was the one.
“The action of course was unlawful, but if ever such a course was justifiable this was the one.”
This incident highlights the pervasive anti-Chinese sentiment of the 1890s in Washington, where newspapers frequently used coded racialized language ('Celestial') and openly endorsed extralegal violence against immigrant populations. The editor's justification of the 'mob' action underscores how normalized such vigilantism was at the time.
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