A Brief History of Anti-Lynching Legislation in the U.S.
Lynching is the public killing of an individual who has not received due process. – NAACP
Lynching is an extrajudicial killing by a group. It is most often used to characterize informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged or convicted transgressor or to intimidate others. --Wikipedia
Lynching was used by white people in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to express rage at the prospects of Blacks’ new rights of citizenship. Whites feared changes to social, economic and political systems, and, in the North and West, whites feared competition for jobs as Blacks migrated out of the South following the failures of Reconstruction.
The Emancipation Proclamation and the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution granted rights to Blacks, but white resistance to change was a barrier for Blacks to fully enjoy those rights. The horrors of being lynched caused Blacks to fear aggravating white people in any way even if it meant the loss of what was rightfully theirs to claim. Often, nothing was required to provoke whites to mob rage; just being a black person was enough.
Blacks had white allies who were concerned over the growing violence. Between 1882 and 1968, nearly 200 anti-lynching bills were proposed in the U. S. House of Representatives. Three made it to the Senate, where Southern Democrats and ambivalent Republicans blocked passage. A major roadblock to passage of any anti-lynching bill was conflict over which jurisdiction, federal or state, should adjudicate lynching. Murder was considered a state crime. (1)
Emancipated along with her parents, Ida B. Wells-Barnett became a journalist who made lynching the focus of her writing and public speaking. She tirelessly advocated for legislation with tough consequences. (2) George Henry White, elected to Congress from North Carolina, introduced H.R. 6963 in 1900, a bill that made lynching a federal crime with possibility of capital punishment. White had received petitions signed by thousands of citizens supporting the bill, however, H.R. 6963 died in committee. The Raleigh News & Observer, at the time, a strong voice of conservative whites, spoke out against Rep. White.
White inadvertently created controversy when he criticized Representative Robert E. Burke (D-TX) over comments Burke made regarding black men lynched because of assaulting white women. White said, “I have examined that question, and I am prepared to state that no more than 15 percent of lynchings are traceable to that crime, and there are many more outrages against colored women by white men than there are by colored men against white women.” (3)
In reaction to horrific crimes against the Black community of St. Louis, Missouri in 1917, white Representative Leonidas C. Dyer (R-MO) introduced H.R. 11279 in 1918. The bill stipulated punishments for perpetrators and officers who failed to protect all citizens. James Weldon Johnson, Field Representative for the NAACP, (who also wrote “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing)” supported Dyer’s bill. Johnson made impassioned pleas to President Woodrow Wilson, legislators, the public and civic leaders, stating that lynching was a crime beyond murder. It was a mob substituting its own will for due processes of law guaranteed by the Constitution to every person accused of a crime… “anarchy—anarchy which the states have proven themselves powerless to cope with.” H.R. 11279 passed in the House 230 to 119 in 1918. Still, the Dyer bill died in the Senate the same way others had died. (4)
President Woodrow Wilson had written an eloquent proclamation in support of the Dyer bill, likely inspired by Johnson, and, due to the publicity surrounding the bill, there were fewer lynchings in the 1920s and 30s. Still, lynchings continue to take the lives of black people. (5)
The tally of lynchings in America varies depending on the data source, but the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) documented 4,080 lynchings of Black people in the following Southern states between 1877 and 1950: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. In 2017, EJI added eight other states where documented lynchings occurred: Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Maryland, Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. Undocumented racially motivated lynchings between 1865 and 1968 are estimated to be around 2,000. (6)
The state of Virginia made an effort to establish a state anti-lynching law. In 1928, Governor Harry F. Byrd, Sr., signed the nation’s strictest law at the time. However, “no white person was ever convicted under the statute for committing crimes against an African American, only against other white persons.” (7)
It wasn’t until early 2022 that the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Bill was introduced in the House by Representative Bobby Rush (D-Ill) and passed by a vote of 422 to 3. A companion bill was introduced in the Senate by Senators Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Tim Scott (R-SC) and unanimously passed on March 7 that year.
After more than a century of failed attempts, the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Bill was signed into law by President Joe Biden on March 29, 2022. Amending the federal Hate Crimes Act, it covered lynching along with all other types of hate crimes. Its key provisions include: “Makes it a federal crime to conspire to commit a hate crime that results in death or serious bodily injury; imposes fines and prison sentences up to 30 years (or life for death-resulting offenses); covers conspiracies involving kidnapping, aggravated sexual abuse, or attempts to kill, in addition to other serious harm.” (8)
The long road to achieving federal recognition and a law with consequential punishment for the crime of racially-motivated lynching began with the advocacy of Black journalist Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Representatives George Henry White and Leonidas Dyer, NAACP’s James Weldon Johnson, and many others. Accomplished only recently, this speaks to the difficulty of breaking through the entitlement and stubbornness of whites to recognize that mutual humanity and rights America extends to all her citizens.
by Josephine “Jo” Baker, Dismantling Racism member, Soapstone United Methodist Church
References:
1. The History of American Anti-Lynching Legislation : We're History
2. Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Lynching Law in America, The Arena 23.1
4. Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill - Wikipedia
5. Woodrow Wilson, July 26, 1918. “My fellow countrymen…”. Government Printing Office, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
6. Equal Justice Initiative, “Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror. (3rd Ed. 2017).
7. Smith, Douglas. “Anti-Lynching Law of 1928.” Encyclopedia Virginia. Virginia Humanities (07 Dec 2020).