在无名之人手中:美国黑人的私刑

D. D. Murphey
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This latter view has long-since become the conventional wisdom among the opinion-makers in the United States. And elsewhere, as well: this reviewer wrote a legal studies monograph in 19951 analyzing the history of lynching and placing it in perspective from a scholarly point of view - and it has been barred from Canada as \"hate literature\" (an act that is arguably as intellectually disgraceful to Canada as Stalin's insistence on Lysenkoism was to the Soviet Union). Herbert Marcuse's prescription, in his discussion of \"repressive tolerance,\" that all views from the left should be permitted and all from the right prohibited has become reality. Philip Dray's new book on lynching fits into that conventional wisdom. Unless one is predisposed to question the Left's image of white Americans, a reader will be inclined to accept its narrative at face value. Dray has written a readable chronology of lynching, with emphasis especially on the South, and his study is the product of considerable research into the subjects he considers important. This said, it remains important to note the ways his book lacks perspective. (What follows is a discussion of just some of those ways, since a complete examination of them would go far beyond the scope of a book review): 1. His entire theme (\"the lynching of black America\") repeats the now-customary premise that lynching was primarily an expression of racism. \"Lynching,\" he says, \"was a form of caste oppression... the white world's cruelty\"; and, elsewhere, \"victims were chosen for their race.\" What is odd is that he cites quite a lot of counter-evidence, but never reflects about it. He tells about the San Francisco Vigilante Committees of 1851 and 1856; about the hanging of the white gamblers in Vicksburg; about the lynching of eleven whites in New Orleans in 1891 after the Police Superintendent was shot from ambush; that half the thirty lynch victims in Illinois after 1882 were white; that thirty-five whites were lynched in North Dakota in the mid-1880s for cattle rustling; and much more. Lynching was not limited by race or by region of the country. Robert Zangrando's The NAACP Crusade Against Lynching, 19091950, cites the figures compiled by the Tuskegee Institute: that during the 87 year span between 1882 and 1968 a total of 1,297 whites and 3,445 blacks were lynched. If racism were the prime mover, the almost 1,300 whites require some explanation. The major explanation as an alternative to the racial one is the amount of crime to which local communities were reacting. We know, of course, of the cattle-rustling and other crimes committed in the \"wild west.\" What most people today don't know about is the extent of black crime in the South. In his book on lynching, James Elbert Cutler quotes with favor a statement that during those years \"the worst instincts of the negro came to the front; the percentage of criminals among negroes increased to an alarming extent; many were guilty of crimes of violence of the most heinous and repulsive kind.\" Another author tells that \"in 1921-22, the homicide rates in Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis, and New Orleans per 100,000 Negro population were 103. …","PeriodicalId":52486,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Social, Political, and Economic Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2002-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"116","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America\",\"authors\":\"D. D. 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This latter view has long-since become the conventional wisdom among the opinion-makers in the United States. And elsewhere, as well: this reviewer wrote a legal studies monograph in 19951 analyzing the history of lynching and placing it in perspective from a scholarly point of view - and it has been barred from Canada as \\\"hate literature\\\" (an act that is arguably as intellectually disgraceful to Canada as Stalin's insistence on Lysenkoism was to the Soviet Union). Herbert Marcuse's prescription, in his discussion of \\\"repressive tolerance,\\\" that all views from the left should be permitted and all from the right prohibited has become reality. Philip Dray's new book on lynching fits into that conventional wisdom. Unless one is predisposed to question the Left's image of white Americans, a reader will be inclined to accept its narrative at face value. Dray has written a readable chronology of lynching, with emphasis especially on the South, and his study is the product of considerable research into the subjects he considers important. This said, it remains important to note the ways his book lacks perspective. (What follows is a discussion of just some of those ways, since a complete examination of them would go far beyond the scope of a book review): 1. His entire theme (\\\"the lynching of black America\\\") repeats the now-customary premise that lynching was primarily an expression of racism. \\\"Lynching,\\\" he says, \\\"was a form of caste oppression... the white world's cruelty\\\"; and, elsewhere, \\\"victims were chosen for their race.\\\" What is odd is that he cites quite a lot of counter-evidence, but never reflects about it. He tells about the San Francisco Vigilante Committees of 1851 and 1856; about the hanging of the white gamblers in Vicksburg; about the lynching of eleven whites in New Orleans in 1891 after the Police Superintendent was shot from ambush; that half the thirty lynch victims in Illinois after 1882 were white; that thirty-five whites were lynched in North Dakota in the mid-1880s for cattle rustling; and much more. Lynching was not limited by race or by region of the country. Robert Zangrando's The NAACP Crusade Against Lynching, 19091950, cites the figures compiled by the Tuskegee Institute: that during the 87 year span between 1882 and 1968 a total of 1,297 whites and 3,445 blacks were lynched. If racism were the prime mover, the almost 1,300 whites require some explanation. The major explanation as an alternative to the racial one is the amount of crime to which local communities were reacting. We know, of course, of the cattle-rustling and other crimes committed in the \\\"wild west.\\\" What most people today don't know about is the extent of black crime in the South. 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引用次数: 116

摘要

《无名之人之手:美国黑人的私刑》菲利普·德雷兰登书屋,2002年出版。没有什么话题比私刑更能引起反美(以及最近的反白人)的异化了。毕竟,这些场面往往是极其残酷的。任何对人类苦难敏感的正派人士都不会为这种残忍行为辩护。然而,如果这意味着没有人愿意在1865年之后的一个世纪里为美国社会的主流辩护,把这个非常残酷的话题放在背景和视角中,那就太不幸了。这样的失败给那些喜欢把那个时期的美国白人描绘成邪恶、贪婪、肆无忌惮的种族主义和虚伪的人留下了机会;他们喜欢把黑人描绘成遭受残酷打击的受害者。后一种观点早已成为美国舆论制造者的传统智慧。在其他地方也是如此:这个评论家在19951年写了一本法律研究专著,分析私刑的历史,并从学术的角度对其进行了分析——它被加拿大视为“仇恨文学”(可以说,这种行为对加拿大来说是智力上的耻辱,就像斯大林对李森科主义的坚持对苏联一样)。赫伯特·马尔库塞(Herbert Marcuse)在他关于“压制性宽容”(repression tolerance)的讨论中提出的建议,即所有左翼观点都应该被允许,所有右翼观点都应该被禁止,这已经成为现实。菲利普·德雷(Philip Dray)关于私刑的新书符合这种传统智慧。除非有人倾向于质疑左派对美国白人的形象,否则读者将倾向于接受其叙述的表面价值。Dray写了一本可读的私刑年表,特别强调了南方,他的研究是对他认为重要的主题进行大量研究的产物。话虽如此,值得注意的是,他的书缺乏视角。(下面是对其中一些方式的讨论,因为对它们的全面考察远远超出了书评的范围。)他的整个主题(“对美国黑人的私刑”)重复了现在的惯例前提,即私刑主要是种族主义的一种表达。“私刑,”他说,“是种姓压迫的一种形式……白色世界的残酷”;在其他地方,“受害者是根据他们的种族选择的。”奇怪的是,他引用了相当多的反证据,但从不对此进行反思。他讲述了1851年和1856年的旧金山治安维持委员会;维克斯堡白人赌徒的绞刑;1891年新奥尔良警察局长在伏击中被枪杀后,11名白人被私刑处死;1882年以后伊利诺斯州30名私刑受害者中有一半是白人;19世纪80年代中期,北达科他州有35名白人因偷牛被处以私刑;还有更多。私刑不受种族或地区的限制。罗伯特·桑格兰多的《全国有色人种协进会反对私刑运动,19091950》引用了塔斯基吉研究所汇编的数据:在1882年至1968年的87年间,共有1297名白人和3445名黑人被私刑处死。如果种族主义是主要推动者,那么近1300名白人需要一些解释。作为种族原因的另一种主要解释是当地社区对犯罪数量的反应。当然,我们知道在“蛮荒的西部”发生的偷牛和其他罪行。今天大多数人不知道的是南方黑人犯罪的严重程度。詹姆斯·埃尔伯特·卡特勒(James Elbert Cutler)在他关于私刑的书中,赞同地引用了一段话:在那些年里,“黑人最坏的本能表现出来了;黑人犯罪的比例上升到惊人的程度;许多人犯下了最令人发指、最令人厌恶的暴力罪行。”另一位作者说:“1921- 1922年,亚特兰大、伯明翰、孟菲斯和新奥尔良的凶杀率是每10万黑人中有103人。…
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At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America
At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America Philip Dray Random House, 2002 There is no subject that lends itself more to anti-American (and, most recently, anti-white) alienation than lynching. The scenes, after all, were often of the utmost cruelty. No decent individual, sensitive to human suffering, undertakes to defend that cruelty. It is unfortunate, however, if that means that no one is willing to speak in defense of the mainstream of American society during the century following 1865, placing this very cruel subject in context and perspective. Such a failure leaves the field to those who like to paint the picture of white Americans of that period as one of viciousness, rapacity, unbridled racism, and hypocrisy; and who like to picture blacks as victims who received the brunt of that cruelty. This latter view has long-since become the conventional wisdom among the opinion-makers in the United States. And elsewhere, as well: this reviewer wrote a legal studies monograph in 19951 analyzing the history of lynching and placing it in perspective from a scholarly point of view - and it has been barred from Canada as "hate literature" (an act that is arguably as intellectually disgraceful to Canada as Stalin's insistence on Lysenkoism was to the Soviet Union). Herbert Marcuse's prescription, in his discussion of "repressive tolerance," that all views from the left should be permitted and all from the right prohibited has become reality. Philip Dray's new book on lynching fits into that conventional wisdom. Unless one is predisposed to question the Left's image of white Americans, a reader will be inclined to accept its narrative at face value. Dray has written a readable chronology of lynching, with emphasis especially on the South, and his study is the product of considerable research into the subjects he considers important. This said, it remains important to note the ways his book lacks perspective. (What follows is a discussion of just some of those ways, since a complete examination of them would go far beyond the scope of a book review): 1. His entire theme ("the lynching of black America") repeats the now-customary premise that lynching was primarily an expression of racism. "Lynching," he says, "was a form of caste oppression... the white world's cruelty"; and, elsewhere, "victims were chosen for their race." What is odd is that he cites quite a lot of counter-evidence, but never reflects about it. He tells about the San Francisco Vigilante Committees of 1851 and 1856; about the hanging of the white gamblers in Vicksburg; about the lynching of eleven whites in New Orleans in 1891 after the Police Superintendent was shot from ambush; that half the thirty lynch victims in Illinois after 1882 were white; that thirty-five whites were lynched in North Dakota in the mid-1880s for cattle rustling; and much more. Lynching was not limited by race or by region of the country. Robert Zangrando's The NAACP Crusade Against Lynching, 19091950, cites the figures compiled by the Tuskegee Institute: that during the 87 year span between 1882 and 1968 a total of 1,297 whites and 3,445 blacks were lynched. If racism were the prime mover, the almost 1,300 whites require some explanation. The major explanation as an alternative to the racial one is the amount of crime to which local communities were reacting. We know, of course, of the cattle-rustling and other crimes committed in the "wild west." What most people today don't know about is the extent of black crime in the South. In his book on lynching, James Elbert Cutler quotes with favor a statement that during those years "the worst instincts of the negro came to the front; the percentage of criminals among negroes increased to an alarming extent; many were guilty of crimes of violence of the most heinous and repulsive kind." Another author tells that "in 1921-22, the homicide rates in Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis, and New Orleans per 100,000 Negro population were 103. …
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Journal of Social, Political, and Economic Studies
Journal of Social, Political, and Economic Studies Social Sciences-Political Science and International Relations
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期刊介绍: The quarterly Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies (ISSN 0193-5941), which has been published regularly since 1976, is a peer-reviewed academic journal devoted to scholarly papers which present in depth information on contemporary issues of primarily international interest. The emphasis is on factual information rather than purely theoretical or historical papers, although it welcomes an historical approach to contemporary situations where this serves to clarify the causal background to present day problems.
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