A Square Deal

by Theodore Roosevelt

In such cases, moreover, it is well to remember that the criminal not merely sins against humanity in inexpiable and unpardonable fashion, but sins particularly against his own race and does them a wrong far greater than any white man can possibly do them.

¶Therefore, in such cases the colored people throughout the land should in every possible way show their belief that they, more than all others in the community are horrified at the commission of such a crime, and are peculiarly concerned in taking every possible measure to prevent its recurrence and to bring the criminal to immediate justice.

¶The slightest lack of vigor either in denunciation of the crime or in bringing the criminal to justice is itself unpardonable. Moreover, every effort should be made under the law to expedite the proceedings of justice in the case of such an awful crime. But it cannot be necessary, in order to accomplish this, to deprive any citizen, of those fundamental rights to be heard in his own defence which are so dear to us all and which lie at the root of our liberty.

¶It certainly ought to be possible by the proper administration of the laws to secure swift vengeance upon the criminal; and the best and immediate efforts of all legislators, judges and citizens should be addressed to securing such reforms in our legal procedure as to leave no vestige of excuse for those misguided men who undertake to wreak vengeance through violent methods.

¶Men who have been guilty of a crime like rape or murder should be visited with swift and certain punishment, and the just efforts made by the courts to protect them in their rights should under no circumstances be perverted into permitting any mere technicality to avert or delay their punishment. The substantial rights of the prisoner to a fair trial must, of course, be guaranteed; but subject to this guarantee, the law must work swiftly and surely, and all the agents of the law should realize the wrong they do when they permit justice to be delayed or thwarted for technical or insufficient reasons.

¶We must show that the law is adequate to deal with crime by freeing it from every vestige of technicality and delay.

¶But the fullest recognition of the horror of the crime and the most complete lack of sympathy with the criminal can not in the least diminish our horror at the way in which it has become customary to avenge these crimes, and at the consequences that are already proceeding therefrom.

¶It is, of course, inevitable that where vengeance is taken by a mob it should frequently light on innocent people; and the wrong done in such a case to the individual is one for which there is no remedy. But even where the real criminal is reached, the wrong done by the mob to the community itself is well nigh as great. Especially is this true where the lynching is accompanied by torture. There are certain hideous sights which when once seen, can never be wholly erased from the mental retina.

The mere fact of having seen them implies degradation. This is a thousandfold stronger when, instead of merely seeing the dead, the man has participated in it. Whoever in any part of our country has ever taken part in lawlessly putting to death a criminal by the dreadful torture of fire must forever after have the awful spectacle of his own handiwork seared into his brain and soul. He can never again be the same man.

¶This matter of lynching would be a terrible thing even if it stopped with the lynching of men guilty of the inhuman and hideous crime of rape; but as a matter of fact, lawlessness of this type never does stop and never can stop in such fashion. Every violent man in the community is encouraged by every case of lynching in which the lynchers go unpunished to himself take the law into his own hands whenever it suits his own convenience. In the same way the use of torture by the mob in certain cases is sure to spread until it is applied more or less indiscriminately in other cases.