A KIND OF MOCK TRIAL.--"It would seem that the way to go about it is to change the forms of law so as to give them some of the features of lynch law, i. e., immediate arraignment, swift trial, and punishment without delay; and all, without the publicity that attends our regular procedure. There should be legal provision for immediate arraignment, with special forms of trial, so that it will be assured that in a very short time the whole matter will be disposed of; and there need be no publicity, provided that there is assurance of a fair trial. The object of publicity is to prevent injustice, unfair trials, and despotic infliction of punishments; but in these days of general information and civic freedom, it is possible to bar out the public without suspicion that anything unfair will be practiced at the expense of the accused. Why, indeed,

should the victim of a brute's criminal lust be brought into court at all, or forced to testify about so horrid an experience? The accused must be confronted by his accuser, if the principle of our laws is to be obeyed, but is it at all necessary that this should be in open court, or in any court at all? It can be as well done in the privacy of the home, with judge and jury only present as the guarantors of the observance of the legal form.

VIRGINIA HAS SUCH A LAW.-"We

understand that Virginia has a special statute affording speedy trial, with private procedure in certain cases, and that since that statute was passed there has not been a lynching in the state. We might as well study such a law and see how far it may be adopted for use here. We should eagerly seek out the best remedy for our unhappy situation and apply it; for the situation is truly unhappy, and it is growing worse instead of better, and is already well nigh intolerable. Let us arrange so that the Law shall be the expression of the absolute needs of the time, and it will then be found, we believe, that we will enlist in its enforcement all sorts and conditions of men, regardless of color. The result cannot fail to be to our great advantage."-Mobile Register.

STATE EUNUCH INSTITUTIONS.We have intimated the establishment of State Eunuch Institutions. We believe that every state should have its penal farms; and that especially here in the South the Negro criminal should be taken care of on such farms. Mississippi has its penal farms which are far in advance of penitentiaries or prison walls. Though only as yet in a crude, experimental stage, a number of abuses being reported, they have been made to pay the state a revenue besides all running expenses. Georgia has also abolished her

unspeakable peonage system, and is falling in line with Mississippi. The occupants of penal farms cannot only support themselves, but could be made to do splendid service for the people of the state in the way of building public roads. "Prominent men," of the vigilance committee, will bump over country roads that are a disgrace to a Hottentot and resort to lynching bees, and help to kill several hundred powerful Negro men annually, whose energy might be utilized in bettering the highways of the state. We contend that every southern state should set aside and equip a farm for the reception of Negro criminals of a class that should be rendered sterile by the authority of the state; and that this authority should extend to white criminals of a like class. We contend that the lynching of Negroes for any crime committed is inhuman and barbarous; and that all law abiding people of both races should demand of the officers of the law that the perpetrators of this crime against justice be apprehended and severely punished. During the campaign President Taft said to an audience. of colored ministers concerning the lynching evil: "The best remedy, and the necessary one, is an improvement in the administration of our common laws, and the holding to strict account of officers of the law who do not use all possible means to prevent and suppress such outbreaks."

We know positively that at some lynchings the officers of the law are in sympathy with the mob, and assist instead of retarding it. We believe that the federal government ought to step in and inquire into these lynching outrages, and bring the law-breakers of these mobs to justice. When the state will not protect its citizens the government must.

STERILIZATION

OF

CRIMI

THE NALS. The criminal class is a class to be deplored, but not hated. Hate is born of ignorance and breeds corruption. A deluded, vengeance-wreaked mob which hangs or burns a criminal is as deplorable a criminal class as the criminal himself. This particular criminal class is the outgrowth of a corrupt social system in the South and elsewhere, and now, since it is with us and increasing, it must be scientifically dealt with -the only just method to rid the country of it.

In this enlightened age any race of people can be improved in any desired direction by proper means. A progressive farmer does not hesitate to cut off an unruly, vicious, unprofitable portion of his flock, in order to produce the desired results. What the intelligent farmer does, the state, in the case of unruly members, must do. But the South has done little to curb the Negro or white criminal class. Promiscuous cohabiting among them and with the whites increases this