by the
institutions of the Union a district required a certain number of
inhabitants before it could be acknowledged as even a district; and that
previous to such acknowledgment, the people who had _squatted_ on the
land had no claim to protection or law. It must also be borne in mind,
that these distant territories offered an asylum to many who fled from
the vengeance of the laws, men without principle, thieves, rogues, and
vagabonds, who escaping there, would often interfere with the happiness
and peace of some small yet well-conducted community, which had migrated
and settled on these fertile regions. These communities had no appeal
against personal violence, no protection from rapacity and injustice.
They were not yet within the pale of the Union; indeed there are many
even now in this precise situation (that of the Mississippi for
instance,) who have been necessitated to make laws of government for
themselves, and who acting upon their own responsibilities, do very
often condemn to death, and execute. [Note 1.] It was, therefore, to
remedy the defect of their being no established law, that Lynch law, as
it is termed, was applied to; without it, all security, all social
happiness would have been in a state of abeyance. By degrees, all
disturbers of the public peace, all offenders against justice met with
their deserts; and as it is a query, whether on its first institution,
any law from the bench was more honestly and impartially administered
than this very Lynch law, which has now had its name prostituted by the
most barbarous excesses and contemptuous violation of all law whatever.
The examples I am able to bring forward of Lynch law, in its primitive
state, will be found to have been based upon necessity, and a due regard
to morals and to justice. For instance, the harmony of a well-conducted
community would be interfered with by some worthless scoundrel, who
would entice the young men to gaming, or the young women to deviate from
virtue. He becomes a nuisance to the community, and in consequence the
heads or elders would meet and vote his expulsion. Their method was
very simple and straight-forward; he was informed that his absence would
be agreeable, and that if he did not "clear out" before a certain day,
he would receive forty lashes with a cow-hide. If the party thought
proper to defy this notice, as soon as the day arrived he received the
punishment, with a due notification that, if found there again