[JerseyanExile]

Alright, the title is a bit misleading - no Federal anti-lynching laws were enacted. There were numerous attempts, and one, the Dyer Bill, managed to pass in the House, only to be stonewalled in the Senate by the Southern states.

But I'm a bit interested to see what people here think. Were the laws proposed legal? This is something of an informal poll, so please begin a post with the number of your choice.

[tx_eggman]

7

[Servant of the Cross]

sniff ...

[mnehring]

Yes. Individual rights trump State powers. One individual right is you can’t be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.

[VeniVidiVici]

Are you worried about something?

[apillar]

Well the issue wasn't lynching being illegal or not, lynching was murder and was already punishable by scores of state and federal law. The problem was getting anybody to investigate, then a getting prosecutor to prosecute, not to mention getting witnesses to testify and a jury who would convict. As for a federal anti-lynching law being constitutional or not, the Supreme Court has pretty much decided that most federal laws of that nature such as “hate crime” laws are constitutional so I would say yes (whether that is what the founders actually intended or not was another story.)

[SauronOfMordor]

The equal - protection clause was originally specially meant to mandate federal intervention if States declined to protect classes of people from violence.

[count-your-change]

When a person feels the hemp tightening around their neck rights and jurisdictions become a moot point.

[Gay State Conservative]

Iran's on the brink of developing a nuke...there's a real possibility that Osama Obama will be able to steal this election...and you're worried about anti-lynching laws?

Yikes!

[JerseyanExile]

Alright, looks like support was strongly in favor of such laws, which was about what I expected. You see, I made an analogy to anti-lynching laws to a pro-abortion co-worker, when defending the legality of federal anti-abortion legislation. Same principle really, that of the individual being deprived of life without due process. He and I got into it a bit on the “state’s rights” argument that was raised historically, and eventually we had a wager on it. Looks like I won.