Keep Digging

Some people are unable to accept defeat lying down. After the rightwing embarrassed themselves over the Breitbart-edited Shirley Sherrod tapes, American Spectator contributor Jeffrey Lord was unable to let the story go. He published a column on Monday alleging that Shirley Sherrod was a liar because she described the lynching of a relative, Bobby Hall, which Lord alleges isn’t true. Lord’s allegations rely on three pieces of evidence: that the Supreme Court vacated the conviction of the sherriff and colleagues for the killing of Hall. But, it gets better. Here’s Lord’s second argument:

It’s also possible that she knew the truth and chose to embellish it, changing a brutal and fatal beating to a lynching. Anyone who has lived in the American South (as my family once did) and is familiar with American history knows well the dread behind stories of lynch mobs and the Klan. What difference is there between a savage murder by fist and blackjack — and by dangling rope? Obviously, in the practical sense, none. But in the heyday — a very long time — of the Klan, there were frequent (and failed) attempts to pass federal anti-lynching laws. None to pass federal “anti-black jack” or “anti-fisticuffs” laws. Lynching had a peculiar, one is tempted to say grotesque, solitary status as part of the romantic image of the Klan, of the crazed racist. The image stirred by the image of the noosed rope in the hands of a racist lynch mob was, to say the least, frighteningly chilling. Did Ms. Sherrod deliberately concoct this story in search of a piece of that ugly romance to add “glamour” to a family story that is gut-wrenchingly horrendous already?

Yep, you read that right, Hall wasn’t lynched because beating to death doesn’t count, only hanging. I also love Lord’s third piece of evidence:

There is also a third possibility for what appears to be a straight-out fabrication. Having watched Ms. Sherrod’s speech and read the transcript, I think it’s abundantly clear that she is a liberal or progressive political activist.

Lord thinks she might be a liberal, so she could be lying. I mean, who can argue with logic like that? The American Prospect‘s Adam Serwer begs to differ:

A lynching is an extrajudicial mob killing. No one who worked to document the practice of lynching in the South limited the definition of the term to solely include those lynchings that occurred using a rope. Don’t believe me? Here’s the definition of lynching as described in the 1922 anti-lynching bill introduced by Republican Rep. L.C. Dyer that Lord pretends to know something about:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the phrase “mob or riotous assemblage,” when used in this act, shall mean an assemblage composed of three or more persons acting in concert for the purpose of depriving any person of his life without authority of law as a punishment for or to prevent the commission of some actual or supposed public offense.

Serwer points out that in his piece Lord describes Hall’s killing and it completely fits into the definition of lynching:

The case, Screws vs. the U.S. Government, as she accurately says in the next two paragraphs, made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Which, with the agreement of all nine Justices of the day — which is to say May 7, 1945 — stated the facts of the killing of Bobby Hall this way:

The arrest was made late at night at Hall’s home on a warrant charging Hall with theft of a tire. Hall, a young negro about thirty years of age, was handcuffed and taken by car to the courthouse. As Hall alighted from the car at the courthouse square, the three petitioners began beating him with their fists and with a solid-bar blackjack about eight inches long and weighing two pounds. They claimed Hall had reached for a gun and had used insulting language as he alighted from the car. But after Hall, still handcuffed, had been knocked to the ground, they continued to beat him from fifteen to thirty minutes until he was unconscious. Hall was then dragged feet first through the courthouse yard into the jail and thrown upon the floor, dying. An ambulance was called, and Hall was removed to a hospital, where he died within the hour and without regaining consciousness. There was evidence that Screws held a grudge against Hall, and had threatened to “get” him.

What Lord wrote was really disgusting. He’s not denying that Sherrod’s relative was killed, beaten to death by a sherriff and his two friends. He still accuses her of lying because, well, because.

the three petitioners began beating him with their fists and with a solid-bar blackjack about eight inches long and weighing two pounds. That fits the definition of lynching in the anti-lynching law.

Jeffrey Lord, however, does not know the first law of digging holes. The law states if you’re in a hole, stop digging. Nope, not Jeffrey Lord. He still has some word-parsing to do. He wrote a defense of himself. Check it out:

Random House Webster’s College Dictionary defines lynching as: “to put to death, esp. hanging by mob action and without legal authority.”

I have read the Court’s decision. Three people are not a “mob.” A mob is defined as a “large crowd.” So there was no “mob action” because there was no mob. Second, the Supreme Court specifically said the Sheriff and his deputy and a local policeman acted “under color of law.” Which means they had legal authority.

So to say that Bobby Hall was lynched is, factually, according to the Supreme Court and, if you prefer, Webster’s, not true. No mob. Therefore no “mob action.” And the three had “legal authority.” So my new friend Radley “Boo” Balko over at Reason pounced…and got it wrong instantly.

I guess Mr. Lord missed the three or more part of the anti-lynching law. Anyway, Lord gets taken down by his own commenters. This comment is probably my favorite:

Coach| 7.27.10 @ 11:55PM

They boy has gumption, you have to give him that. No style, forethought, afterthought… No thought to speak of, really. But here he is, the whole internet in his face, left right and center telling him he doesn’t know his face from a mudpie, and what does he do? Double Down!

GUMPTION. That boy’s got it.

And this…

MoeLarryAndJesus| 7.27.10 @ 1:39PM

I think Jeffrey’s just sorry he wasn’t there to get a few kicks in at the skull of the egregious lawbreaker Bobby Hall.

So he’s doing it here, with words.

What a man!

Lord even wanders into the comments to try to defend himself and gets the smackdown again.