George,
Like in so many other things, the practices of fifty years ago were so much better than the way things are done today.
In my part of the country too, that is how problems were resolved. If somebody was becoming a public nuisance then he would get a strong warning to straighten up and change his ways, probably from the sheriff, but sometimes from a committee of local notables.
And look how much better it worked! The drunk got to enjoy his whiskey and there was no public expense of courts, jail, probation officers, caseworkers and all the rest. Now the drunk would be arrested for being drunk in his barn, much less his car.
My favorite uncle told me how as a young man, maybe around 1920, he would go with his father and a committee of community elders to straighten out problem individuals:
Lets say a man had been drunk for a month, beating his wife and kids and stealing his neighbors chickens. The "committee" would saddle up and ride at midnight and when they arrived at the drunks house, they would cut long sapling poles and then ride around and around the house beating on the sides of the house from horseback. One rider would be carrying a pine torch (this being before electric lights in rural places) and another a length of rope. When the drunk stumbled out on the porch he would be would addressed by the leader of the committee and told in no uncertain terms that if he didn't straighten up and change his ways that the rope would do its work on the next visit.
This was called "brush beating" a house and uncle said that it ALWAYS worked and that they never had to hang anyone. This method probably was used by the KKK but probably predated the Klan. And according to uncle, all the subjects of "brush beating" that he knew about were white men.
Slagle |
