Public outrage

“ Were we, however, if only from an abstract point of view, to venture an opinion on the vexed question as to why so many have a leaning towards the seamy and sinister side of life, we should be disposed to consider that, apart from the allurement of the abnormal and the inclination to indulge a morbid curiosity, perhaps [298] the chief influence serving to stimulate the mind of the public when a great crime has been perpetrated in a genuine concern that a serious outrage has been made on society, constituting a veritable menace to its security. ”

“ The quantity of snobbish and anti-social public opinion thus manufactured is formidable; and a new sort of crime—the incitement by newspapers of mobs to outrage and even murder—hitherto tried only on religious impostors, is beginning to be applied to politics. ”

“ I have heard of crimes which betoken greater pravity of heart, but never have I heard or read of an act more flagitious in its open defiance of sacred rights, in its ruthless disregard of all humane sentiment and shameless violation of decency and order. We shall form a more just conception of the outrage by viewing it abstractedly from any interest we may feel in it as fellow-citizens of the parties concerned. ”

“ While we regret that the necessary for such scenes should have existed, we are proud of the public spirit and indignation against offenders displayed by the citizens, and congratulate them on having at length banished a class of individuals, whose shameless vices and daring outrages have long poisoned the springs of morality, and interrupted the relations of society. ”

“ In a narrower and, perhaps, seemingly less important branch of these powers, however, the rights of the people are constantly made the subject of outrage, and little attention is paid to it by the reformers. ”

“ What course remains open to the Government if they intend, as they ought deliberately and seriously, to show a connection between crime and outrage, and these considerable powers which they are laboring to put down? ”

“ Injustice, in trying condemning and punishing upon the mere Representations of interrested Men, without calling the Party to answer; and Cruelty in the Destruction of a whole Community only because it is alledgd that Outrage has been committed in it, without the least Enquiry whether the Community have been to blame. ”

“ There, Monsieur Bergeret, you put your finger189 on the weak point; there you make the void to echo. The public is becoming used to the spectacle of wrong-doing and is losing the power to discriminate between good and evil. That’s where the danger lies. Now one public scandal after another arises, only to be at once hushed up. Under the Monarchy and the Empire there was such a thing as public opinion; there is none to-day. ”

“ No one more sincerely regrets the insults offered his person, and the injury done to his property; but I cannot restrain my indignation, when I hear the public virtue, that so promptly recoils from undue violence, stigmatized as time-serving conwardice. ”

“ Granting all that can be said on the head of provocation—all that can be quoted to show that the balance of crime and outrage has ever been on the side of our oppressors in the past—when will we learn the lesson which common sense and prudence teach, that the one grand fatal error in all popular movements is to allow the promptings of individual passion to silence the warnings of moral sense and prudence in order to seek a selfish and criminal gratification, regardless of all consequences to a people's cause? ”

“ If the general good demands it, I am prepared to bear the unjustified slur which a deceived public opinion has put upon me, in the belief that the eternal justice of people will one day absolve me again. ”

“ Each time an outrage occurs, the doctors of the ethico-social sciences, who swarm in journalism, indulge in reflections on the question, Can the criminal act be excused, or sometimes even justified, from the point of view of the highest justice? ”

“ The force of injustice could no further go. To act in this way is to play the part of a moral assassin, and ought to draw down on the head of the journalist who could play so criminal a part the indignation and abhorrence of the public. ”

“ When you are asked to find a false verdict think of these consesequences. When you are asked to please the public think of these consequences. When you are asked to please the press think of these consequences. When you are asked to act from fear, hatred, prejudice, malice, or cowardice think then of these consequences. But whenever you do right, consequences are nothing to you, because you are not responsible for them. Whoever does right clothes himself in a suit of armor that the arrows of consequences can never penetrate. ”

“ Can it be, Sir, that these great men, under cover of those hallowed words, intended to make a government that should outrage justice and trample upon liberty as no other government under the whole heavens has ever done? ”

“ If such are the men with whom bitter quarrels are waged, and upon whom unstinted contumely and contempt are poured out, shall we not all, upon every side, pause and reflect that to blow mere party fires to fury, and to trample personal character in the mire of angry political dispute, is to disgrace ourselves and the cause that we would serve, and the country whose good name depends upon us? ”

“ The audacity and frequency with which outrages are committed, forbid us, in justice to our consciences, to omit to use the powers we possess, to bring them to the severe action of the law; and when we find our powers inadequate, to draw upon them public attention, and the rebuke of the good. ”

“ For so it happens, that, instead of enquiring into the skill or honesty of those kind of people, the manner is now to enquire into their party, and to reject or encourage them accordingly; which proceeding hath made our people, in general, such able politicians, that all the artifice, flattery, dissimulation, diligence, and dexterity, in undermining each other, which the satirical wit of men hath charged upon courts; together with all the rage and violence, cruelty and injustice, which have been ever imputed to public assemblies ”

“ I do not wish to be understood as saying that brave and good men do not sometimes, under strong excitement, participate in this outrage against human rights and organized society, for it is a fact that such rebellions are not infrequently led by the most prominent citizens, and, from this very fact, it is the more to be deplored. ”

“ If they have such legal rights, they are at this moment unquestionably exposed to what I must call outrage. If a white person were ejected from the cars on account of his skin, we should all feel that it was an outrage. Is it any less an outrage because the person ejected is simply guilty of a different skin? I confess, that, to my mind, it is a greater outrage, because obligations are greater in proportion to the humility and weakness of those with whom we deal. ”

“ You are a Whig, a reformer—does not that of itself imply all other crimes and misdemeanours? That being once granted, they have a clear right to heap every other outrage, every other indignity, upon you as a matter of course ”

“ But I am assured that if the fear of the upper police did not restrain the disturbers, the brawlers, they would publicly express an opinion contrary to the principles of the government.... Public opinion is daily going down. ”

“ Such an outrage, so offensive in every respect, not only to the Constitution, but also to the whole system of order by which the universe is governed, can be nothing but a national nuisance, which, for the general welfare, and in the name of justice, ought to be abated. ”

“ It is true, that in aristocracies, as well as under a more open form of government, where a single demagogue unfortunately possesses the sovereign power, common sense is too frequently construed into public offence. ”

“ If they were to pay attention, they would perceive that these accusations are only confined to some few out of a class comprehending many many thousands in our wealthy isle, and that the very circumstance of their rank being no shield against the attacks made upon them, is a proof that they are exceptions, whose conduct is universally held up to public ridicule or indignation. ”

“ The facts in a sentence are simply these: Half a dozen boys, in the pursuit of a selfish gratification, persist in violating the rights of citizens, and this conduct is sustained by the community which yet acknowledges the outrage. ”

“ A perusal of the following sketches will prove, however, that only those pretenders have obtained any strong hold upon national feeling who have appeared in times of general dissatisfaction or public calamity, and when the people have been only too willing to swear allegiance to any one having the slightest shadow of authority, and who, at the same time, appeared disposed to rectify their grievances. ”

“ This outrage, when the person it respects is present, we distinguish in the lower rank of people by a peculiar term: and let it be observed, that though the decencies of behaviour are a little kept, the same outrage and virulence, indulged when he is absent, is an offence of the same kind. But, not to distinguish any further in this manner; men run into faults and follies, which cannot so properly be referred to any one general head as this, that they have not a due government over their tongue. ”

“ By a natural process minorities of agitators cast cowardly and selfish members out of their ranks; in other words, they weed out the useless, the feeble, the derogatory elements, and the elements which, being dependent upon the favour of the public, or susceptible to public criticism, flinch if subjected to unfavourable judgment. ”

“ And we learn, with the greatest concern, that any misrepresentations whatever, of the Government and its proceedings, either by individuals or combinations of men, should have been made, and so far credited as to foment the flagrant outrage which has been committed on the laws. ”

“ It persecutes a principle; it would whip a right; it would tar and feather justice, by inflicting fire and outrage upon the houses and persons of those who have these. It resembles the prank of boys, who run with fire-engines to put out the ruddy aurora streaming to the stars. The inviolate spirit turns their spite against the wrongdoers. ”

“ Such an assumption rarely fails to react, or to operate reflectively upon those by whom it is essayed; never, indeed, except in instances in which it can be sustained by a power absolute and irresponsible enough to repress opposition, or to silence the expression of public sentiment. ”

“ But whether these combinations be offensive or defensive, they are always abundantly heard of. In order to bring the point to a speedy decision, they have always recourse to the loudest clamour, and sometimes to the most shocking violence and outrage. ”

“ But nevertheless the attempt must be made and made again until the seared conscience of the civilized world’s hall throbs with righteous indignation at such outrage. “To sin by silence when we should protest makes cowards out of men. ”

“ Having agreed to worship public opinion, without asking themselves definitely who were the public, they fell into frequent and fatal errors. The mob often claimed the place on the pedestal of opinion, and its claims were allowed. ”

“ For thus the cause of individuals is made a public concern, and the general indignation which their wrongs excite, forms at once one of the severest punishments which can be inflicted on the oppressor, and one of the strongest bulwarks that can be raised in defence of the unprotected. ”

“ IN any community in which a sensational crime has recently been committed, the feelings of the individuals who go to make up that community must of necessity vary somewhat sharply according to the degree in which the personal fortunes of each are affected by the outrage. ”

“ This agitation they have maintained by orations, harangues, and seditious speeches at public meetings—by publications through a licentious press—by exaggerations—by forgeries—and by all other means which it is in the power of that description of persons to use, in order to excite the multitude; and then, when they are excited, to make them appear in large bodies to terrify and over-awe the people. ”

“ It is simply a line of conduct that runs parallel with the requirements of the society amongst which we live, and which we know varies so much in different nations and amongst different people, that what some call a virtuous action, we should condemn as an outrage on the feelings of humanity. ”

“ That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop, or the beauty shop, or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failing. ”

“ Does not the public behold with indignation, persons not only generally scandalous in their lives, but the identical persons who, by their society, their instruction, their example, their encouragement, have drawn this man into the very faults which have furnished the cabal with a pretence for his persecution, loaded with every kind of favor, honor, and distinction, which a court can bestow? ”

“ The abuses of the public service are to be condemned on account of the harm to the public interest, but there is an incidental injustice of the same general character with that which we are discussing. ”

“ The despairing accusations made against our public servants are not the peculiar creation of the times in which we live, and the allegation of wide spread demoralization in the body politic, was no more novel in any of the generations of the past than it is now. ”

“ We deplore the outrages which accompany revolutions. But the more violent the outrages, the more assured we feel that a revolution was necessary. The violence of those outrages will always be proportioned to the ferocity and ignorance of the people; and the ferocity and ignorance of the people will be proportioned to the oppression and degradation under which they have been accustomed to live. ”