Negroes in the U.S.A.
In 'ordering (not for the first time) a re-trial of the celebrated Scottsboro' case, in which two negroes were sentenced to death, the Supreme Court of the United States has laid down a. principle, whose consequences for the South should be far-reaching. It has quashed the previous trial on the ground that negroes had been arbitrarily excluded from the jury. Such exclusion— which, of course, has been the regular practice over a large part of the South—the Supreme . Court held to be inconsistent with the American Constitution ; with the corollary that, whenever it is practised, the court proceedings affected become invalid. Here is indeed a charter of justice for the negro, though one easier to enunciate than to make effective. Possibly a first conse- quence of it may be to increase the frequency of lynching. But when that abomination is put down, the result should be a distinct step forward. It is curious how little notice of it, comparatively speaking, has been taken in England.
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