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Byrd's lynching became the subject of national news and prompted anti-lynching legislation to be signed into law by Governor Harry F. Byrd of Virginia in 1928. [1] The only man indicted by a grand jury for the lynching, Floyd Willard, was acquitted after only ten minutes of deliberation during the trial on July 19, 1927. [1] [3]
Capital punishment was abolished in Virginia on March 24, 2021, when Governor Ralph Northam signed a bill into law. The law took effect on July 1, 2021. Virginia is the 23rd state to abolish the death penalty, and the first southern state in United States history to do so. [1] [2]
Sociologist Arthur F. Raper investigated one hundred lynchings during the 1930s and estimated that approximately one-third of the victims were falsely accused. [4] [5] On a per capita basis, lynchings were also common in California and the Old West, especially of Latinos, although they represented less than 10% of the national total.
From the beginning, local and state officials denied that a lynching had taken place. In 1928, then-Governor Harry F. Byrd Sr. signed into law "the first effective anti-lynching law", [7]: 21 the Virginia Anti-Lynching Law of 1928 (the Barron-Connor Act).
A graph of lynchings in the US by victim race and year [1] The body of George Meadows, lynched near the Pratt Mines in Jefferson County, Alabama, on January 15, 1889 Bodies of three African American men lynched in Habersham County, Georgia, on May 17, 1892 Six African American men lynched in Lee County, Georgia, on January 20, 1916 (retouched photo due to material deterioration) Lynching of ...
Embattled Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax compared himself to Jim Crow-era lynching victims in a surprise speech as he resists calls to resign.
Although more than 6,500 lynchings occurred between 1865 and 1950 according to the Equal Justice Initiative, lynching did not become a federal crime until 2022 under the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, which was signed into law by President Joe Biden, over a hundred years after Antilynching legislation was first proposed. [193]
Joseph H. McCoy (1878/1879 – April 23, 1897) was a Black teenager who was lynched in Alexandria, Virginia beginning the night of April 22, 1897 by a mob who fought their way through police officers to break him out of jail. The mob then beat McCoy severely before he was hanged to death.