The brutal murder of Enforcement Officer Leon George and Deputy U.S. Marshal Sam Lilly by a gang of bootleggers in Brunswick County recently calls for vigorous action. It is the most revolting crime that has stained the State’s escutcheon in a decade. When men who are standing between decency and lawlessness are lured into the net of the vilest of the vile and done to death it is time for every law-abiding citizen to show his hand.
In a talk recently before the Better Government Association of Chicago, Senator Frank B. Willis of Ohio placed the blame for crime at the door of the “better class.” He said, in part:
“The burglar who cracks the safe of a bank and escapes with thousands of dollars is not one whit worse than the president of that same bank who purchases whiskey from an illicit dealer.
“The pickpockets, sneak thieves and purse-snatchers are no more criminals than that type of citizens who lie or use political influence to evade jury service.
“The Eighteenth Amendment has been blamed for awakening a spirit of lawlessness in the hearts of the people. That is now true. The Eighteenth Amendment merely uncloaked a great number of hypocritical people who were able for a while to pose as respectable, law-abiding citizens. These at heart never possessed that unfaltering love of the law that makes a decent citizen.”
The Jeffersonian is making no charges. It sincerely hopes that the class of citizen pictured by Senator Willis may not be found to an appreciable extent in North Carolina. but the tribe is not extant so long as bootleggers ply their nefarious trade and faithful officials are shot down in cold blood.
If the Brunswick County murderers are not apprehended and brought to justice, every foe of law and order will take new courage. No citizen will be safe who dares to expose infractions of the prohibition law, and law-breakers, instead of law itself, will eventually direct the governmental policy.
Lead editorial from the editorial page of the Carolina Jeffersonian, Raleigh, N.C., Aug. 6, 1924
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073001/1924-08-06/ed-1/seq-8/#words=AUGUST+6%2C+1924
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