An article titled ‘The Sexual Criminal’ written by Dr. James Weir, MD in The Medical Record, a weekly national journal of medicine and surgery (Vol 47, Jan 5th 1895 - June 29th 1895)
Native born Americans, whose ancestors came form Great Britain and Europe, are remarkably free from the evil effects of degeneration, consequently the native-born white sexual criminal is of rare occurrence. The negro violator, on the other hand, is quite numerous, springing up everywhere in all of the Southern States, where his race is mostly domiciled. His criminality is not due to degeneration, but is the result of perfectly natural and, for him, normal mental habitudes. Let us study, for a moment, the psychology of this semi-civilized savage. The childlike simplicity and happy-go-lucky carelessness of the negro, and I mean, throughout this paper, the true negro, not the half-breed, is notorious. The cares of to-day are sufficiently burdensome for him; he lets tomorrow take care of itself. Two hundred years of civilization have given him a thin, a very thin, veneer of superficial morality. In fact his moral nature about equals that of a white child five or six years old, who has no real knowledge of abstract ethics whatever. The negro cook who steals your flour, butter, sugar, and eggs does not consider her peculations to be thefts; she numbers such acts among her inalienable rights, though she is very careful to conceal as much as possible her petty rogueries. When she drops on her knees and asks God to pardon her, your butter, sugar, flour, and eggs do not form any portion of her burden of sin. The negro who robs your watermelon patch and your henroosts on Saturday night will be found Sunday morning in the deacons' corner of the sanctuary. His full, rich, sonorous voice will sound all the better in prayer and song, on account of the fat chicken and luscious watermelon that he has eaten before he donned his long-tailed coat and hied himself to church. His religion is pure and unadulterated superstition. God and the devil (Voodoo in some form or other), are equally objects of his superstitious regard.… The records of the police courts, wherever the laws against fornication are enforced, will show that the negro, both male and female, has little or no regard for virtue. Northern sentimentalists nave declared that the slave-owning whites were to blame for this moral laxity. This is nonsense, for it is a well-known fact that three half-breeds are born to-day where there was one born during slave time, thus showing conclusively that the negro women voluntarily yield up their virtue. But why argue this question; the history of the world shows that the women of the lower races, wherever found, eagerly enter, as a general thing, into concubinage with men of the white race. The men of the lower races passionately desire the embraces of the women of the white race, and this accounts, in a measure, for the numerous rapes upon white women by negroes. The negro is rarely accused of committing rape on the females of his own race. The reason for this is found in the natural complaisance of the females of this race; the male being able to easily satisfy his desire without resorting to violence. For the same reason a white man is seldom guilty of raping a negro woman. No amount of legislation will ever make people accept the negro as their social equal. Common-sense teaches them that he is their inferior, while science shows conclusively that he is of lower origin. Hence it happens that when a white girl is raped by a negro the disaster is simply appalling. She feels as though she had been dishonored and defiled by some monstrous beast; her moral courage is gone forever; her honor and her virtue can never be regained. These feelings are also entertained, to a certain extent, by her relatives, friends, and, in fact, by every white individual in the whole country.
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