Theodore E. Burton to Charles W. Chesnutt, 3 November 1921
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THEODORE E. BURTON
22D DISTRICT OHIO
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES
House of Representatives
Washington, D. C.
Nov. 3, 1921.
Mr. Chas. W. Chesnutt,
1105 Williamson Building,
Cleveland, Ohio.
Dear Mr. Chesnutt:
I have your letter of the first. I strongly favor the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill1 if I can be satisfied of its validity. I feel that it is worth while to take some chances on the decision of the Supreme Court. I am considering this matter now and do not feel entirely sure about it.2 I am sending you a copy of the bill with the report on same.3
Very respectfully yours, Theodore E. Burton TEB-FCorrespondent: Theodore E. Burton (1851–1929) was a White attorney and Republican politician from Ohio whose political career began in Cleveland, Ohio in the 1880s. He represented Ohio multiple times both in the U.S. House of Representatives (1889–1891, 1895–1909, and 1921–1928) and in the Senate (1909–1915 and 1928–1929). Chesnutt appreciated his politics and supported his run in the Cleveland mayoral election of 1907, which he lost to Tom L. Johnson (1854–1911) before returning to national politics. After the publication of The Marrow of Tradition in 1903, Burton urged Chesnutt to distribute it to a number of U.S. politicians.
1. The Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill was first introduced in 1918 by Leonidas C. Dyer (1871–1957), a White Republican U.S. Congressman from Missouri. In January 1922, it passed in the House, but was then blocked by Democratic filibusters beginning on December 2, 1922. The NAACP had begun its anti-lynching campaign shortly after its founding in the 1910s and began to lobby forcefully for the Dyer Bill in 1918 after initial doubts about its constitutionality. As a member and sometime leader in the organization, Chesnutt would have received regular updates and calls to action about the bill's progress; as it was being debated in November 1921, he wrote to at least two Ohio representatives, Harry Gahn (1880–1962) and Theodore Burton (1851–1929), in support of the bill. [back]
2. The concern about the constitutionality of the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill was related to its possible infringements of states' rights, and the question of whether the Fourteenth Amendment granted the federal government the power to intervene in the case of lynchings. Because the bill never became law, the U.S. Supreme Court never weighed in. By early 1922, Theodore Burton had become convinced of its constitutionality (see Burton's statements in "The Anti-Lynching Bill," New Tork Times, March 5, 1922: 96). [back]
3. Burton's enclosure has not been located. Chesnutt's letter to Burton from November 1, 1921, has also not been located, but it was likely similar or identical to Chesnutt's appeal the same day to his fellow Republican congressman Harry Gahn (1880–1962) to consider voting for the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill in Congress. Like Gahn and all other Ohio Republicans in the House, Burton voted for the bill in January of 1922. [back]
