Vicarious Violence: Spatial Effects on Southern Lynchings, 1890-1919

Abstract

This article considers what effect lynchings in one location had on lynchings elsewhere. The "contagion" model predicts that lynchings in one area increased the probability of lynchings in nearby areas, while the "deterrence" model expects the probability of lynchings in a given locale to decline when lynchings occurred elsewhere. County-level data for 10 southern states yield strong evidence of a negative spatial effect for three time periods (1895-99, 1905-9, and 1915-19) consistent with the deterrence model. Two interpretations for this spatial effect are: (1) whites were satisfied that local blacks were sufficiently threatened by nearby lynchings; (2) blacks altered their behavior to minimize conflict with local whites.