THE POETICS OF RACIST LUNACY (Does the mouth have a nose?)

“I didn’t say I love you because you’re black, or I love you because you’re white or I love you because……….you’re from Japan….”- Donald Trump, campaign speech Phoenix, Az., Aug. 22, 2015

“….Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came….” @realDonaldTrump tweet July 14, 2019

“Send her back! Send her back!”- crowd chant, North Carolina Trump Rally July 17, 2019

“I disagree with [the chant] it. But again I didn’t say that.” -Donald Trump July 18, 2019

Dr. Thomas Spencer sworn

By John Van Buren Atty. Gen:

Q.  Do you think there is an expression in the mouth?

A. I should think a negro’s mouth and lips were as expressive as his eyes. But as a general rule the eye is most expressive.

Q. Speaking metaphorically, as you have, does the mind have a nose?

A. I have not studied bumpology sufficiently to answer that question.

Q. Has the mind any mouth?

A. I do not know as it has.

Q. Was Paradise Lost written under the excitement of hunger or anger?

A. I never supposed either.

Q. Was the tragedy of Hamlet?

A. I have never supposed so.

Q. Do you consider Paradise Lost a coherent work?

A. I do. It is a work of reason combined with imagination and volition.

Q. How is the tragedy of Hamlet?

A. In that there is an imitation of incoherence. I think it is coherent incoherence.

Q. Was either of them composed under the excitement of joy?

A.  They were deliberate, no doubt, although compositions of that character excite the feelings. Poets are, therefore, more frequently found in Lunatic Asylums than mathematicians.

     The information age had begun. Due to the new telegraph lines, now strung throughout western New York, The Auburn Daily Advertiser had details of the Van Nest family murders within a few days and police departments within hours. Sketchy reports of a ”negro” or someone in the “disguise of a negro” had been widely circulated in the area. The paper correctly named William Freeman as the suspect and breathlessly reported that he had confessed. The only thing stopping Freeman from killing the entire family was a broken knife and his injured wrist, they told their readership. This was a surprisingly accurate account of the facts; within only thirty-six hours of the act. 

      It didn’t take long for word of the Van Nest family murders to reach Hon. WH Seward. Here is where the William Freeman case (just like the Jennings case) takes on historical proportions. With Richard Jennings, it was the first murder conspiracy to be prosecuted in the state. With Freeman, although not the first “not guilty by reason of insanity” case tried in the U.S., with Seward involved, it became the most high profile one. The Hardenbergh case was just before McNaughton. The name Cornelius W. Hardenbergh is long forgotten; while the William Freeman trial is still well known in case law. William Hannibal Freeman, was no longer the anonymous, sympathetic victim of injustice, brutalized by the system. He was the half indian, half African American, cold-blooded murderer of innocent, white women and children, on the front page of the paper. Was Freeman the racial embodiment of blowback for centuries of injustice, or a tragic, homicidal victim (like Wyatt) driven insane by the brutal system?      

   After the Wyatt trial Henry Seward had gone back to Florida, New York to help his father Doc. Seward with the sale of some real estate. Two weeks before the Van Nest murders, on Thursday Feb. 24, 1846 Seward wrote a letter to his daughter Francine back in Auburn. “My father is as well as usual, but he is very infirm. The school [The Seward Academy} flourishes, to the great satisfaction of all parties. This is the day of sale of the real estate. It is cold and clear with a bright sky.”

    On his way back to Auburn, on March 14th Henry read of the Van Nest murders in the Albany papers. A few days later, still in Albany, Henry received a letter from his wife.

“The occurrence of that fearful murder has made me feel very much alone with the little ones.” Frances Seward wrote, “You have, of course, read all that the newspapers can tell about the frightful affair; nothing else has been thought or talked of here for a week….I cannot conceive it possible for a human being to commit a crime so awful without a strong motive, either real or imaginary….Bill Freeman is a miserable, half-witted negro, but recently emancipated from the State-prison and did not know by sight the family he has murdered….He manifests no remorse or fear of punishment…I believe he must have been impelled by some motive not yet revealed…I trust in the mercy of God that I shall never again be witness to such an out burst of the spirit of vengeance as I saw while they were carrying the murderer past our door.”   

     The fallout from the Wyatt mistrial made Seward a pariah in the small community of Auburn. And then the Van Nest family was murdered. “The public mind, unbalanced by the second and more horrible crime,” Seward admitted in his autobiography, “was no longer able to reason impartially about either criminal. Instead of the doubt about Wyatt’s mental condition, reflected in the verdict of February jury, there was now an almost universal belief that he was sane, and his offense willful, wicked, and deliberate.”

    Allowing Wyatt to escape the noose, which in turn poisoned the well for Freeman, was an obstacle Seward and his team would have to overcome from the start. The Wyatt trial represented the murder of prison inmate, a man juries usually don’t care too much about. The first hung jury was surprising. There would be a re-trial, but not until Freeman was tried in the same courtroom. The Freeman case was much more volatile, and to many a cut and dry incident of unconscionable, murderous insanity. Nonetheless, most felt Bill should hang….immediately! Many thought hanging was too good for the “half-witted negro.” They blamed William Henry Seward for even bringing up the question of sanity in the Wyatt trial and would not entertain it again, even though all the evidence pointed to that being the only defense. But, that’s exactly what would happen. The defense would be the same as in Wyatt—insanity. The mind had a mouth.