Mob Violence Appeal on Southern States

In general, you can go and spend months wandering around southern states....discussing hundreds of topics (weather, mosquits, tornados, pool-halls, septic tanks, NCAA football, corruption, taxation, Baptist revivals, lightning strikes, alcohol abuse, meth, trailer parks, etc)....but when you come to the topic of mob violence, there's generally going to be just two observations by most southerners.

First, the 'we-don't-do-that-kind-of-thing-around-here' attitude will be laid out.  Maybe you could dig up some great history from the 1840s, 1860s, and even up to the 1920s.  But things have simmered down and it's hard to get folks to the level of thinking....yeah, mob violence is a fine thing. 

Second, the same people will tell you....once you start a mob, there's is no clear steering-wheel to the act, and you just might come to greatly regret the mob you created.   Yes, they might actually burn down some court-house....but they go and also burn down a gambling establishment, a church, a pool-hall, or any of a dozen public facilities.

So you discover that mob violence just doesn't make folks that happy and they tend to see it as a bunch of thugs.  Associating this to politics?  Well....that really starts to burn up public perception. 

But these people are the types to say if there's some bunch of thugs beating up on poor people....let's get the shotguns and go establish authority.  So even if the cops were supposed to just let thugs run around and make some theatrical action for cameras.....the southern folks would get into the middle and likely hurt, maim, or accidentally kill a few mob folks.

All of this....I think....makes for a bad publicity scene for Democrats in states like Alabama or Tennessee.  If this were a national strategy idea?  It just seems like you'd take into consideration the amount of damage you are creating elsewhere.