The US government paid indemnities to Italy for lynched Italian citizens.

Evidence

BACK TO NOTE REFERENCE 46 Alan G. Gauthreaux, “An Inhospitable Land: Anti-Italian Sentiment and Violence in Louisiana, 1891–1924,” Journal of the Louisiana Historical Association 51, no. 1 (2010): 50–51. On March 15, 1891, the US secretary of state, James G. Blaine, repeatedly told Italian ambassador Fava that “the federal government would eventually approve a request of indemnity.” — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations, 717

Secretary Olney told Fava that a grand jury had been assembled to investigate the matter and was “unable to ascertain the offenders.” He claimed there was no proof that the victims were Italian citizens and therefore the United States did not owe reparations for their murders. Italy refused to back down. Ultimately, the Italian government was able to prove that the three victims had been Italian subjects at the time of their deaths and that their families were entitled to an indemnity from the US government. And that is how for a second time the federal government compensated Italy to the tune of 18,000 (almost 675,000 today) for the lynching of its citizens—$6,000 to each of the victims’ Italian families. — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations, 133

Categorization

• XREF: This is one of Brown’s precedent examples for US reparations to foreign nationals, a key comparison point against the refusal to pay African Americans. — connects to: Italian immigrants were lynched for alleged crimes without legal process. — John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of…, 538; The US pledged indemnity to Italy for the lynching of Italians. — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations: How Building a…, 717; The federal government compensated Italy for lynchings of its citizens on three separate occasions — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations: How Building a…, 127
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations: How Building a…, 717; Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations: How Building a…, 133