I recall when "Lynching" meant unlawfully hanging someone to death

By gosh, it still does!

Liberty Counsel attacks anti-Lynching bill.

Not to mention that the word is properly capitalized, being derived from a proper name.

Evidently, in law at least, words mean what the lawmakers say them mean.

And that can be quite different from what they mean in plain English.

Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ), Kamala Harris (D-CA), and Tim Scott (R-SC) — the Senate’s three black members — introduced the Senate’s anti-lynching bill in June. 

Their bill was a companion to one filed in the House earlier that month by Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL). Rush reintroduced the House’s version of the bill at the beginning of this year.

By classifying lynching and attempted lynching as a federal hate crime, the bill enables judges to impose additional sentencing on top of any other charges when determining the punishment for those convicted of such crimes. 

The legislation specifically defines lynchingas acts that “willfully cause bodily injury to any other person because of the actual or perceived race, color, religion, or national origin,” or acts that cause injury due to a person’s actual or perceived “gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.”