Mr. MARKLE. Of course, there you were dealing with a law that was morally not popular and I suppose it would be more difficult. But I think although psychologically increasing the penalty would increase the fear of violation, I do not think it would have as much of an effect as the certainty of prosecution and conviction. I think your point is well taken and I would say taht I substantially agree with you. However, it makes a crime seem much more serious when there is a larger penalty attached to it. It just has that psychological effect. And there is no law that says you must always find the maximum penalty when a man is convicted of a crime.

Under section 31 of title 18 of the United States Code, all citizens in the United States who are otherwise qualified by law to vote in any election either for Federal, State, or local office, are entitled to vote at all elections, without distinction because of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, notwithstanding the existence of any constitution, law, custom, usage, or regulation of any State or Territory to the contrary. Part II of title II of the proposed bill under consideration would amend this section for two purposes. First, it would extend the protection of the section to all those eligible by law to vote and would make the protection applicable to their right to qualify to vote. Secondly, it would specify that the right to qualify to vote, as well as the right to vote in every election, whether it be a general, special, or primary election, is a right protected by the Federal Constitution and laws under section 242 of title 18. What this amendment does is to recognize that one of the techniques used to deny the franchise to persons otherwise eligible, is to prevent them from qualifying to vote by preventing them from registering or establishing their residential qualifications or-where the poll tax is still a prerequisite to the right to vote--preventing them from paying their poll tax.

The last provision of part II of title II establishes two new sections. to be used in case of interference with a person's right to qualify to vote or to vote. This final section permits a civil suit to be brought against any person or persons violating the provisions of section 594 as amended, either for damages or for a court order enjoining the denial of the right to vote or to qualify to vote. The same section also permits the Attorney General of the United States to bring an action for an injunction against any officials denying any citizen his right to vote or to qualify to vote in accordance with the provisions of the foregoing sections. It is provided that both the Federal district courts and State and Territorial courts shall have concurrent jurisdiction over all civil proceedings either for damages or for preventive, declaratory, or other relief against violations of the first two sections of part II or title II.

The provisions of part II of title II of H. R. 4682 are based upon a recognition that, contrary to popular understanding, the voteless citizens, both colored and white, of the South, are not disfranchised on election day, but prior thereto. Vast numbers of persons who are qualified to vote under the election laws of the Southern States never show up at the polls because they have not been allowed to pass through the various preliminary steps leading to qualification as a voter in the primaries and general elections. They are not permitted to vote on election day because they are not registered to vote.

Mr. FRAZIER. Now, just what do you mean by that-not being able to qualify?

Mr. MARKLE. May I be permitted to read the rest of this page? I think that answers your question. Then I shall come back, if there is any question about it.

Mr. FRAZIER. Go ahead; I just wanted a clarification of what you

meant.

Mr. MARKLE. I think I cover that in the next two paragraphs.

Although there has been a considerable gain in recent years in the number of colored citizens in the Southern States who qualify to vote, it is still a fact that only a very small percentage of southern Negroes of voting age do so. A recent study, "Race and Suffrage in the South Since 1940," by Prof. Luther P. Jackson of Virginia State College, indicates that only 600,000 of the over 5,000,000 southern colored citizens of legal age qualified to vote in 1947. Most of the 600,000 are residents of the large southern cities. In many areas of the rural South, where 65 percent of the Negroes reside, it is well-nigh impossible for one of them to get past the first steps in the voting process.

Although the poll tax still represents a formidable obstacle to qualification in the seven Southern States which still maintain this archaic prerequisite for the exercise of the franchise, a far greater barrier to voting is the registration requirements used by local boards 10 disfranchise arbitrarily thousands of persons satisfying all the formal requirements of the election laws. In his study, Professor Jackson lists some of the discriminatory tactics which are practiced upon Negro applicants for registration:

1. Requiring one or more white character witnesses.

2. Severe application of property qualifications and requiring only Negro applicants to show property-tax receipts.

3. Strict enforcement of literacy tests against Negro applicants.

4. Putting unreasonable questions on the Constitution to Negro applicants.

5. Basing rejection of Negro registrants on alleged technical mistakes in filling out registration blanks.

6. Requiring Negro applicants to suffer long periods of waiting before the officials attend them.

7. Requiring Negro applicants to fill out their own blanks while those of whites are filled out for them by the officials.

8. Evasion-informing Negro applicants that registration cards have run out, that all members of the registration board are not present, that it is closing time, or that the applicant will be notified in due course.

9. Deliberate insults or threats by officials and/or hangers-on.

The correctness of Professor Jackson's observations has been verified by independent and impartial observers.

Under existing law practices such as those listed above can be attacked only by indictment and trial of election officials by the Federal Government long after the crime is committed or by civil suit brought by the parties injured. The first method is ineffective because southern white juries do not convict in such cases. The second is ineffective for the same reason and because it is so expensive to the plaintiff.

What part II of title II would do, in addition to strengthening existing remedies, would be to create a new remedy. The law would authorize the Attorney General to seek an injunction against every election official who put illegal barriers in the way of citizens qualifying under the Constitution and general laws to vote. Relief would be immediate. Persons violating such injunction orders would be subject to jailing for contempt of court. Such punishment could be

assessed without any resort to prejudiced juries. The resources of the Federal Government with respect to finances and personnel are such that an enforcement program could be undertaken of sufficient scope to be effective in the only way that counts, so as to give large numbers of previously disfranchised people access to the ballot boxes.

The third and last part of title II of H. R. 4682 contains two sections directed against discrimination or segregation in interstate transportation. The first section declares that all persons traveling within the jurisdiction of the United States shall be entitled to full and equal enjoyment of the accommodations of any public conveyance operated by a common carrier engaged in interstate or foreign commerce, subject only to conditions and regulations applicable to all, without discrimination or segregation because of race, color, religion, or national origin. The second paragraph of the section provides that any person who attempts to deny to any other person the full and equal enjoyment of any such accommodation because of race, color, religion, or national origin shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction be subject to a fine of up to $1,000 as to suit by the injured person for damages or for preventive or declaratory relief. The same paragraph provides that suits under this section may be brought in any district court of the United States without regard to the sum or value of the matter in controversy. The second section of part III makes it unlawful for any common carrier engaged in interstate or foreign commerce, or any employee thereof, to segregate or otherwise discriminate against passengers using any public conveyance or facility of such carrier because of the race, color, religion, or national origin of such passengers. The same section also provides that any such carrier or officer, agent, or employee of such a carrier who segregates or attempts to segregate such passengers because of their race, color, religion, or national origin shall be guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $1,000 and shall also be subject to civil suit for damages or for injunctive relief.

The provisions of part III of title II of H. R. 4682 are long overdue. It has long been a blot on the record of our democracy that our Federal Government permits the maintenance of Jim Crow practices in interstate commerce. Insofar as we continue such segregation we are going contra to all the basic tenets of our American system of democracy. When the Federal Government abdicated its control over interstate commerce and permitted the States to institute requirements of racial segregation in common carriers passing through their territory and engaged in interstate commerce, the Federal Government took upon itself the blame for this denial of human rights-for this establishment of classes of citizenship. In view of the Federal Government's international commitments as embodied in the Declaration of Human Rights and the Act of Chapultepec, it is necessary that the Government reassert its full control of interstate commerce, and use that control to bar racial segregation in the area of interstate and foreign commerce, and to lead those States which still require segregation forward on the road to democracy. So long as the Federal Government permits racial segregation in areas under its jurisdiction, it will find its campaign to extend democracy to backward areas throughout the world severely impeded. Ours is an international obligation. Let us not shirk it.

The report of the President's Committee on Civil Rights was an epoch-making document. Its recommendations are a blueprint for completing the noble democratic structure which our founding fathers envisaged. It is well that we should initiate as quickly as possible the passage of legislation intended to lift the recommendations of that report from the realm of theoretical discussion into the area of actual practice. Passage of H. R. 4682 will be one step forward toward that goal.

Mr. BYRNE. Are there any questions, gentlemen? If not, thank you very much, Mr. Markle.

Mr. Wilkins?

STATEMENT OF LESLIE PERRY, REPRESENTING THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE, NEW YORK, N. Y.

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Chairman, my name is Leslie Perry. Mr. Wilkins was unable at the last moment to get here and has asked me to read his statement.

Mr. BYRNE. Very well. You may proceed.

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People of which I have the honor to be acting executive secretary, wishes to express its appreciation for the opportunity to appear before you and testify in support of this legislation.

This association has a membership of 500,000 white and colored persons organized into 1,600 local units located in 45 States, the District of Columbia, and the Territory of Hawaii. It has been devoting all of its energies since its founding in 1909, to securing the civil rights of the Negro citizens of the United States, and in this effort, as the record will show, it has preserved and protected the civil rights of white Americans, as well.

It is natural, therefore, that our association should be in favor of the type of legislation your committee has under consideration. American citizenship, with its rights and privileges, is cherished beyond price because of the principles of freedom and equality of opportunity for the individual enunciated by the founders of the Nation.

It was obvious from the beginning that the mere enunciation of these principles would not suffice to secure to the individual citizen his rights under the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. As the Nation grew, our courts had to interpret the Constitution. Our legislatures had to enact laws.

There is no necessity, we are sure, to recite in lengthy detail here the reasons why it has become imperative that the Congress enact effective antilynching legislation such as the Douglas-Case bill, H. R. 795 and H. R. 155, and the Celler omnibus civil-rights measure, H. R. 4682. The issue of human rights has become the concern of the nations of the world. An important section of the Charter of the United Nations relates to these rights because it has come to be recognized that deprivation or abridgement of them on any wide scale in any nation creates a condition which could strain the relations of nations and perhaps lead to war.

Human rights also have become the concern of our own country, not only because of our position of leadership among the nations, but because of a desire on the part of increasing millions of our citizens that every American shall be protected in the enjoyment—insofar as law can protect and guarantee of the fundamental rights of men and citizens in a great democratic commonwealth.

The concrete expression of that concern was contained in the report of the President's Commission on Civil Rights, entitled "To Secure These Rights." Therein, as a result of public hearings, research and exhaustive study, it was recommended that legislation of the kind under consideration by this committee be enacted by the Congress.

The Negro minority, being the largest in the country, and the most easily discerned, has been the principle victim of inadequate legislation and indifferent enforcement of such laws as touched upon its condition. Negroes have been lynched with impunity and no law has operated to punish lynchers. We cite the March 1949 report of the Southern Regional Council, an organization of white and colored southerners with headquarters in Atlanta, Ga., which declared: "But it should be remembered that a lynching is only an extreme example of a general lack of regard for the individual. The climate which produces lynchings is one of daily insult, intimidation, and the lesser forms of violence, directed against a whole segment of the population." The council asserted in this report that a "pattern of violence" exists in the South. For a number of years the association has called for the enactment of a strong antilynching law. We reiterate that demand.

In what ways, aside from lynching, has this pattern of violence operated against Negro citizens? Well, in great numbers they have been denied access to the ballot box through trickery, intimidation, terror, and violence not short of murder. So recently at the last primary election in the State of Georgia in September 1948 Isaac Nixon of Toombs County, was shot down and killed in his home after the polls closed simply because he exercised that day his right to vote. In Montgomery County in the same State of Georgia, D. V. Carter, father of 10 children, was beaten up and driven from his home and the State because he advised his people to vote and carried some of them to the polls on election day. On numerous occasions prior to elections members of the notorious Ku Klux Klan have paraded through areas inhabited by Negroes with the avowed intention of preventing them from voting. Part 2 of title II of H. R. 4682, dealing with protection of the right to political participation, is therefore, an immediate need.

The Negro has suffered not only deprivation of the right to vote through violence, but deprivation of due process in cases involving life and liberty. Last November 20 Robert Mallard was set upon by a mob in Toombs County, Ga., and shot to death in his automobile in the presence of his wife and child. It was said that Mallard was not the "right kind of Negro" and was "too prosperous." No one has been punished for this crime.

Nineteen days ago at Irwinton, Ga., Caleb Hill was shot to death while in the custody of a law officer and on June 14 two men suspected of his murder were freed by a grand jury on the ground of insufficient evidence. That even so small a part of due process as the