Thirty or forty years ago Booker T. Washington and Robert Moton would have resented such a question and would have angrily shouted the answer, "Yes; we have racial pride." And history of the South shows that white people of that area applauded and encouraged the Negroes' awakened determination to lift the standards of his race. But the NAACP has been busy. They have destroyed that pride of race. They want amalgamation and mongrelization.

So, why not take the next step? Why not bring to the attention of all 3 branches of Government the fact that miscegenation laws on the statute books of 28 States are definitely in violation of integration? Again thanking you for the opportunity to express my opposition to this array of civil-rights bills, I conclude my statement with brief comment upon S. 907.

The authors admit that "This act may be cited as the 'Omnibus' Human Rights Act of 1955."

Webster's Dictionary puts the word "omnibus" in the category of slang. So, it seems charitable to dignify S. 907 as the "Potpourri Human Rights Act." The same dictionary defines "potpourri" as a "confused collection; a miscellaneous mixture."

S. 907 is an unpalatable dish resulting from a scrambling of a half dozen separate bills on civil rights. It seeks to establish a Commission on Civil Rights, also to provide a Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice in which an additional Assistant Attorney General shall be appointed by the President; it proposes to set up a Joint Committee on Civil Rights; it provides punishment where two or more persons go upon the highway in disguise; it seeks to deprive every enforcement officer of human instincts by forcing him to treat all accused persons precisely the same way, lest said official subject himself to prosecution and suit for damages in a United States district court. This proposed potpourri law makes it a crime for you and for me to exert efforts in behalf of a candidate for any Federal office and in violation thereof subjects us to criminal prosecution and alsɔ to civil action for damages in any United States district court.

This potpourri law seeks to implement recent decisions of the United States Court with reference to segregation, although in those decisions precedent and stare decisis were brushed aside in favor of books on social science. Prior decisions under which we had lived for almost a century were ignored in favor of psychological and psychiatric abstractions.

A certain section of the proposed potpourri law is no doubt a surprise to Abraham Lincoln who must have thought his proclamation forever ended slavery. But we must now conclude that a civil-rights law has been needed all these past 90 years, for if S. 907 is enacted a person cannot be "held in or sold into involuntary servitude, or held as a slave.”

Gentlemen, you'd better get rid of your slaves.

History speaks for itself. Have we no ears for the past?

Free competitive enterprise and local self-government have made this Nation strong. So, why should we destroy either?

But the attempt is being made. The pattern of attack is clear. That some powerful force is operating in this country to undermine our system of economy and our system of local self-government is as obvious as a hunk of mud on a snowbank.

This cannonade of civil-rights bills is designed for a certain specific target. What is the target? The South is the target. Why? Because the South is now and has always been the stronghold for local selfgovernment for States rights.

Many years ago when the United States Supreme Court announced the doctrine of "separate but equal" facilities for Negroes, the South, although called the No. 1 economic problem of the Nation, made heroic effort to comply.

Were we commended for this? Not at all. Abuse of us continued on the floors of Congress, the press, and radio and television kept on calling us ugly names.

The Negro has always been an economic burden to the South, and now you would make of him a social problem.

With those of us who don't belong to minority groups, pressure groups, or any other sort of groups, there is a growing sentiment that it is time for other regions of the Nation to share the burden. We are ready to say: "We've done the best we could; now, you take over."

In the frantic effort to enact a conglomerate mess of civil-rights laws, why not give thought to a fair, a just, and liberal way to disperse the Negro population throughout the Nation?

If you men of the East, North, and West are so compassionate for the Negro, why not take him off our tired backs and draw him to your own palpitating bosom?

Mr. YOUNG. Mr. Chairman, Senator Lehman, of New York, has submitted a statement and wishes it printed in the hearings.

Senator EASTLAND. Senator Lehman's statement will be accepted and printed in the record at this time.

(The prepared statement of Herbert H. Lehman, a United States Senator from the State of New York, is as follows:)

PREPARED TESTIMONY OF SENATOR HERBERT H. LEHMAN BEFORE SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE ON PENDING CIVIL RIGHTS BILL

Mr. Chairman, I do not suppose I need supply this committee with any special affirmation of my deep interest in civil rights legislation. I will assume that all the members of this committee are aware of my long-time advocacy of congressional action to secure and guarantee to each American citizen the rights each citizen is supposed to enjoy under the Constitution, but which are denied to some, in some States, on the basis of race or color.

I have been introducing and arguing for civil rights legislation ever since I have been a Member of the Senate and for many, many years before that. I am a cosponsor of some of the measures now pending before this committee. I am the primary sponsor of one of these bills, S. 1089, whose House counterpart, H. R. 5205, has been favorably recommended to this committee by its own Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights.

These hearings before your full committee have been going on for some time now, a very long time. I count it a privilege to be able to appear before you and to have my views included in the record which will constitute, I trust, the basis for early-indeed, I hope immediate-recommendations to the Senate.

I am sure you are aware, Mr. Chairman, that we are in the closing weeks of this session and of this Congress. There is not much more time.

A moment ago I said that for many years I have been advocating congressional action on civil rights legislation. I emphasize the word "action." It would be a pity-and a travesty on the legislative process-if these hearings you have been holding were to be so prolonged as to make action impossible.

I trust that this distinguished committee will not permit its hearing processes to be used as a means of denying the Senate the right to consider and act on some of the civil rights bills pending before you. Some of my constituents are already complaining that this committee is itself conducting a filibuster on this legislation.

I hope this committee will belie this complaint and proceed to act within further delay.

Although we do not have much time left in this session, there is still enough time for the Senate to consider, at whatever length is desired, appropriate civil rights legislation. I am not a member of this committee, but as a Member of the Senate whose agent this committee is, I ask that you do not deny the Senate a chance to legislate on this subject.

These hearings, whose record I am eager to read, have undoubtedly resulted in the submission of much useful information and many value views. Up to a point these hearings have provided a great public service. Beyond a point, in my judgment the prolongation of these hearings would constitute a threat to the democratic process in the Senate.

I am aware that the administration bears a considerable share of the responsibility for the delay in bringing this legislation on this subject before the Senate. It was April of this year-the fourth year of this administration-before the administration submitted its recommendations.

Already by that time your Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights had acted and reported some civil rights bills, with all of whose purposes I agree. One of the bills your subcommittee reported is the House companion measure to a bill I introduced and have advocated for a number of years, H. R. 5205, and S. 1089, a proposal to make it a Federal offense to assault, without provocation, a member of the United States armed services while on duty.

As I have said and as this committee knows, its Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights reported a number of civil rights bills some time before the administration even submitted its recommendations. Those bills are pending before this committee, along with the administration bills. Some of the bills reported out by the Hennings subcommittee have been pending here for 2 years and were considered in previous Congresses by the Judiciary Committee. Some were reported out in previous Congresses.

So today this committee has before it the bills already reported by the Hennings subcommittee, plus those recently introduced at the instance of the administration.

Some of the administration bills contain provisions which duplicate those in bills already reported. Some of the administration proposals are weaker in some respects than some of the provisions already approved by the Hennings subcommittee.

But, Mr. Chairman, I am not interested in the sponsorship of these bills, not even my own. I am not concerned over whether the bills to be acted upon are administration bills or bills introduced by Democrats. I hope there will be no deadlock based on any such considerations.

I am interested in seeing action taken.

I will vote for any civil rights bills-and I don't care who introduced them or who will get the credit for them-that do the job, that protect the unprotected in the enjoyment of their constitutional rights * * * that protect the physical security and the political equality of our citizens, and which improve the machinery of government established to help achieve these purposes.

The administration may have had political motives in making its civil rights recommendation in this year of 1956, in the month of April. The administration wanted to get the credit for making these recommendations without running the danger of having the legislation enacted.

But I am willing to give the administration all the political credit it can gather and put my shoulder to the wheel, even the administration's wheel, if it will result in the passage of some significant and meaningful civil rights legislation. In so speaking, Mr. Chairman, I speak for the overwhelming majority of the 16 million people of New York State. They want action on civil rights legislation, action at this session. They want to see the constitutional rights of all our citizens protected, in every part of our country. They want a comprehensive program of legislation passed-antilynch, antipoll tax, protection of the right to vote, FEPC, a civil rights section in the Justice Department, antidiscrimination in interstate travel-and others including some bills which are not before this committee at all.

But of the bills pending before this committee at this time, we of New York will be content with a minimum program, too-an antilynch bill, an antiviolence bill, and legislation protecting the right to vote, plus provisions for enforcement of these and other constitutional rights. We shall fight for other undertakings now pending before other committees including, and above all, an antisegregation proviso on any general school-aid bill that is considered for enactment.

I know that whenever we ask for civil rights legislation with teeth in it-for legislation with sanctions and enforcement powers-the cry is heard that this is a dangerous thing; that it is an invasion of the police powers of the States, and that we propose to extend the long arm of the Federal Government into local affairs.

Mr. Chairman, we seem to have no difficulty in writing enforcement provisions into Federal statutes which make it a crime to steal automobiles, or peddle narcotics, or kidnap somebody. Why shouldn't it be a Federal crime to deprive a man of his constitutional rights, to kidnap his precious right to vote, and his vital right to be secure in his person and to enjoy equal treatment before the law and in access to public facilities?

The rights and privileges guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States are the very core of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, as defined in the Declaration of Independence. In depriving any man, or any group of men, of these rights, or any of them, we are depriving that man, and these men, of the fundamentals for which our forefathers fought and which are the very essence of our nationhood.

Explicitly forbidden in the Constitution is the denial of any of these rights— any of them—on the basis of race, creed, color, or previous condition of servitude. Admittedly, it is a difficult task fr the Federal Government, in our FederalState system, to enact laws which will assure to every citizen these rights which are assured to him in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Yet, as difficult as it is, it is not less imperative that we should do so. It is one of the legislative imperatives of this year, 1956—and we are, already, very long overdue to enact appropriate legislation and to take all the steps that are necessary to assure these rights to all our citizens and to eliminate the criterion of race, color, or creed as a basis for discrimination against some of our citizens in the enjoyment of these rights.

I am aware that we have made progress over the past 30 or 40 years, and the Negro has made progress. He has broken down some of the walls which formerly constricted his horizons and has obtained some of the rights which were formerly denied him. But the progress he has made, as great as it has been, is very little compared to the progress which remains to be made.

You will note that I have said that the Negro has made progress. Much of the progress has been made by virtue of the efforts of Negroes themselves, in the face of the most devastating handicaps. Government has helped, to some extent, but Government has responded for the most part to the pressures exerted by Negroes themselves.

It is time now for Government, and specifically for the Congress, to recognize the inevitability of the forward movement that has been taking place and that will continue to take place.

It is a fact that Congress has not enacted a single piece of civil-rights legislation for 75 years. I think this is a shameful circumstance. I hope this Congress is going to bring to an end this legislative famine in the field of civil rights.

But progress has been made during the last two decades, progress which is a tribute to our democratic system. The fact that there has been progress shows what can be accomplished in the face of the most insuperable odds, and the most difficult obstacles. I think it is time that we in Congress take a hand in this situation-a situation in our country which is the object of all eyes throughout the world.

It is time for the Congress to act. I do not think it is any argument against congressional action to say that progress has been made without congressional action. Progress has been made despite us. Congress has been one of the obstacles to progress.

Let us now move with the tide, and give leadership to the movement, rather than to try perpetually, like old King Conute, to halt the tide with our determined inaction.

I intend to make reference in the course of these remarks to the specific bills before us, but, first, I would like to dispose briefly of a recurring argument which is made whenever the subject of civil-rights legislation comes up-the argument that the protection of civil rights against discriminatory treatment is not a proper field for legislation.

I must say, with all due deference to those who have, through the years made this argument, that it is utter nonsense. It is not only nonsense, it is contrary to fact and experience. There is actually as much legislation on the statute books of the several States and localities on the subject of civil rights as there

is on any other subject under the sun. A survey of statutory law in the various States on the subject of what we might call civil rights shows that every State in the Union, with one exception, has enacted legislation on this subject.

Some of it is good legislation; some of it is bad legislation. Some of it guarantees and assures civil rights: some of it denies and deprives certain minorities of their civil rights. The number of State statutes and local ordinances on this subject would fill many volumes. The only State which does not have legislation regulating relationships between various racial and religious groups of citizens is Vermont.

The specific subject matter of these State and local laws is extremely varied. It covers the conduct of Negro and white citizens in places of public accommodation, in public and private schools, in public housing, in the National Guard and other military services, in the conduct of insurance companies, transportation facilities, public hospitals, penal institutions, paupers' homes, mines, manufacturing establishments, in the keeping of public records and the holy bonds of matrimony.

A historical study of these laws indicates that some 40 of the 48 States are moving slowly toward the day when men and women will be protected against restriction of their action on the basis of race, color, or creed. In the other eight States there is, I believe, no perceptible advance in this direction. Quite the contrary.

In addition to these State laws, there are Federal statutes, enacted some 75 years ago, relating to the protection of civil rights. These Federal statutes have proven to be effective in only a very limited degree.

So the argument that civil rights is not an appropriate area for legislative action seems to me to be not only weak, but completely unsupported by fact and experience.

There is a related and analogous argument against civil-rights legislation, namely, that you can't legislate against prejudice.

This argument is usually advanced in connection with the thesis that prejudice and discrimination can only be overcome by education and that we should concentrate on the educational approach.

I am sure that some of those who advance this argument are sincere. Some who make it are less than sincere, and plead this aphorism as an excuse for inaction, or at least for toothless action.

Well, Mr. Chairman, I do not propose that we legislate against prejudice. Prejudice is an evil of the spirit. It is acquired from the environment, in the home, and in the school. It can be overcome only by experience or revelation. No, Mr. President, I do not propose that we legislate against prejudice. I propose that we legislate against discriminatory practices, against action based on prejudice, which is quite another thing. A man can be prejudiced against his mother-in-law or against mothers-in-law, in general. There is nothing to be done about that. But if a man sets out to beat his mother-in-law, or all mothersin-law, that is against the law.

The fact is that in a growing number of States, legislation has been enacted against prejudice. In all too large a number of States and localities, there is a plethora of legislation enforcing and supporting prejudice, giving teeth and legal sanction to prejudice. Such latter legislation must be set aside. Such legislation is, in my judgment, unconstitutional. Such legislation denies the spirit and the meaning of our Constitution and our Bill of Rights, and the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments.

I turn now to the proposed legislation before this committee.

Mr. Chairman, the several bills being considered by your committee can be broken down into general groupings. Some of them are, I believe, more important in the present situation than others.

There are three bills pending before you reflecting the same proposal to create a Federal Commission to study, conduct investigations, and report on the status of civil rights in our Nation today. I myself do not give this proposal a top priority at this late stage of the congressional session.

Civil rights have been extensively studied in previous years by many congressional committees, including this one, by many private groups, and by the President's Committee on Civil Rights in 1947. All of this study material is available.

In my opinion, the creation of a study commission at this time, unless accompanied by other more positive and constructive legislative action, would be a weak excuse for a legislative program.

I must point out that if the administration is sincerely interested in creating such a commission-and it has established much less important study commis