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mass demonstrations and the other weapons of economic and social disputes, Congress attacked the problem on a broad front. In implementing its objective, however, it followed established lines of authority. It regulated restaurants and gas stations which obtain a significant portion of the goods they sell from other States, on two grounds. First, racial disputes, like labor disputes, discourage patronage and interfere with business; they thereby interfere with and reduce purchases-for-resale from other States. Second, the refusal of such retail establishments to serve Negro consumers, like a group boycott forbidden by the Sherman Act, imposes a wholly arbitrary limitation on the market by eliminating an important source of potential demand for goods from other States. Similar principles justify the prohibition of discrimination by theaters and other places exhibiting motion pictures, athletic events, or other forms of live entertainment.

The basis for forbidding racial discrimination by hotels and motels, such as that operated by appellant, is equally clear. The testimony before Congress. shows that the unavailability to Negroes of adequate places of lodging interferes significantly with interstate travel. Negroes are required to travel excessive distances between places of lodging, are subjected to the humiliation of frequent rebuffs, are often forced to travel circuitous routes to find lodging, and must frequently accept inferior accommodations. The predictable result-a significant deterrence of interstate travel by Negroes-has in fact occurred.

The power of Congress, under the commerce clause, to remove these burdens and alleviate these hardships is clearly established. Racial discrimination by interstate motor, rail, and air carriers has been forbidden for years. The prohibition extends not only to the carriers themselves but to the terminal facilities they use, e.g., a terminal restaurant. The power of Congress is clear, for, as this Court said in Boynton v. Virginia, 364 U.S. 454, 463, interstate travelers "have to eat" and a terminal restaurant exists for the very purpose of serving the need of intrastate and interstate travelers. Similarly, interstate travelers have to sleep, and hotels and motels are devoted to serving this need of both local and interstate travelers. Indeed, because of the burden which a lack of hotel accommodations imposes on interstate travel, the National Labor Relations Board has frequently assumed jurisdiction (with the Court's explicit approval) over the labor relations of hotels. The effect on travel of a denial of lodging accommodations to Negroes is, of course, at least as significant, certain, and direct as is the effect on travel of an unfair labor practice engaged in by a hotel.

Finally, elimination of the burden on interstate travel resulting from a refusal to furnish equal lodging accommodations to Negroes requires and justifies a prohibition of discrimination against all Negroes, whether they are engaged in intrastate or interstate travel. Congress acted well within its prerogatives in deciding that Negro interstate travelers should not

be subjected either to the risk of being unable to prove their "interstate status" or to the burden of carrying some form of proof; either alternative interferes with interstate travel. More basically, requiring Negroes to prove their "interstate status," while whites evidently were not subjected to that requirement, would impose upon Negro travelers the very discrimination that the Act was intended to prevent.

2. Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 does not violate appellant's rights under the Fifth Amendment. The "due process" clause grants no immunity from reasonable regulations of business and commercial activity. Ferguson v. Skrupa, 372 U.S. 726. Both the existence of the common law innkeeper's obligation and this Court's decisions upholding local anti-discrimination laws testify to the reasonableness of the regulation of hotels and motels imposed in this case. See, District of Columbia v. John R. Thompson Co., 346 U.S. 100. Nor was appellant's property taken without just compensation. Such consequential damage as a person may suffer from valid regulation of a business does not constitute a "taking" within the meaning of the Fifth Amendment. United States v. Central Eureka Mining Co., 357 U.S. 155.

3. Appellant corporation is not subjected to involuntary servitude in violation of the Thirteenth Amendment. A requirement of furnishing equal treatment to Negroes as a condition of operating a particular business is not a requirement "akin to African slavery." Butler v. Perry, 240 U.S. 328, 332. The present statute was preceded by public accom

modation laws in thirty States and the District of Columbia (see District of Columbia v. John R. Thompson Co., supra) and these in turn merely extend the common-law innkeeper rule. Certainly the framers of the Thirteenth Amendment, who hoped to remove the disabilities imposed on Negroes, did not intend either to invalidate the innkeeper rule or place discrimination in places of public accommodation be yond the reach of both federal and State law.

ARGUMENT

INTRODUCTION

Section 201(a) of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 provides

All persons shall be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, and accommodations of any place of public accommodation * * *, without discrimination or segregation on the ground of race, color, religion, or national origin.

Section 201(b) lists four kinds of business establishment each of which is defined as a place of public accommodation, within the meaning of Section 201(a) if either of two bases of coverage is satisfied, viz

if its operations affect commerce, or if discrimination or segregation by it is supported by State action.

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Section 201 (c) defines the meaning of the phrase "affect commerce, as applied to each kind of establishment listed in Section 201(b). The first is "any

inn, hotel, motel, or other establishment which pro

997

vides lodging to transient guests.' Such establishments are deemed per se to affect commerce. Restaurants, cafeterias, lunchrooms and similar facilities, and also gasoline stations, make up the second class. They are declared to affect interstate commerce within the meaning of Title II if they serve interstate travelers or if a substantial portion of the food which they serve or products which they sell "has moved in commerce." The third class-motion picture houses and other places of exhibition—are deemed to affect commerce if the films or persons providing the entertainment move in interstate commerce. The fourth class is made up of establishments which are an integral part of any of the foregoing places of public accommodation.

Section 201(d) defines the meaning of "supported by State action."

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The statute, if constitutional, is admittedly applicable to appellant's place of business under the first ground of coverage. It is a "motel" which provides lodging to transient guests, and it does not fall within the only relevant exception. It is also undisputed that appellant did in fact refuse to provide lodging to Negroes on account of their race and color, and intends to continue the discrimination in the absence of a court order. The sole question here, is the constitutionality of the statute, which appellant claims.

'There is an exception for "an establishment located within a building which contains not more than five rooms for rent or hire and which is actually occupied by the proprietor of such establishment as his residence." Section 201(b)(1).

8 Note 7, supra.

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