also provides that in case of a death as the result of mob violence, the county or municipality shall be penalized in the sum of $10,000 for the use of the family or dependents of the victim. It is clear that those provisions are designed to discourage and prevent lynching as a whole and, therefore, they come within the terms of the amendment which gives this Congress the power to pass appropriate legislation to enforce the equal protection of the laws.

I should like to devote my attention briefly to the point that has been raised again and again about section 5, which fixes a fine of $10.000 on the county where a lynching occurs. I believe that is important. As Professor Lleyellyn said. "It is the core of the bill." I think it is the preventive that is more likely to discourage lynching, because it touches the pocketbook.

Senator MCCARRAN. Do you think lynching is ever tolerated by a community?

Mr. STOCKTON. Yes.

Senator MCCARRAN. Do you know, as a matter of fact, that mobs are organized in an hour or two, and the members of the community have no knowledge of it? How can a community stop an act of that kind?

Mr. STOCKTON. I think lynching is more frequent in communities where public opinion is in favor than where public opinion does not sanction it. I think the fact that it springs up within an hour is not the whole story. It goes back to the thought that lynching is, after all, a very useful method of keeping other races in order.

Senator MCCARRAN. What is the history of lynching prior to the Emancipation?

Mr. STOCKTON. I think it has been stated before you. Prior to that, I understand, it was merely a matter of border difficulties. In other words, it was something akin to the California vigilantes. It was an incident of violations of the moral law, in places where there was no established law and order.

Senator MCCARRAN. I had reference to the lynching of colored people. Is there any history of lynching of colored people before the Civil War? I have never looked into it.

Mr. STOCKTON. I have done so, and my understanding is that there was lynching of colored people before the Civil War, but that it was probably more evenly divided between the races at that time, and that there were many instances of the lynching of white people, although the lynching of colored people undoubtedly predominated. I think that before the Civil War it was more a feature of the unsettled country, but since that time it results from a complexity of causes, some of which Professor Chadbourn has pointed out.

Senator MCCARRAN. My first question may be rather abrupt, but I had this thought in mind: Suppose that you lived in a community where the lynching took place, and the responsible people of the community knew nothing about the event until it was all over. We propose by this legislation to impose a penalty on those people who knew nothing about it, and who were willing, ready and able to see the law carried out in its proper channels. Is that the idea you have in mind as to what should be done?

Mr. STOCKTON. Yes. I would be willing to take my share of the taxpayers' burden on that. Since the California lynching I have talked to editors of metropolitan New York newspapers and business

Senator DIETERICH. Yes. Let me say further for this record that I am perhaps doing more in a constructive way to try to get a law through than you are by stubbornly holding to something that might be controversial. The idea is to get a law that will stop the atrocious lynchings that have been committed, and not a law that will penalize some innocent community, the taxpayers of which were in no way responsible for the crime. If you think it is better to leave that in, of course, that is your judgment.

Mr. STOCKTON. The last thing I want to do, Senator, is to be opinionated on a thing of so much importance as this. I would only submit to your own knowledge and experience this question, which I think is very important, as to whether this cannot be kept in this form. The minute you limit it to lynching of people taken from the authorities, you rule out about 25 percent of the lynchings. Senator DIETERICH. But the Illinois law was not passed with reference to any race troubles. It was placed upon the statute books to prevent corporations from suffering losses or damage to property by reason of strikes and such as that. Because it is the law of Illinois, I am not necessarily in sympathy with that kind of a law. I do not think any innocent community or officers should be penalized for something they were unable to prevent.

Mr. STOCKTON. I read the opinion of the court because it appeared, sir, that the Supreme Court of Illinois found no difficulty in upholding the law. It was applied in the case of two parties, one Negro and one white, who were taken from the officers and lynched. And may I suggest that, with reference to this $10.000 provision, one exactly identical with it was included in the Dyer bill, which in 1922 passed the House of Representatives by a large majority, and which was prevented by filibuster from passage in the Senate. It seems to me there was at that time no feeling in the House of Representatives that there was any injustice in that provision; that the Supreme Court of Illinois felt that it was a reasonable provision: that lynching is a crime that depends for its existence upon public opinion; and that nothing will have a greater effect upon changing public opinion than to have it pay for its mistakes.

Senator VAN NUYS. There are several witnesses who cannot be heard. I warned witnesses there were 25 people to be heard and they should curtail their statements. They have not done so. Tomorrow I will do it for them. We have 10 minutes left. The committee must adjourn at 5 o'clock. The members of the committee have not had lunch, and I hope you appreciate their patience. We have 10 minutes to hear Mr. Clarence Pickett and Mr. Broadus Mitchell.

STATEMENT OF CLARENCE E. PICKETT. PHILADELPHIA, PA., REPRESENTING THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS

Senator VAN NUYS. I now call upen Mr. Clarence Picked. Secretary of the Ameri an Friendly Service Committee of Philadelphia, representing the Society of Friends.

Senator MCCARRAN. Where do yon reside!

Mr. PICKETT. Philadelpiera.

Senator VAN NUYS. You may proved.

Mr. PICKETT. I want to make only one point which has come to my mind in going over the things that have to do with the atrocity of lynching, and I have nothing to contribute to the legal side.

I have had occasion recently to be impressed with the increasing prestige which actions of the Federal Government have on our public opinion, especially in matters of race and questions of segregation, and so on. The attitude that the Federal Government takes has an influence, I think, much beyond what we usually attribute to it, and I am sure this will increase when there comes a time when we do not think in State terms or State boundaries, but of river boundaries or regional terms, or even in Federal terms.

I feel very clearly convinced that the action which is now requested by this bill of Congress is important, not primarily because it is going to punish some county because it has a lynching, not because it seems to be a reflection on any State in which lynchings have occurred, but because it marks the stamp of distinct disapproval of the Federal Government on a practice which is a practice in the United States and not in any particular section of the United States. I come from the North, but when there is a lynching in the United States it spreads its infection to the North in the same way it does in the community where it is generated.

I think we were all impressed with the reaction to the support for lynching given by the Governor of California. I think it will have a great influence upon the sentiment in the country generally if Congress takes the attitude that the Federal Government places the stamp of disapproval on this great social issue, will have a great influence in the way of restraining a community.

I can see the point that was just made, that it is not fair to tax the good citizens for the things which the bad citizens do; but it would seem to me that part of the bill is of primary importance as an announcement that the Senate and House of Representatives have taken the stand which this bill requires them to take, in case it is enacted into law, which I think will have an extremely effective restraining influence on the whole of our public opinion. From that point of view and its restraining effect by putting the stamp of approval on legal methods of procedure as against mob violence or illegal methods of procedure, I believe we are very much inclined to underestimate the significance of this measure.

I am a member of the Society of Friends, and I like to use all other methods of restraint that are possible rather than coercion. I think here is a chance to use a method which, I believe, will have a psychological effect and which will be a tremendous influence. I hope very much that this side of the effect of this action will not escape our attention.

Senator DIETERICH. May I ask you a question?

Mr. PICKETT. Yes, sir.

Senator DIETERICH. You think if the Government would place its stamp of disapproval upon lynching it would have a tremendous effect?

Mr. PICKETT. Yes, sir.

Senator DIETERICH. And that would be true even though we would take out all of section 5. I am not asking you to answer that. But if a bill could not pass the Congress without some modification of

that section, it would be better to have it with some modification than not to have the bill passed?

Mr. PICKETT. I should think so. I believe there will be a wonderful effect from the stamp of disapproval and the attitude suggested by the bill.

Mr. Chairman, I could say much more, but I do not want to take the time from my friend, Broadus Mitchell.

STATEMENT OF BROADUS MITCHELL, BALTIMORE, MD., REPRESENTING THE LEAGUE FOR INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY

Senator VAN Nurs. The next proponent is Broadus Mitchell, representing the League for Industrial Democracy; instructor in political economy at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.; member of the executive committee of the American Economic Association.

Mr. MITCHELL. Mr. Chairman, I would like to touch first on one point as to which I think Senator Dieterich has very much apprehension. It has several times been brought out by him that the bill is directed against officers who neglect to do their duty and not against members of the mob. The copy of the bill which has been furnished to me says in section 4:

The district court of the judicial district wherein the person is injured or put to death by a mob or riotous assemblage shall have jurisdiction to try and to punish, in accordance with the laws of the State where the injury is inflicted or the homicide is committed, any and all persons who participate therein.

Then it contains a provision that it shall first be shown that the officers had been negligent.

Senator DIETERICH. I understand that.

Mr. MITCHELL. I should like to tell you very briefly of our experience in Maryland. I am a citizen of Maryland, and I have made some observations regarding our two recent lynchings, one at Salisbury on the Eastern Shore, and one a few miles away at Princess Anne 18 months later.

We have found that the local officers did not want to do their duty. and the State officers were under constitutional disability and, I am constrained to say, have shown considerable indifference. The attorney general of the State named seven persons accused of the Princess Anne lynching and requested their indictment. The local authorities of the county in the last instance refused the request of the attorney general of the State to arrest these seven persons. Mr. Anderson, the assistant attorney general, told me that there is no question as to the guilt of these people; that his office can describe their movements before the mob action and during the assault of the mob at Princess Anne, so much so that he can make a graph representing the movements of each of these men, but they have been unable to secure the cooperation of the State's attorney in that county.

My State has been the head and front of the State rights movement in America in recent years. Our Governor has stood for the Maryland Free State idea. When it comes to a practical expression of that theory we are a total loss, and every conscientious resident of Maryland feels humiliated at our record in these past two lynchings.

I want to say one other thing. It has been suggested by Senators that the most intelligent and educated group in the community does

not approve of these lynchings. In the case of Maryland, a former Maryland Senator came out with a long letter in the Baltimore Sun, condoning the lynching at Salisbury.

The

Senator VAN NUYS. A former State senator of Maryland? Mr. MITCHELL. I believe he was a former State senator. former United States Senator was William Cabell Bruce. That reppresented a tremendous support to the criminal element, the ignorant element in our State. Those who conducted the lynchings are well aware of that sentiment. But I am sure that we are supported in our views by thousands of people of the State of Maryland who have no particular way of making their disapproval known.

Those of us who abhor lynching and are sure of the inability of the State of Maryland to deal with it ask for the interference of the Federal Government, after our break-down of the local administration of justice.

Senator VAN NUYS. Do you think that this bill under consideration will accomplish that end?

Mr. MITCHELL. I do.

Senator VAN NUYS. Do you have any suggestions or amendments to offer?

Mr. MITCHELL. No, sir. I agree with the testimony of one of the previous witnesses, in reference to the point raised by Senator Dieterich, that when the committee reaches the point of final consideration of the bill that and other matters will no doubt be subject to scrutiny.

Senator VAN NUYS. Thank you very much for your succinct and able statement.

The committee will now recess until 10:30 tomorrow morning. (Whereupon, at 5 p.m., a recess was taken until the following day, Wednesday, February 21, 1934, at 10:30 a.m.)