act, have been too terrified to act, and when the State itself is looked upon as an enemy of the community for taking action against mobs and their leaders, our Federal Government should certainly be given the power to arrest, try, and punish. The possession of this power would in itself serve as a deterrent to the crime and would prevent the holding of mere mock trials in which leaders of mobs are speedily acquitted on entire lack of evidence or on evidence known to be false. Often the victims of lynching have been guiltless of the crime alleged and have been so proved after they had suffered torture and death, especially in the case of Negroes. Lynchings too have occurred for such slight offenses as stealing, planning to sue or even quarreling with a white man. These are the things which other nations learn about us and for which they hold the United States Government responsible.

The crime is alarmingly on the increase; two have occurred already in this year of 1934; it imperils law and order and cannot but have a disastrous effect upon the youth of our country when they realize that the Nation whose Constitution they have been taught to revere as professing to give to all of its citizens, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, refuses to protect some of its citizens against mob murder. Since the Federal Government has taken upon itself by the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments the duty of protecting the civil and political rights of its citizens, it is surely bound to enact legislation to enforce protection of their lives. About one fourth of the States have legislation against lynching, but are not all enforcing it, while the majority of the States do not even pretend to have a safeguard against it. We read in James Herman Chadbourn's book on Lynching and the Law that in his study of the matter he has been forced to the conclusion that a "prolynching sentiment is expressing itself even in the judicial circles." When such a state of affairs exists, civilization itself is at stake.

Members of our organization traveling in such remote places as old Bokhara, and Tashkent, in Indo-China and in all parts of Europe, have found that the good name of the United States has been doubted because of this total lack of Federal responsibility in lynchings. This fact, we believe, has a very real and unfortunate effect on our international relations. It often weakens the perfectly sincere and honest efforts on the part of our Government to throw its influence on the side of humanity and justice when racial outrages occur in other parts of the world. Since this question has been dealt with from various angles by others, I have confined myself to the effect of inadequate antilynching legislation upon our international relations.

Senator VAN NUYS. Thank you very much.

STATEMENT OF MARC CONNELLY, REPRESENTING THE WRITERS' LEAGUE AGAINST LYNCHING

Senator VAN NUYS. I understand that Mr. Marc Connelly is present at this time. He has been before another committee. Mr. Connelly represents the Writers' League Against Lynching, is a playwright, director of the Dramatists Guild of the Authors' League of America, and author of "Green Pastures."

42640-34-PT 1—6

Mr. CONNELLY. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I will speak very briefly. As an American author and as an amateur but earnest sociologist, I presume I may know something concerning race conflict. I have studied the Negro and studied his political and economic adventures at various times in various States of the South. I am the employer of a group of Negro artists whom I have studied for the last 4 years, whom I have worked with, whose point of view I have assimilated, whose Americanism I have appreciated, and I have never been free from the feeling of the constant threat over the heads of all the Negroes I ever met who lived in the South as to the future of Negroes, particularly when placed in the hands of the South where lynching has become such a common outrage.

As a writer and as an American I was one of a group of writers who formed themselves into a committee to do their best to stop lynching in this country. It seems to me that too many States have professed a sort of bankruptcy of integrity, and it is about time for the Federal Government to see that those States regain their ancient integrity and function as communities in which every resident has a sense of justice.

I am so filled with horror over what I have read and heard and studied, the facts that I have digested, that I simply want to register as one person my earnest conviction that this bill is a vital need to the safety of every American.

I thank you.

Senator VAN NUYS. We appreciate your observations very much, Mr. Connelly.

STATEMENT OF MISS ELIZABETH GILMAN, REPRESENTING THE CHURCH LEAGUE FOR INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY

Senator VAN NUYS. I will now call upon Miss Elisabeth Gilman, representing the Church League for Industrial Democracy.

Miss GILMAN. Mr. Chairman, I have been asked to come here by the Church League on Industrial Democracy, which is an organization of religious people throughout the United States. We have for our president Bishop Parsons of California, who has come out bravely and courageously in respest to the attitude of Governor Rolph. Our secretary is William B. Spofford, another clergyman. Our purpose is by study, prayer, and action to promote what we believe to be the principles of Christ in industrial life.

We maintain that social justice must be free to every one, black or white. We do not feel that in this present situation in many of our States that can be accomplished merely by State laws. I happen to be a citizen of Maryland. We sometimes get a little tired of being called the "Free State of Maryland." It is not free for the Negro race. They do not have the same social justice that the white people have. I am firmly convinced that had they had that in Maryland we would have had convictions in the case of the lynching in Princess Anne. I even feel that the lynching need not have taken place.

At the special session of our legislature a month and a half ago the Anti-Lynching Federation of Maryland, representing about 32 organizations, both white and Negro, had a bill prepared by one of

our leading attorneys, J. H. Steel, of Baltimore, and introduced into the committee on the judiciary of the Maryland Senate. We had a Learing. We could see by looking at the people that they were not interested, and we lost. There is no real strong antilynching sentiment in Maryland, I fear; at least, it is not widespread, not a majority.

I happened to be asked about that time to speak before a club, one of the leading clubs of business men, on how possibly lynching might be prevented. I did not say anything very radical or revolutionary, and when the question was discussed it was very evident, it seemed to me, that probably three fourths of that group of business men, a fair cross-section of Baltimore business men, did not feel it was so bad that we had lynching.

I have a strong feeling against lynching, and I feel that under many circumstances it can be avoided. I feel that in a State that is white-minded, where the Negro does not get social justice, we must have a Federal law to support local legislation. Therefore, I am strongly in favor of the bill now being considered and presented by Senator Costigan and Senator Wagner.

Senator VAN NUYS. Thank you very kindly.

STATEMENT OF MISS ELIZABETH YATES WEBB, INSTRUCTOR IN HISTORY AT VASSAR COLLEGE

Senator VAN NUYS. May I next introduce Miss Elizabeth Yates Webb, instructor in history, Vassar College; native of Shelby, N.C.; daughter of former Representative and Judge Webb; niece of ex-Governor O. Max Gardner, of North Carolina.

Miss WEBB. Mr. Chairman, I am not here as an expert on lynching or the details of this proposed law. I should like to say something about public opinion in the South on the subject, and from a good many different points of view from what has been said. I am not representing any organization at all, but I know that if what I want to bring out is not representative of something more than my own opinion, it would not be worth much to you.

I should like to say to you that there are really thousands of southern white men and women-especially women, I think—who care a great deal about helping to bring about more decent race relations. Not quite so many, but a considerable minority have. come to the point where they are willing for the Federal Government to help do that. Perhaps, in the face of conflicting evidence on that point, you might like to know how I know that is true. I am southern. I was born and brought up in the South. The four generations before me in my family have been southern, and I expect for four generations more we shall continue to be southern. I was educated there. Perhaps more important than any of that is the fact that I know a good deal about what community opinion is in a small southern town.

Mob violence is not confined to any part of the country, but I realize, not only from what has been said here, but from what has been said in the South, that the races, and to a very considerable extent the white race, are interested in the question of getting this bill passed. It is on this second point that I wish to speak to you.

There are men and women in the South who have tried for many years to do something to bring about better race relations and to curb lynchings. I hope someone will be here to speak for them and about them. The people belong to the older half of the present generation. I want to tell you something about my own contemporaries, about the younger half of the present generation.

For the time being we are the submerged element. We are too old to be represented by college organizations and too young to be represented through the important organizations, but we are deeply concerned in what is going on about us.

I have had an unusual opportunity to know my generation very well. During my undergraduate days and for several years afterward. I was connected with student movements which kept me in very close contact through travel and conference with students in about 200 colleges in 10 Southern States. I knew as well as any what my generation was studying and thinking about, when they were thinking at all.

You know how it is when young people first become really aware of the world in which they live. We are very serious about all these new-found problems. To many of you we may seem very gay and comfortable, but we are very much concerned about these problems we find confronting us. We are concerned with domestic problems, with international relations, with industrial questions and, of course, racial questions. I think it was really because of our youthful limitations that we came to the point where we did not refuse to deal with the question of racial relations as a problem that we must cope with. We felt that we had to face it squarely. That is more really more difficult to achieve, I think, in the South than it is in the Northor California or somewhere else. A good many draw back and more turn back. But I assure you that thousands of us have tried very hard to think this thing through without fear. I think you can count on those of us, no matter who we are or what we are doing today to support any intelligent and decent measure that will help bring about better race relations.

I do not mean to tell you that my college generation came through to that point of view where we felt we had found a solution, but I think even the youngest of us became quite convinced that a solution can be found, and that we are doing something beneficial to the community in which we live. That is something quite aside from the mere matter of race justice. We feel that there is a sort of moral fiber in our own communities that will work intelligently and exhaustively to achieve a decent solution of our race question. We found and realized that for better or for worse we have got to work eut a common solution in the South, a solution that concerns both

races.

We cannot get rid of it. I think we saw that this matter of lynchng was a stupid repudiation of all the things that our education neant. We have become so convinced that this is true that the difficulty of details in carrying it out have become secordary. I do not near we have overlooked them, but we are convinced that something heers to be done, and we sincerely believe it can be dore,

I should say, as a very conservative estimate, that better than 20 tervent of my generation have come to feel that we will have to

make an earnest and vigorous attempt to face our race problem. I assure you that a far greater percentage feels very intensely against lynching. I am not forgetting that we do have the grave question of intolerance to fight; I am not forgetting that these things can be overturned, as they have been in the past, and must be attacked again and again; but I hope and believe the point of view I am trying to explain to you may be considered representative of southern opinion on this broad question, and that our social problems cannot be handled in an atmosphere of enmity and prejudice.

When a crisis arises in a community, organization and legislation and constructive measures break down. Many communities in the South have been faced with questions like that. Under such circumstances there is not much chance for Negro justice when people are in a frenzy like that. The only thing to do is to prevent the outbreak. The majority is against it. I assure you that that is so. If you have a different opinion, it is because of certain communities in which there have been crises at times, but you cannot judge general sentiment in the South by those.

We have no way of coping with the lynching situation except through the law, and I can say to you that the most of my generation have become convinced that it will have to be through a Federal law. We are not really strong enough to handle it, and we would like for you to strengthen our hands in facing this problem by passing a law that will make the community more decent and safe to work in and to live in. In getting this bill enacted into law, it is not going to be difficult to make a case against lynching, but the difficulty will be to make a case for the Federal Government. I suppose you know that at times in the South the Federal Government has not had a very good reputation.

We have talked a good deal in the South about State rights. We have talked this State rights matter more than personal rights and more than human rights and more than national rights. At this time there are many people in the South who are earnestly desirous of justice between the races, and are willing to have the Federal Government take a part in bringing that about.

The phrase "coerce the States is no answer to anything. Some of us who are still too young to be thoroughly orthodox consider it a little metaphysical. I am not saying that the constitutional issue is not important. It is, but it seems a little metaphysical to bring that answer up whenever this question is raised. Personally, I would rather see the Federal Government assert some of the authority of the State than to see the mob do it. I do not think that is necessarily the choice, but if it were I would not hesitate very long about it.

I would consider it very unfortunate and very unfair to challenge this law on the ground that it is directed against Southern States. and is designed to usurp the authority vested in the States. I look upon it as an aid to the States, something that will tend to uphold the judicial integrity of our States. We do not question the right of the Federal Government to send troops in when local justice breaks down. I would much rather see the Federal Government take a part in such things through law and judicial action than to have to wait until troops are sent in.