[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 39 (Thursday, March 11, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E422]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           INTRODUCTION OF HATE CRIMES PREVENTION ACT OF 1999

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. JOHN CONYERS, JR.

                              of michigan

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, March 11, 1999

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be introducing the Hate 
Crimes Prevention Act of 1999, along with Representatives Morella, 
Baldwin and Forbes. As of today there are 118 original cosponsors. This 
legislation will amend Federal law to enhance the ability of Federal 
prosecutors to combat racial and religious savagery, and will permit 
Federal prosecution of violence motivated by prejudice against the 
victim's sexual orientation, gender or disability.
  In 1963, the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, was 
dynamited by the Ku Klux Klan. The killing of four African-American 
girls preparing for a religious ceremony shocked the Nation and acted 
as a catalyst for the civil rights movement. Last month, 36 years after 
the brutal bombing in Birmingham, Alabama was witness to another 
heinous act of violence motivated by base bigotry. The beating and 
burning of Billy Jack Gaither is testament to the reality that a 
guarantee of civil rights is not enough if violence motivated by hatred 
and prejudice continues. The atrocity, coming on the heels of last 
year's torture and murder of James Byrd in Jasper, TX and Matthew 
Shepard in Laramie, WY illustrates the need for the passage of the Hate 
Crimes Prevention Act of 1999.
  Current Federal hate crimes law only covers crimes motivated by 
racial, religious or ethnic prejudice. Our bill adds violence motivated 
by prejudice against the victim's sexual orientation, gender or 
disability. This legislation also makes it easier for Federal 
authorities to prosecute racial, religious and ethnic violence, in the 
same way that the Church Arson Prevention Act of 1996 helped Federal 
prosecutors combat church arson by loosening the unduly rigid 
jurisdictional requirements under Federal law for prosecuting church 
arson.
  Under my legislation, States will continue to take the lead in the 
persecution of hate crimes. In the years 1991 through 1997 there were 
more than 50,000 hate crimes reported. From 1990 through 1998, there 
were 42 Federal hate crimes prosecutions nationwide under the original 
hate crimes statute. Our bill will result only in a modest increase in 
the number of Federal prosecutions of hate crimes. The Attorney General 
or other high ranking Justice Department officials must approve all 
prosecution under this law. This requirement ensures Federal restraint, 
and ensures that States will continue to take the lead.
  At one time lynchings were commonplace in our Nation. Nearly 4,000 
African Americans were tortured and killed between 1880 and 1930. 
Today, Americans are being tortured and killed not only because of 
their race, but also because of their religion, their disability, their 
sex, and their sexual orientation. It is long past time that Congress 
passed a comprehensive law banning such contemptible acts. It is a 
Federal crime to hijack an automobile or to possess cocaine and it 
ought to be a Federal crime to drag a man to death because of his race 
or to hang a man because of his sexual orientation. These are crimes 
that shock and shame our national conscience and they should be subject 
to Federal law enforcement assistance and prosecution. There certainly 
is a role for the States, but far too many States have no hate crimes 
laws and many existing laws do not specify sexual orientation as a 
category for protection.
  This problem cuts across party lines, and I am glad to be joined by 
so many of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle in proposing this 
legislation today. This is a battle we cannot afford to lose--we owe it 
to the thousands of African Americans who have been lynched, and we owe 
it to the families of James Byrd, Matthew Shepard and Billy Jack 
Gaither.

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