[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 52 (Thursday, April 3, 2008)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2589-S2590]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




RECOGNIZING AND HONORING 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF FAIR HOUSING ACT AND 20TH 
           ANNIVERSARY OF FAIR HOUSING AMENDMENTS ACT OF 1988

  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate 
proceed to the immediate consideration of S. Res. 503, submitted 
earlier today by Senator Durbin.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the resolution by title.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A resolution (S. Res. 503) recognizing and honoring the 
     40th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act and the 20th 
     anniversary of the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988.

  There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the 
resolution.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, today I rise to support this resolution 
honoring the 40th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act and the 20th 
anniversary of the Fair Housing Amendments Act.
  But first I want to honor a man whose work helped pave the way for 
this landmark civil rights legislation. Forty years ago, the Reverend 
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. lost his life to a sniper's bullet. Today, 
we remember him as one of the greatest civil rights leaders of our 
country. We know his dream. We are intimately familiar with it. It is a 
dream conceived in the founding of our country and enshrined in the 
words of the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution, a 
dream that lives today in our values, our identities, our highest 
ideals as Americans.
  This is the dream: that all men are created equal, and that in a just 
society all are afforded the same opportunities.
  A week after Dr. King's assassination, and in a step closer to the 
fulfillment of this dream, Congress passed the Fair Housing Act as part 
of the Civil Rights Act of 1968. The Fair Housing Act prohibits 
discrimination in housing on the basis of race, color, national origin, 
and religion. In 1974, Congress added protection on the basis of sex. 
In 1988, thanks to the leadership of Senator Kennedy and Senator 
Specter, Congress included protection on the basis of familial status 
and disability.
  We have made a lot of progress since the summer of 1966, when Dr. 
King led a movement to protest housing discrimination and slum 
conditions for African Americans in Chicago. But if he were alive 
today, he would be the first to say--we aren't there yet. Segregation 
persists in our schools and neighborhoods. We are in the middle of a 
housing crisis that is hitting African-American and Hispanic families 
and communities particularly hard. In Chicago, African-American 
borrowers were 14 times more likely to have a higher cost loan from 
Wells Fargo than were White borrowers. This is a pattern that repeats 
all across the country. African-American and Latino families were 
dramatically more likely to have subprime loans than White families. 
Right now, millions face the possibility of foreclosure. And when they 
lose their homes, they lose their assets. They lose their plans for 
financing their kids' education, for building a better life for 
themselves in the future, for closing the income and education gaps.
  For too many Americans, the dream is still just that--a dream, with 
little chance of becoming reality. We may have all been created equal, 
but since then we have been treated very differently. We are treated 
differently because of the color of our skin, the faith we practice, 
whether we are a man or a woman, single or with children, or use a 
wheelchair and a ramp to enter our apartment.
  The irony is that we have fair housing laws that make this kind of 
treatment not only unfair but illegal--and we have had them for 40 
years. Yet 3.7 million violations of these laws occur each year against 
African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and Indian Americans. This 
doesn't even include the number of violations that occur on the basis 
of other protected classes. Only 1 percent of people who believe they 
are victims of fair housing violations report it to the Government. 
Testing on the enforcement of fair housing laws shows a high rate of 
discrimination in the rental, sales, mortgage lending, and insurance 
markets. More than four decades after Dr. King and his supporters 
marched through the streets of Chicago to fight housing discrimination, 
African Americans and Latinos in Cook County report substantial levels 
of unfair--and illegal--treatment in the housing industry.
  The intent of the Fair Housing Act was broad and inclusive: to 
advance equal opportunity in housing and achieve racial integration for 
the benefit of all Americans. But enforcement of this law has been 
narrow and incomplete. Where you live profoundly affects where you 
work, what you do, where you send your kids to school, whether they 
grow up healthy and safe. As long as our commitment to fair housing 
laws--to civil rights--remains timid, we will never end segregation. We 
will never declare victory over poverty. We will never build a truly 
just society.
  As we honor Dr. King, former Senator Walter Mondale and former 
Senator Edward Brooke, who cosponsored the original Fair Housing Act, 
and others who made possible fair housing laws, we need to remember 
that it is not enough to pass laws. We have to enforce them. The dream 
of equality is our Nation's moral compass. Our duty as legislators and 
as citizens is to make sure the needle points in the right direction.
  I thank Senators Specter, Kennedy, Dodd, Brown, and Voinovich for 
joining me today in honoring the 40th anniversary of the Fair Housing 
Act and the 20th anniversary of the Fair Housing Amendments Act, and I 
urge my colleagues in Congress to renew their dedication to upholding 
these laws. These laws may be 40 years old, but the dream they seek to 
make real is as old as our country.
  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution 
be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motions to reconsider be 
laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate, and any 
statements related to the resolution be printed in the Record.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The resolution (S. Res. 503) was agreed to.
  The preamble was agreed to.
  The resolution, with its preamble, reads as follows:

                              S. Res. 503

       Whereas 2008 marks the 40th anniversary of the enactment of 
     the Fair Housing Act (42 U.S.C. 3601 et seq.);
       Whereas 2008 also marks the 20th anniversary of the 
     enactment of the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988 (Public 
     Law 100-430; 102 Stat. 1619);
       Whereas the Chicago Freedom Movement, which took place from 
     1965 to 1967 and was led by the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther 
     King, Jr., raised the national consciousness about housing 
     discrimination and shaped the debate that led to landmark 
     fair housing legislation;
       Whereas the National Advisory Commission on Civil 
     Disorders, appointed by President Lyndon B. Johnson and 
     commonly

[[Page S2590]]

     known as the Kerner Commission, found in 1968 that ``[o]ur 
     nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white--
     separate and unequal'';
       Whereas Congress passed the Fair Housing Act as part of the 
     Civil Rights Act of 1968 (Public Law 90-284; 82 Stat. 73), 
     and President Johnson signed the Act into law on April 11, 
     1968, one week after the assassination of Dr. King;
       Whereas the Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in 
     housing and housing-related transactions on the basis of 
     race, color, national origin, and religion;
       Whereas, in section 808 of the Housing and Community 
     Development Act of 1974 (Public Law 93-383; 88 Stat. 728), 
     Congress amended the Fair Housing Act to include protection 
     on the basis of sex;
       Whereas the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988 (Public Law 
     100-430; 102 Stat. 1619), passed by overwhelming margins in 
     Congress, included protection on the basis of familial status 
     and disability and expanded the definition of 
     ``discriminatory housing practices'' to include interference 
     and intimidation;
       Whereas Congress's intent in passing the Fair Housing Act 
     was broad and inclusive, to advance equal opportunity in 
     housing and achieve racial integration for the benefit of all 
     people in the United States;
       Whereas housing integration affects other dimensions of 
     life, including educational attainment, employment 
     opportunities, access to health care, and home equity;
       Whereas the majority of people in the United States support 
     neighborhood integration and numerous studies have shown the 
     universal benefits of residential integration;
       Whereas the National Fair Housing Alliance estimates that 
     3,700,000 violations of fair housing laws still occur each 
     year against African Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and 
     American Indians, and that number does not include violations 
     that occur on the basis of other national origins, religion, 
     sex, or familial status or against persons with disabilities;
       Whereas the Department of Housing and Urban Development 
     estimates that only 1 percent of individuals who believe they 
     are victims of housing discrimination report those violations 
     of fair housing laws to the government, and this 
     underreporting is a major obstacle to achieving equal 
     opportunity in housing;
       Whereas testing of the enforcement of fair housing laws 
     continues to uncover a high rate of discrimination in the 
     rental, sales, mortgage lending, and insurance markets; and
       Whereas the Fair Housing Act is an essential component of 
     our Nation's civil rights legislation: Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That the Senate--
       (1) recognizes and honors the 40th anniversary of the 
     enactment of the Fair Housing Act (42 U.S.C. 3601 et seq.) 
     and the 20th anniversary of the enactment of the Fair Housing 
     Amendments Act of 1988 (Public Law 100-430; 102 Stat. 1619);
       (2) supports activities to recognize and celebrate the 
     historical milestone represented by the anniversaries of the 
     enactment of the Fair Housing Act and the enactment of the 
     Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988; and
       (3) encourages all levels of government to rededicate 
     themselves to the enforcement and the ideals of fair housing 
     laws.

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