the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members In my judgment the Congress is under an obligation to carry out the mandate of section 2 of the 14th amendment by reducing the representation in the House of Representatives of States in which the right to vote is denied or abridged. This responsibility is clearly that of the Congress, not the Judiciary nor the Executive. But for 95 years the Congress has failed and neglected to comply with this responsibility. Because of the difficult problems in carrying out the mandate imposed by section 2 of the 14th amendment of the Constitution, it was my suggestion that a bipartisan congressional commission composed of four Members of the House and four Members from the Senate, with a Chairman elected by such members, being an outstanding citizen from private life, be given the task of making studies and finding facts and reporting to the Congress recommendations together with the necessary evidence upon which the Congress in apportioning representatives among several States could effectuate the mandate of section 2 of the 14th amendment. In the full Judiciary Committee I offered this amendment which was rejected by a voice vote. Title I with this amendment would constitute workable, reasonable, and effective legislation for enforcement of voting rights which the undersigned will support. The text of the amendment follows: ESTABLISHMENT OF COMMISSION; DUTIES SEC. 102. (a) COMMISSION ESTABLISHED.-There is hereby established a bipartisan commission to be known as the "Commission on Voting." (b) DUTIES OF COMMISSION.-The Commission shall conduct a full and complete investigation and study to ascertain whether and to what extent the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the inhabitants of such State, being 21 years of age and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, and shall also ascertain the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. The Commission shall calculate the number of Representatives to be apportioned among the several States, reducing the basis of representation therein by the proportion which the number of such citizens whose right to vote is so denied or in any way abridged bears to the whole number of citizens 21 years of age in such State. The Commission shall report the results of its investigation and study together with all MEMBERSHIP OF THE COMMISSION SEC. 103. (a) NUMBER AND APPOINTMENT.-The Commission shall be composed of nine members as follows: (1) Four Members of the House of Representatives, two from each of the two major political parties, to be elected by the Representatives of the respective parties. (2) Four Members of the United States Senate, two from each of the two major political parties, to be elected by the Senators of the respective parties. (3) A Chairman elected by the foregoing members who is an outstanding citizen of the United States in private life. (b) VACANCIES.-Any vacancy in the Commission shall not affect its powers, but shall be filled in the same manner in which the original appointment was made. (c) QUORUM.-Five members of the Commission shall constitute a quorum. COMPENSATION OF MEMBERS OF THE COMMISSION SEC. 104. (a) MEMBERS OF CONGRESS.-Members of Congress who are members of the Commission shall serve without compensation in addition to that received for their services as Members of Congress; but they shall be reimbursed for travel, subsistence, and other necessary expenses incurred by them in the performance of the duties vested in the Commission. (b) CHAIRMAN.-The Chairman shall receive compensation at the rate of $25,000 per annum, plus reimbursement for travel, subsistence, and other necessary expenses incurred by him in the performance of his duties. TITLE II-PUBLIC ACCOMMODATIONS The compromise version reported by the full Judiciary Committee is more limited than the subcommittee version and broader in some respects, and more limited in others than the original administration proposal. Title II as reported, however, exceeds, in my judgment, the proper sphere of the authority of the Federal Government and relies for its enforcement upon government by injunction. In the subcommittee, the undersigned offered an amendment confining Federal action in the field of public accommodations to assuring equal access to transportation facilities by interstate travelers and providing for enforcement of public policy in this field by criminal sanctions. There is also a nonpreemption provision which would preserve the validity, in the field of public accommodations, of the laws of 32 States. The text of the amendment offered as a substitute for the provisions of title II is as follows: SEC. 201. (a) Chapter 13 of title 18, United States Code, is hereby amended by adding at the end thereof the following new section: "§ 245. Public accommodations. "(a) No owner, operator, lessee, agent, or employee of any hotel, motel, inn, restaurant, eating establishment, or gasoline station which is situated or advertised adjacent to an interstate or primary highway (as defined in title 23, United States Code, sec. 103) and which is held out as serving or offering to serve interstate travelers, and no owner, operator, lessee, agent, or employee of any public conveyance on land or water, or in the air, including the stations and terminals thereof, serving interstate travelers, shall directly or indirectly refuse, withhold from, or deny to any person any accommodations, advantages, facilities, or privileges thereof on account of race, creed, color, or national origin. "(b) Whoever violates the above provision, or aids, incites, requires, or encourages such violation, shall be punished by a fine of not more than $1,000, or by imprisonment for not more than one year, or both. "(c) In any action commenced pursuant to this section, the United States shall be liable for costs, including reasonable attorney's fees, if it fails to sustain the prosecution. "(d) Nothing contained in this title shall be construed as indicating an intent on the part of Congress to occupy the field in which such title operates, to the exclusion of any State laws on the same subject matter, nor shall any provision of this title be construed as invalidating a provision of State law which would be valid in the absence of such title, except to the extent that there is a direct and positive conflict between such provisions so that the two cannot be reconciled or consistently stand together." (b) The table of contents of such chapter 13 is amended by inserting "245. Public accommodations." immediately below "244. Discrimination against person wearing uniform of TITLE 111-DESEGREGATION OF PUBLIC FACILITIES AND TITLE IVDESEGREGATION OF PUBLIC EDUCATION Both contain the sanction of proceeding by injunction and purport to authorize Federal action in areas beyond the scope of Federal authority. I oppose them. TITLE V-COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS Makes the Commission permanent and adds to its duties investigation of allegations that citizens are unlawfully being accorded or denied the right to vote or having their votes properly counted. I favor the provisions of title V. TITLE VI-CUTOFF OF FEDERAL FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE Certainly it is within the power of the Federal Government, when granting financial assistance in a host of federally sponsored programs, to specify the conditions and terms upon which that assistance is granted. Clearly, the Federal Government should incorporate in any such grants or loans our well-established national policy against discrimination on grounds of race and color. Federal financial assistance should not underwrite the perpetuation of discrimination. While this policy is clear, it is not easy to express in clear statutory language. Subcommittee members wrestled with this problem during the hearings and then during consideration of the bill in executive session. The subcommittee urged that criteria or standards be established to guide administrators in applying this policy in administering financial assistance programs, but it was unsuccessful in its attempt to have the executive branch suggest language spelling out criteria and standards. The subcommittee sought a way of making the withholding mandatory, rather than discretionary with administrative officials. Administration witnesses strenuously urged that mandatory provisions would be unworkable and advocated that the withholding of funds be discretionary. The subcommittee also sought to provide for adequate judicial review. Members cited examples of Federal officials withholding funds from States and local governments by arbitrary decision from which no adequate redress appeared to be available. At one point, in seeking to achieve these objectives a draft was suggested giving administrators of financial assistance programs rulemaking authority and then authorizing the enforcement of such regulations against discrimination by injunction processes. In fact, this version of the withholding section was contained in the bill reported by the subcommittee. The compromise version reported by the full Judiciary Committee struck the government-by-injunction remedy and thus was an improvement over the subcommittee version. It is my belief that objectives of nondiscrimination with respect to Federal financial assistance programs can be achieved in a much simpler and more workable way. We can provide that recipients of Federal financial assistance, as a condition to receiving the grant or loan, must enter into an enforceable undertaking against discrimination in the administration of the program. Such an undertaking would be enforceable by existing law governing remedies for the violation of a contract. The text of the substitute I propose for "Title VI-Nondiscrimination in Federally Assisted Programs" is as follows: SEC. 601. Any executive department or agency of the United States which extends financial assistance in the United States (by way of grant, contract, or loan) shall require, as a condition to the receipt of such assistance, that the recipient assume a legally enforeceable undertaking designed to insure that (1) no person because of his race or color, will be excluded from all of or a part of the benefits of such assistance or will be extended benefits of a different (2) no person in order to receive the benefits of such Sec. 602. The undertaking referred to in section 601 TITLE VII-EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY Title VII is in reality the so-called FEPC bill, H.R. 405, reported from the House Education and Labor Committee on July 22, 1963, now pending before the Rules Committee of the House. The only major difference between the subcommittee version (H.R. 405) and the compromise version is that the enforcement procedure was changed from the administrative type of cease and desist order to a de novo proceeding in court initiated by the Commission. In essence, this was the approach and the provisions of a similar bill, H.R. 10144, reported in February of 1962 by the House Education and Labor Committee in the 87th Congress. The Judiciary Committee or its subcommittee held no hearings on the language of title VII. Representatives of neither industry nor labor had their day in court before the Judiciary Committee and the Judiciary Committee members had no part in producing the phraseology title VII contains. The title creates a new Federal independent agency similar to the National Labor Relations Board; deals in an area of legislative jurisdiction assigned to another committee of the House (House Education and Labor Committee); will have far-reaching consequences on both management and labor; contains onerous provisions for recordkeeping, inspection, and reporting; and constitutes an important but ill-devised limitation upon the area of discretion and decisionmaking of both American businesses and American workers. Such an important innovation in Federal activities should not be undertaken casually and upon a flimsy record. The undersigned would support legislation to prevent discrimination in employment by the Federal Government or in the execution of contracts let by the Federal Government. This function is at present being performed under an Executive order of the President-10925, March 8, 1961, 26 F.R. 1977—by the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity. The undersigned believes there are valid reasons for having this function of nondiscrimination in Federal employment and contracts established on a statutory foundation and thus not subject to revoca |