You are right, Mr. Chairman. You are sticking to the Constitution. Your committee rejects and resents this body down the street changing the Constitution. I know of your anxiety. I know what you did to Brownell when he sat right here. You turned him every way but loose. He didn't know what hit him when Sam Ervin proposed questions to his unrealistic thinking from the same book that you and he read out of the Harvard Law School.

They are afraid of you. They are afraid of John McClellan because you men are basic.

That is why I came over here this morning, because you gentlemen understand the whole complexion of the myriads and cosmic problems contained in this thing. I ask you, Mr. Chairman, to do whatever you can, and I know you will, to protect that great treatise on which our rights are founded. We will do what we can to help you on our side.

I am grateful that you have permitted me to come here, to stand before you gentlemen who are much better versed in this subject and in the law of the land than I am.

I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman. If you will permit me I would like to submit a statement from our local newspaper, the oldest daily paper in the South. This is an article by Roulhac Hamilton. Roulhac is a North Carolinian like his great father who taught at your magnificent university the civil rights brass telling about their accomplishments before one of our committees of the House, the Judiciary Committee. I will let you read what this Civil Rights Commission has done.

Senator ERVIN. That will be received as part of the record at this point.

(The newspaper article referred to is as follows:)

[May 11, 1959]

CIVIL RIGHTS DIVISION BRASS TELL ABOUT ACCOMPLISHMENTS

(By Roulhac Hamilton)

WASHINGTON.-Officials of the new Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, seeking an increased appropriation for the new fiscal year, devoted an entire morning recently to trying to make a record of inaction look like one of action.

But they failed to such an extent as to bring figurative tears to the voices of two House Appropriations Committee members who, openly anxious to approve the appropriations request, complained bitterly that the Justice Department officials were giving them no justification to do so.

TESTIMONY

The situation was disclosed Sunday night as the committee made public testimony taken in secret last February 4 from Assistant Attorney General W. Wilson White and his top assistant, J. M. F. Ryan, in support of a $541,000 budget request for the Civil Rights Division for the year beginning July 1.

The requested figure represents an increase of about $13,000 over the amount needed for the division in the current year.

White and Ryan told the House appropriations subcommittee that the Civil Rights Division had disposed of 826 cases thus far in its first full year of operation. But under sharp questioning, White admitted that only seven of the cases fell in "the category of civil rights as most people understand the term," as Chairman John J. Rooney, Democrat of New York, put it.

And, he said in further response to Rooney's questioning, only three or four of those involved race.

This situation caused both Rooney and Representative Glenard P. Lipscomb of California, ranking Republican sitting on the subcommittee and like Rooney a strong procivil rights lawmaker, to complain.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS?

Rooney said during White's testimony such things as "You have taken an awful lot of trouble to show a light workload" and "It does not appear so far in this record what you are doing." He repeatedly begged White to tell him "what have you been doing," to give him "some examples of what you have been doing, what have been your accomplishments."

Finally, after pages of words from White, Rooney asked in despair: "If I understand what has been said correctly, up to now you have had no accomplishments as yet except in the research field." This, he said, was "something I would have expected you had had since the days of the Civil Rights Section of the Criminal Division."

White said he didn't think that was a fair estimate of his accomplishmentshe said "The first accomplishment is, of course, the first case started under the law (in Terrell County, Ga.), and the second about to be started."

Lipscomb, also fighting for specific answers to questions, told White "It would be helpful to the committee to know***. The accomplishments of this particular program," and when White could give him nothing definite, said "I might say I am not convinced. I believe in this program; however, I am not convinced as to what you have done. I know that you have worked on it, but I cannot put my finger on the whole thing."

BREAKDOWN

Ultimately, White furnished a breakdown of the 887 "cases" he had said at the outset his division had handled. It turned out to be a breakdown of "complaints" handled, rather than cases, and only 15 of these had any bearing at all on race per se.

More than a third were cases involving brutality by police or prison officials. Including these, more than two-thirds involved such things as unlawful searches, arrest or deprivation of liberty and property, and mistreatment while in custody. The 32 actual cases-as opposed to complaints-listed by White as having been handled by his division-furnished an interesting breakdown. Twelve of them were habeas corpus matters, three police brutality cases, three cases involving mental defectives, two matters concerning writs of mandamus, two fugitive felon actions, two for probation or parole violation-and one, somewhat to Rooney's expressed amazement, involving liquor and contraband.

"That would hardly be civil rights, traffic in liquor and contraband articles," Rooney noted. "How did all these kinds of cases get over into your civil rights area?"

White had no direct answer. He said somewhat vaguely that "There is a relationship because we have problems arising out of jails where civil rights are involved. That is, such incidents as kangaroo courts or mistreatment by jailers."

RACIAL CASES

Of the total 32 cases listed by White as actually having been handled by his division, it developed in the end that White was sure only that these three involved race in one way or another:

The Terrell County (Ga.) voting case, now pending in U.S. Court for the Middle District of Georgia, the John Kaspar contempt case in the Eastern Tennessee District Court arising from the Clinton County desegregation matter, and the enforcement of civil rights commission subpenas in Alabama.

White, obviously conscious that he was not making out much of a case for an increased budget, insisted that "The list of 32 matters in court does not accurately reflect the work," but when Rooney asked him if he had “anything else to throw light on this," he could come with only one other case, not shown in the record. In that case, he said, an Alabama sheriff had pleaded guilty in a police brutality case, involving only white persons. Under questioning, he said the sheriff had pleaded nolo contendere (no contest) rather than guilty.

Senator ERVIN. Incidentally, one of the great privileges of my life. was sitting at the feet of his father, Dr. J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton

who taught me the first things I ever learned about the Constitution of the United States in his course on constitutional history.

Mr. RIVERS. I know of your great background.

Senator ERVIN. I am very sorry that there are a lot of people in high places who didn't have the privilege of sitting at his feet, because I think they would have come away from them with a sounder notion about the reasons why the Constitution was drawn and a sounder understanding of what its provisions are.

Mr. RIVERS. I believe, Mr. Chairman, like one Member of the House used to say, when you graced our body with your great dignity and your great ability, as long as the light holds out to burn itself it is time for the vilest sinner to return. I believe if we hold out we will get converts every day. A lot of people are getting disenchanted with Warren & Co., and so long as my tongue isn't loose I plan to criticize them when they are wrong. I do not care what is contained in those proposals.

Senator ERVIN. Doesn't the fact that the authors of certain of these bills find it necessary for Congress to place the stamp of its approval on particular decisions of the Court indicate a fear on the part of some people that those decisions are of such dubious constitutionality that they need to be bolstered up?

Mr. RIVERS. You hit the nail on the head. Take Little Rock. They didn't prosecute a man. And now they want to write a law. That is what they are after. They have a smart program for them. They want to underwrite the illegal decisions of the Supreme Court and make it part and parcel of the statutes of this country. You have completely hit the nail on the head. That is exactly it.

Senator ERVIN. The chairman is grateful to you for coming before the committee and expressing your views. I am absolutely convinced that those of us who fight these bills are really fighting to save the constitutional and legal systems of the United States for the benefit of all Americans, of all races and all generations.

Mr. RIVERS. Mr. Chairman, you stated it much better than I. I know Henry Grady spoke his immortal speech and said substantially that when anybody's destiny becomes involved in political considerations, he always loses. This matter is mixed up with politics. That is why people who are normally rational lose their sense of direction. I hope that somewhere down the line you can put them back on the ground.

May I ask to apologize to Senator McClellan for taking all of this time.

Senator MCCLELLAN. The Congressman has not at all inconvenienced the Senator from Arkansas. I am glad to hear your presentation. I do have to go to my own committee, Government Operations Committee, within the next few minutes, to conduct a hearing on a bill that is of considerable importance to the State of Arkansas. I had scheduled hearings on that bill prior to the time I scheduled the hearing for the day, prior to the time that I knew that the distinguished Attorney General of the State of Arkansas was scheduled to testify. I shall be compelled to leave possibly in the next 15 or 20 minutes, Mr. Chairman, to proceed with those hearings. However, I am glad that it is possible for me to be present in this committee at this time so that I may have the privilege of presenting to

the committee our distinguished Attorney General from Arkansas, the Honorable Bruce Bennett.

Come around, Bruce.

I may say, Mr. Chairman, that in Arkansas, as is well known, we have had some problems, possibly in this field, that are peculiar to our State as of now. I doubt if they are peculiar to our State for any great or indefinite period. I think others will probably experience something comparable maybe to what we have had to endure. But in the course of this ordeal Arkansas has been forced to go through with it. We have sought by legal means to protect the rights of our people, the rights of our State, our constitutional rights, and by legal means to combat forces and influences that we think are detrimental and that if not checked or not restrained will permanently impair, if not in some instances, in some degree, permanently destroy the rights that we cherish and the rights that we feel are ours. In this fight I may say that Attorney General Bennett has been out in front. He has taken the initiative. He has conducted and in fact he has initiated and is presently conducting a number of cases in the courts in the defense of those rights that we speak of. I know of no one in my State, public official or private citizen, who is more competent to address this committee and to give it the benefit of his experience and knowledge in this field.

It is my pleasure to present the Honorable Bruce Bennett, attorney general of Arkansas, Mr. Chairman.

Senator ERVIN. The Chair is delighted to have you here. The Chair is delighted to welcome Attorney General Bennett to the committee and to have him present his views to the committee. The Chair has the pleasure of being acquainted with Mr. Bennett and also knows of his reputation as one of the outstanding advocates and counselors of the country.

We are delighted to have you with us.

Mr. BENNETT. Thank you very much, Senator Ervin.

STATEMENT OF HON. BRUCE BENNETT, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE STATE OF ARKANSAS

Mr. BENNETT. I would like to say at the outset that I am deeply and humbly grateful for those kind remarks my lifelong friend, John McClellan, extended in my behalf. I appreciate it very much.

Gentlemen of the committee, my name is Bruce Bennett. I am attorney general of the State of Arkansas, having been elected for a term which commenced on January 15, 1957. I was reelected last year without opposition in the primary and the general election. I have lived in Arkansas all of my life; served 512 years in the Army and Air Force, with duty in Europe and the South Pacific as a bomber pilot. I graduated from the Vanderbilt University Law School in January 1949. In 1953 I was elected district prosecuting attorney for four counties in south Arkansas and served through 1956, at which time I assumed my present duties. At the present time I am chairman of the Southeastern Attorneys General Association, composed of 16 States.

In 1943 the Arkansas Legislature enacted a law cited as the "Uniform Law To Oppose Federal Encroachments." This act directed

the attorney general to inform the Arkansas Senators and Representatives in Congress of legislation which in his opinion was objectionable as being a Federal encroachment upon State powers. Under act 166 (Ark. acts of 1943, sec. 2) it is made the duty of— the Attorney General to likewise cooperate with such other attorneys general in making studies and examinations of all now pending or hereafter proposed congressional legislation to determine whether the same may result in Federal encroachments into the normal field of State legislation or State functions, or whether same is harmful or beneficial to the interests of the State or its citizens, and advise said Senators and Representatives in writing of his opinion and views with respect thereto, together with his reasons therefor;

Under the authority of the above, I appear here this morning and am grateful for the opportunity to testify before your committee.

I feel that these hearings are of extreme value to the people of my State and of this Nation. When I appeared before the House Judiciary Committee a little over 2 years ago, there were pending certain civil rights bills, one of which would have permitted the Attorney General of the United States to prosecute a local officer on some trumped-up charge alleged by a confirmed criminal. This would have put the officer in a Federal court without a jury. Fortunately, the Congress would not adopt such far-reaching legislation. It is for this reason that I believe these hearings are of extreme value.

It seems to me that my remarks should be confined to the effect the legislation now before this committee would have upon the State of Arkansas.

Before taking up the proposed legislation, I think it might be enlightening to this committee if I commented upon the cause and effect of that which we commonly call the Little Rock incident.

It is a matter of common knowledge that all of the people-all of the races of Arkansas have lived in peace and harmony for over 150 years. Men of all races have made progress politically, socially, and economically. Historians cannot point to any country where a transplanted race such as the Negro has made as much progress as he has in our section of this country these past 150 years. He did not do this by himself, nor did his benefactor, the white man, aid and assist him through coercion and force. The progress was motivated by men of good will, interested in a minority race advancement, in order that that race could take it place in the modern civilization and thereby shoulder its responsibilities and duties in payment of the rights enjoyed as free-born Americans. It might be of interest to this committee to know that since 1945, 60 percent of Arkansas school construction money has gone for the erection of modern school facilities for the Negro race, while at the same time it is estimated they pay only 8 percent of the taxes in our State and comprise only 25 percent of our population.

Yet in the presence of these harmonious relations my section of the Nation is now called upon to defend itself against these punitive measures proposed under the guise of so-called civil rights measures. Significantly, I am unable to learn where the Civil Rights Commission, authorized by Congress 2 years ago, has had occasion to make any investigation as a result of a complaint lodged by any person within the borders of Arkansas since its inception.