![](media/image1.jpeg){width="6.489583333333333in"
height="1.15625in"}**Legislative
Bulletin..................................................June 20,
2007**

> **Contents:**
>
> **H.R. 923 ---** Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act
>
> **H.R. 923 --- Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act**
>
> **(*Lewis, D-GA*)**

**[Order of Business:]{.underline}** H.R. 923 is scheduled for
consideration on Wednesday, June 20, 2007, under a motion to suspend the
rules and pass the bill.

**[Summary:]{.underline}** H.R. 923 would authorize \$10 million
annually for the Attorney General to create an Unsolved Civil Rights Era
Crimes Unit within the Civil Rights Division of the Department of
Justice (DOJ) and to appoint a deputy to head the unit. The deputy of
the unit would be responsible to investigate and prosecute alleged civil
rights violations that occurred prior to 1970 and resulted in a death.
Any violations that the deputy investigates that do not fit the
aforementioned criteria will be referred to the Civil Rights Division of
the DOJ.

The bill would also establish a Civil Rights Unit of the FBI that would
be headed by a Deputy Investigator, who would coordinate with the DOJ
deputy on unsolved civil rights investigations. The bill would authorize
\$1.5 million annually for technology that would bring law enforcement
agencies together to investigate unsolved civil rights crimes. All
funding for the program would sunset in ten years.

The bill expresses the sense that the DOJ should:

-   "expeditiously investigate unsolved civil rights murders, due to the
    amount of time that has passed since the murders and the age of
    potential witnesses; and

-   "provide all the resources necessary to ensure timely and thorough
    investigations in the cases involved."

**[Additional Information]{.underline}**: Emmett Till was a 14 year old
boy from Chicago who was kidnapped and killed in an apparently racially
motivated attack while visiting family in Money, Mississippi in 1955.
According to the DOJ, "Till was kidnapped and murdered on or about
August 28, 1955 by Roy Bryant and his half-brother J.W. Milam. The
murder occurred after Till purportedly whistled at Bryant's wife,
Carolyn, while shopping at the Bryants' store. Fewer than four weeks
after Till's body was pulled from the Tallahatchie River, an all white,
all male jury acquitted the two of the murder. They subsequently
detailed to a magazine journalist how they beat Till, took him to the
river, shot him in the head, tied a large metal fan to his neck with
barbed wire, and pushed his body into the river. Milam died in 1980, and
Bryant in 1990. No one else was ever indicted or prosecuted for
involvement with the kidnapping or murder."

Till's murder helped to animate the civil rights movement and sparked
protests across the South. In 2004, nearly fifty years after the murder,
and in spite of the fact the five year federal statute of limitations
for federal charges had expired, the case was reopened by DOJ officials
who believed that more people may have been involved. The renewed
investigation, a cooperative venture between Mississippi's District
Attorney, the United States' Attorney, the FBI, and local law
enforcement failed to bring any new charges or come to any new
conclusions, but it did restore interest in civil rights crime
legislation.

Although current civil rights laws allow for people to be punished more
severely if they commit a crime because of someone's race, this bill
would not increase criminal penalties. It would, however, create and
fund a special unit of the DOJ, in coordination with the FBI, to
investigate unsolved civil rights crimes that result in death even
though there is no statute of limitations for murder, and unsolved civil
rights crimes are already investigated without this legislation.
According to Congressional Quarterly, "in 2005 a jury in Mississippi
convicted an 80-year-old man of manslaughter in a case where three civil
rights workers were attacked by a mob and killed in 1964. This month, a
71-year-old man in Jackson, Miss., was convicted of killing two black
teenagers in the mid-1960s."

**[Committee:]{.underline}** H.R. 923 was introduced on February 8, 2007
and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, which Subcommittee on
the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties on March 1, 2007,
and the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security on June
8, 2007. On June 12, 2007, a subcommittee mark up was held and the bill
was report, by voice vote, to the full committee which held a mark up
the following day, amended the bill, and reported it by voice vote.

**[Cost to Taxpayers:]{.underline}** A CBO score for H.R. 923 is not
currently available, however, the bill would authorize \$11.5 million in
FY 2008 and \$55.5 million over five years.

**[Does the Bill Expand the Size and Scope of Government?]{.underline}**
Yes. It creates new DOJ and FBI units to investigate unsolved civil
rights crime and, if the violation took place before 1970 and resulted
in death, prosecute the offender.

**[Does the Bill Contain Any New State-Government, Local-Government or
Private-Sector Mandates?]{.underline}** No.

**[Constitutional Authority]{.underline}**: A committee report citing
constitutional authority is not available. However, House Rule XIII,
Section 3(d)(1), requires that all committee reports contain "a
statement citing the *specific* powers granted to Congress in the
Constitution to enact the law proposed by the bill or joint resolution"
*\[emphasis added\]*.

**[RSC Staff Contact]{.underline}**: Andy Koenig;
<andy.koenig@mail.house.gov>; 202-226-9717

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