IV 

116TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. RES. 1042 

Calling on the Senate to rename the Russell Senate Office Building. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

JULY 9, 2020 

Mr. GREEN of Texas (for himself, Ms. BASS, Ms. CASTOR of Florida, Mr. 

CLEAVER, Mr. COOPER, Ms. GARCIA of Texas, Ms. HAALAND, Mr. HASTINGS, Mr. KENNEDY, Mr. LAWSON of Florida, Ms. JACKSON LEE, Mr. 

LOWENTHAL, and Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi) submitted the following 

resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Transportation and 

Infrastructure 

RESOLUTION 

Calling on the Senate to rename the Russell Senate Office 

Building. 

Whereas Senator Richard B. Russell opposed civil rights as 

‘‘unconstitutional and unwise’’; 

Whereas in 1935, Senator Russell participated in his first filibuster of a civil rights bill, when he and his colleagues 

in the Senate stopped an anti-lynching bill with 6 days 

of nonstop talking; 

Whereas in 1936, Senator Russell stated in a re-election campaign speech that ‘‘as one who was born and reared in 

the atmosphere of the Old South, with six generations of 

my forebears now resting beneath Southern soil, I am 

willing to go as far and make as great a sacrifice to preVerDate Sep 11 2014 05:15 Jul 10, 2020 Jkt 099200 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR1042.IH HR1042

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•HRES 1042 IH 

serve and insure White supremacy in the social, economic, and political life of our state as any man who lives 

within her borders’’; 

Whereas in 1956, Senator Russell wrote an initial draft of 

the Southern Manifesto, the bicameral resolution stating 

support for segregation and refusal to observe Brown v. 

Board of Education; 

Whereas, because President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the 

Civil Rights Act of 1964, Senator Russell, along with 

more than a dozen other Senators, including Herman 

Talmadge, boycotted the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City; 

Whereas, on March 17, 1964, the New York Times published 

an article entitled, ‘‘Relocate Negroes Evenly in States’’, 

in which Senator Russell proposed a voluntary ‘‘racial relocation’’ program to adjust the imbalance of the AfricanAmerican population between the 11 States of the old 

Confederacy and the rest of the Union; 

Whereas in 1972, shortly after Senator Russell’s death, the 

Senate voted in an overwhelming majority (99–1) that 

the Old Senate Office Building be named the Russell 

Senate Office Building; 

Whereas historian Gilbert C. Fite wrote at the conclusion of 

his biography of Senator Russell, ‘‘White supremacy and 

racial segregation were to him cardinal principles for 

good and workable human relationships’’; and 

Whereas Public Law 115–58, a joint resolution signed into 

law on September 14, 2017, rejects ‘‘White nationalism, 

White supremacy, and neoNazism’’: Now, therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 


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•HRES 1042 IH 

1 (1) once again rejects White nationalism and 

2 White supremacy as hateful expressions of intoler3 ance that are contradictory to the values that define 

4 the people of the United States; 

5 (2) condemns the use of captions, statutes, me6 morials, and artwork used or erected to memorialize 

7 Senator Richard B. Russell, or any other lawmaker 

8 who intentionally disavowed the Declaration of 

9 Independence’s exhortation that all persons are cre10 ated equal; and 

11 (3) calls on the Senate to rename the Russell 

12 Senate Office Building for an honoree who embraced 

13 equality for all Americans, and to revert to using the 

14 building’s original name, the Old Senate Office 

15 Building, until the Senate selects such honoree. 

Æ 


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