Evening star., 1937-04-25
BY MARK SULLIVAN.

close to understanding the whole
question-Supreme Court. constitu-
t1onality, and States rights-which is
Just coming to head in Washington
1t Is question for the country and
Tor Congress. Particularly is it a
question for the Democratic party.
Most particularly of all, it is a prob
lem, and an acute one, for the South
err Democrats who provide most of
the leadership and substantially all
the Democratic party leadership, in
Congress. These leaders have lust
become aware Of where they have
been carried by their assent to New
Deal measures during the past four
years. They have just become aware
that they face crisis. One of them
says, and most observers agree, that
the crisis is of the same kind that
the South went through during the
years following the Civil War.
The anti-lynching bill must be
looked at in connection with the pro-
posal to change the Supreme Court,
and the Courts recent decision up
holding the Wagner labor relations
act. For understanding the situation
In general, and the anti-lynching bill
specifically, it is convenient to begin
with the Wagner act
Southerners Troubled.
In the crisis, the part of the Wag-
ner act is indirect. The Wagner act
gives to Congress the right to regu-
late labor relations in every State and
the Supreme Court has sustained this
right. This is the farthest extension
OF Federal power into the States that
has ever taken place. And the South
ern Democrats are now troubled by
an alarming reflection. If the Fed
eral Government can regulate labor
relations in comparatively small
factory In Richmond, Va. Gas in one
OF the cases decided by the Supreme
Court) maybe the Federal Govern
ment. III pursuance of this trend, can
regulate some matters which the
South regards as more important than
labor relations; which the South, in
thing, regards as paramount to every
thing else. Southern Democrats
wonder if the time may come when
the Federal Government will regulate
elections in the Southern States.
What makes the situation vivid to
the Southern Democrats is the anti
lynching bill
The Anti-Lynching Bill.
Let 1t be said at once that no
Democrat in Congress, from the
South or anywhere else, condones
lynching. The Southern Democrats
are as eager as any one else to end
lynching. In their respective States
they are trying earnestly to end it,
and they are succeeding. But they
want to end it by local action, by
action within their respective States.
What the Southern Democrats fear
about the anti-lynching bill is the
intrusion of the Federal Government
into the domestic affairs of the States.
And, in truth, the anti-lynching bill
proposes such an intrusion as has
never taken place before-not since
the Federal Government sent troops
into Southern States after the Civil
War, to be present at the polls in
order to insist on Negroes voting. The
anti-lynching bill represents a quite
similar exercise of Federal authority
within the States.
The anti-lynching bill proposes that
II there is a lynching anywhere the
Federal Government shall take notice
OF 1T. If the Federal Government
thinks the State government or
county government has not been as
vigilant in preventing the lynching
as the Federal Government thinks it
ought to have been, then the Federal
Government will act If the Federal
Government thinks that the local
State or county government fails,
neglects or refuses to make all dilieent
efforts to protect the victim of lynch
Ing, or to apprehend all persons par
ticipating in lynching mob-in that
event the Federal Government is to
step in. The Federal Government is
to prosecute the local, State or
county official, prosecute him in q
Federal Court, try to convict him.
and, on conviction, punish him with
fine up to $4,000 or Imprisonment
up to five years, or both. Further
most astoniShingly further-the Fed
eral Government proposes to put a
fine up to $4,000 upon the county in
which a lynching has taken place, the
money to be turned over to the VIC
TINS heirs.
That is certainly going far in Fed
eral invasion Of States rights. Fed
eral intrusion into local affairs.
Nothing like it has ever been done
before. If the Federal Government
can do this there isn't anything it
can't do within State
II this anti-lynching bill having
passed the House, now passes the Sen
ate, and if the President signs it, and
II it becomes law and if the Federal
Government attempts to arrest State
or county official-then we shall see
something interesting, perhaps some
thing dramatic. We shall see what
the Governor Of the invaded State
will do. There are persons in the
South and elsewhere who think that
. State or county official thus threat
ened by Federal officer should be
defended by force of arms. They
think that governor ought to call
out the State troops, if necessary, to
defend State or county official from
arrest by the Federal Government for
something done or not done by the
State officials in the line of his Of
ficial duty. There have been Gov
ernors, In the North as we'll as the
South, who would not hesitate to 60
that far.
What Southern Democrats Fear.
There have been Federal anti
lynching bills in Congress before
Always the Southern Democrats have
resisted them. Always the resistance
has been successful-no such bill has
ever passed. But now the Southern
Democrats have two fears. They fear
this bill will be enacted, as indeed it
may bet has already passed the
House. And the Southern Democrats
hova onother feor nauy oro