Senate Backs Legislation to Make Lynching a Federal Hate Crime

It’s 2019 and lynching still hasn’t been properly outlawed. A bill, introduced by Sens. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Tim Scott (R-S.C.), was cleared on Thursday in the Senate to make lynching a federal crime. The measure will now go to the House. Harris, Booker and Scott are the only Black members of the Senate.

Harris tweeted on Thursday:

Congress has tried more than 200 times to pass an anti-lynching law, but has failed. The Senate passed a resolution in 2005, apologizing to lynching victims.

The bipartisan bill acknowledges the harms of lynching, which is a form of domestic terrorism, and the federal government’s failure to stop it.

It defines the crime as “the willful act of murder by a collection of people assembled with the intention of committing an act of violence upon any person.”

In December, the Senate also passed the bill. But it was days before the 115th Congress went out of business, and the measure never reached the House floor.

“It’s not the first time we’ve come down to this body to try to right the wrongs of history,” Booker said on the Senate floor.

“For too long we have failed, failed to ensure justice for the victims of history and failed to make clear in the United States of America, in this great country, lynching is and always has been not only a federal crime but a moral failure.”

According to the NAACP, “From 1882-1968, 4,743 lynchings occurred in the United States.”

“Of the total, 3,446 of the victims were Black, accounting for approximately 72.7 percent; and 1,297 were white, which is 27.3 percent.”

“These numbers seem large, but it is known that not all of the lynchings were ever recorded,” the organization stated.

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