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RACIAL PROFILING PROHIBITION ACT OF 2001 -- HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON
(Extensions of Remarks - May 17, 2001)
[Page: E833] GPO's PDF
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HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON
OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Thursday, May 17, 2001
- Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, today we introduce the Racial profiling
Prohibition Act of 2001 (RPPA). Congress is decades late in doing its part to
insure that law enforcement officers no longer stop or detain people on the
street because of their color or their apparent nationality or
ethnicity.
- It was not until 37 years ago that Congress passed the first civil rights
law that had any teeth. The 1964 Civil Rights Act finally barred
discrimination against people of color in employment, public accommodations
and funding of public
institutions. Yet, today, irrefutable, and widespread evidence from every
state confirms racially and ethnically motivated stops by police officers and
shows that Congress has urgent, unfinished business to update the nation's
civil rights laws.
- This bill, which is overwhelmingly supported by both the Congressional
Black Caucus (CBC) and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) as original
co-sponsors, seeks to eliminate both legal and constitutional problems that
arise when a person is stopped by a police officer because of skin color,
nationality or ethnicity. Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (CRA), enacted
in part to implement the 14th Amendment requirement of equal protection,
forbids the use of public money for discriminatory purposes. The bill we
introduce today, is based on both the 14th Amendment, which gives power to
Congress to implement its equal protection responsibilities and on the
spending clause of the Constitution, which allows Congress to put conditions
on the receipt of federal funds
.
- The federal funds that are
the focus of our bill today are the vast sums contained in our transportation
legislation. The last transportation bill, known as TEA-21 (Transportation
Equity for the 21st Century Act) authorized $172 billion for highways in 1998. The new
transportation bill, which Congress will enact next year, will authorize at
least $250 billion in highway
funding . By introducing our
racial profiling bill today, we serve notice that Congress must not authorize
another huge highway bill that
does not effectively bar the use of transportation money to fund racial profiling stops on those
highways .
- The strength of our bill lies in what it requires and what it would do.
The bill requires three important obligations if states are to qualify for
federal transportation funds .
First, law enforcement officers may not use race, national origin, or
ethnicity in making decisions concerning a stop unless they are relying on a
physical description that may include race to determine that a particular
individual may be the person sought. Second, states must adopt and enforce
standards prohibiting the use of racial profiling on streets or roads built
with federal highway funds . Third, states must maintain
and allow public inspection of statistical information on the racial
characteristics and circumstances of each stop. Only three states even
prohibit racial profiling today; ten others require only racial and ethnic
data collection.
- As important as information concerning who gets stopped is, what makes our
bill effective is its sanction: the withholding of federal funds from states that fail to meet
the three obligations of the statute. Money for streets, roads, bridges and
other infrastructure is ardently pursued in the Congress. Each state and
locality receives funds that are
indispensable to building and maintaining major parts of its infrastructure.
Next year's authorization will mean nearly 50 percent more in transportation
funding to states and
localities. These funds will
either reinforce pervasive racial profiling or help eliminate it.
- The power of transportation funding to command the necessary
attention and bring quick results has been repeatedly demonstrated. Congress
has successfully used federal highway funding to compel states to attack
some of our most urgent problems, for example, reducing drunk driving among
minors; requiring the revocation or suspensions of driving licenses of
convicted drug offenders; and establishing a national minimum drinking age.
[Page: E834] GPO's PDF
Police
stops of people on the streets because they are black or Hispanic or of any
other non-majority national origin requires the same urgent action.
- Withholding federal highway
funds works because it hurts.
The threat of losing highway
funds has proven to be a
powerful incentive. We saw the power of this incentive as recently as last
year's Transportation appropriation. Congress enacted a provision requiring
states to enact .08 blood alcohol content (BAC) laws by 2004 or being
forfeiting their highway funds . In only the first six months
after that provision was enacted, six states have already passed .08 BAC laws.
Many more are sure to follow in order to preserve precious highway funds . A racial profiling provision
in the 2003 federal highway
funding bill would give the same
set of alternatives to the states--effective enforcement of racial profiling
legislation or loss of federal funds . If Congress is serious about
eliminating this last disgraceful scar of overt discrimination in our country,
let us put our money where our mouth is.