The United States congress has passed legislation that will make lynching a federal hate crime after more than 200 previous failed attempts.
The Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act was passed by the Senate on Monday, March 7, and will now be passed on to US president Joe Biden to sign into law.
It is named after Emmett Till, the 14-year-old boy who was murdered after being accused of insulting a white woman in 1955, and will designate lynching as a hate crime punishable by up to 30 years in prison.
The bill received a unanimous vote in the Senate after previously being passed in the House of Representatives last month. Bobby Rush, a Democrat representative for Illinois who pushed the bill, commended the result in a statement cited by The Times, saying: 'Lynching is a longstanding and uniquely American weapon of racial terror that has for decades been used to maintain the white hierarchy.
Advert
'Unanimous Senate passage of the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act sends a clear and emphatic message that our nation will no longer ignore this shameful chapter of our history and that the full force of the US federal government will always be brought to bear against those who commit this heinous act,' he continued.
Rush added that he looks forward to Biden 'signing the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act into law very, very soon'.
The first legislation against lynching was introduced in 1900 by George Henry White of North Carolina, who was the only Black member of congress at the time, but the bill never made it out of committee. Over the following 100 years, lawmakers tried time and again to pass a bill into law, but never succeeded.
The Times notes that several bills passed the House from the 1920s, but each was reportedly blocked by senators from southern states. In 2005, the Senate passed a resolution expressing remorse at the lack of an anti-lynching legislation, but the law itself still failed to materialise.
Advert
Commenting on the latest effort, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that while the law 'will not erase the horrific injustices to which 10s of 1000s of African Americans have been subjected over the generations, nor fully heal the terror inflicted on countless others, it is an important step forward as we continue the work of confronting our nation's past in pursuit of a brighter and more just future.'
Under the law, a lynching can be prosecuted when the perpetrator conspires to commit a hate crime that results in someone's death or serious bodily injury, including kidnapping and aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kidnap, abuse, or kill.
If you have been affected by any of the issues in this article and wish to speak to someone in confidence, contact Stop Hate UK by visiting their website www.stophateuk.org
Emily Brown