a vast difference in the fundamental principles of the present Auchincloss bill to what is in the Kefauver bill and what was in the so-called Auchincloss bill was up in the last Congress.

Now do you expect the committee and the Congress, just because there is something before it, to adopt it, and to go right along because the ultimate objective in somebody's mind is to do something? Those are the things on which the committee would like to have some help. Mr. DEWITT. In regard to that, our organization believes that whatever, in regard to the majority or plurality vote, in regard to the question of the manner in which Congress retains authority by veto or by positive legislative action upon bills passed by the Municipal Council, that it is interested in securing action, and just as in the Constitution we have had amendments and Congress will and can exercise the power if the District of Columbia, through its municipally elected legislative group adopts certain ordinances can be changed just as changes have been made in other legislation.

There are many things which today we might advocate with reference to minor details of the bill which would have to be modified in view of future circumstances. The basic principle involved is simply that Congress can delegate just as it has delegated to the present Commission a good many powers, reserving the right to protect the Federal interest, which is necessary because of the unusual system that obtains in Washington relative to the Federal Government. Mr. HARRIS. Thank you very much, Mr. DeWitt.

Mr. DEWITT. Thank you.

STATEMENT OF JAMES WILLIAM BRYAN, REPRESENTING THE DEMOCRATIC CENTRAL COMMITTEE

Mr. HARRIS. Our next witness will be Mr. James W. Bryan, from the Democratic Central Committee.

The committee will be glad to hear you at this point, Mr. Bryan, and I trust that you will take just as much time as you feel necessary in representing the Democratic Central Committee of the District.

Mr. BRYAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HARRIS. And if you have been inconvenienced or delayed we want to offer our apology.

Mr. BRYAN. Personally I have been neither inconvenienced nor delayed, Mr. Chairman, because I have enjoyed these proceedings, because to me they have been most extraordinary.

My name is James William Bryan-and spell the William out.

I come from the State of Tennessee, Mr. Chairman, and I have been here 37 years. I am perhaps the dean of the Democratic workers in the District of Columbia. I have been to every national convention on my own, and especially can I say that consistently I have voted for home rule, some kind of home rule since the beginning of the home rule idea.

Since 1912 I have been on such a committee, and since 1892 the Democratic platform and the Republican platform, I believe, have included such a provision.

Now, Mr. Chairman, my desire is not to delay these proceedings, but a proceeding like this is very much like a barrel of fish hooks, when you take hold of one you pull out a lot of others.

I feel that there is a crying need, time or no time, for a summary on the part of the defense. I feel that it should be shown in the record as follows: That we are not, those of us who are for home rule, the razzle-dazzle, bobbed tails of the District of Columbia, that we stand on sound ground and have our place as citizens in this city; that the Board of Trade's last testimony was inspired, that it was based on self-interest; that the constitutional question, if you please, has been answered beyond per adventure of argument in the summation I would like to see made.

And here is the thing I feel most deeply. I have told you that I am from Tennessee. We love Estes Kefauver. We believe in Estes Kefauver; we believe he is a man of destiny. We believe that we have in him somebody in whom we are well pleased.

I have stood right here, and sat right here in this committee room and have heard the bill called every kind of name; every term has been used right in this committee room by members of this committee, one that the author, if you please, is the author of a phony bill, and undoubtedly as a political

Mr. HARRIS. Let me interrupt you: What member of this committee has referred to it as a phony bill? Mr. BRYAN. His name is Abernethy. He has called it every name, and has led witnesses to say the same thing. He led this Dr. Shepard out to call it names that I do not even remember-it has been a long time since I shot craps on the levee. Now I

Mr. ABERNETHY. Just a minute.

that last remark?

Mr. BRYAN. I was

What were you referring to in

Mr. ABERNETHY. Just a minute. I want to understand what you meant by your last statement.

Mr. BRYAN. What last statement?

Mr. ABERNETHY. The statement that you just made.

Mr. BRYAN. I was not reading; I was speaking extemporaneously. Mr. ABERNETHY. Well, the reporter can read it.

(The reporter read the record as requested.)

Mr. ABERNETHY. What did you mean by "It has been a long time since I shot craps on the levee"?

Mr. BRYAN. I mean, you said it was a phony; you called it various names that I did not understand, and when Dr. Shepard

Mr. ABERNETHY. What was that?

Mr. BRYAN. I said I did not remember. Did you not call the bill. a phony bill?

Mr. ABERNETHY. No, but if I did not I will call it that now.
Mr. BRYAN. Thank you; that is all I want from you.

Mr. ABERNETHY. That is not all I want from you.

Mr. BRYAN. All right, go ahead.

Mr. ABERNETHY. I want to know what you meant by your statement "That it has been a long time since I shot craps on the levee"?

Mr. BRYAN. I meant that you were using various names that I did not recall, but you used some terms that I do not remember.

Mr. ABERNETHY. I stated that

Mr. BRYAN. And you insulted Mr. Kefauver.

Mr. ABERNETHY. You are just as crazy as the devil.
Mr. BRYAN. All right.

Mr. ABERNETHY.

insult him.

* * *

if you think I insulted him. I did not

Mr. BRYAN. I was here.

Mr. ABERNETHY. Has he told you he has taken offense at it?
Mr. BRYAN. Well, I have.

Mr. ABERNFTHY. You ought to be the last person to come here and say that you have a right to take offense. He has not been offended. I have stated that this bill provides for creating a proxy council, have I not?

Mr. BRYAN. Yes. I think you used that term among others.

Mr. ABERNETHY. I stated that it sets up a proxy council. But who said it was a phony bill?

But

Mr. BRYAN. A man by the name of Abernethy from Mississippi. Mr. ABERNETHY. Well, if I did not use it I will use it now. what did Dr. Shepard say?

Mr. BRYAN. Well, you led him to say

Mr. ABERNETHY. What?

Mr. BRYAN. To call him-you quoted his views.

Mr. ABERNETHY. He called it a "quickie," did he not?

Mr. BRYAN. I imagine; I do not know what a quickie is.

Mr. ABERNETHY. You certainly went to considerable trouble

Mr. HARRIS. The Chair feels that the committee should proceed in order.

Mr. BRYAN. With your permission.

Mr. HARRIS. You may proceed.

Mr. BRYAN. I should like to follow up this summary, if it is of interest to the committee, and if the committee is not interested we will not insist upon it.

I have mentioned just now the fact that we are not the rag-tag bobbed tails of the District of Columbia, as they say, no reasonable man, would be found on the home rule bill, or words to that effect. I want to say that we are not in that group. We are not members of any subversive orgnaization, including the Communist Party or the Ku Klux Klan. I have never known a Communist or a fellow traveler, but I have known many members of the Klan, and I have seen them by the thousands, yes, as a newspaper man, by the tens of thousands in their conclaves and cross burnings and mammoth parade in Washington. This was one of the tremendous parades of the Ku Klux Klan.

Neither am I a member of the board of trade, but I have known many of its members, and for more than a generation have realized that this organization is through "special privilege" the true master of the District of Columbia. Indeed, asking Ed Colladay and his familiars about voteless Washington, in my opinion, is the same thing as asking Ed Crump about Memphis.

Aside from being a citizen of the District of Columbia-if there is such a thing-I attest my right to speak on behalf of the District on substantial grounds, for up to date I am primarily responsible for bringing approximately $12,000,000 of outside money to the District and investing it in taxpaying real estate, and if I may modestly so state, Mr. Chairman, this is more money than any other human beingliving or dead-has ever brought to this town and District, including the eminent counsel of the Board of Trade and his organization in its entirety as such.

As I say, I represent the Democratic Central Committee of the District of Columbia-the authoritative voice of the Democrats residing in this territory. We are heartily behind this bill. Personally I was a member of the committee which wrote one of the original drafts of the present bill. As perhaps the dean of Democratic workers of the District I can testify from my own experience that we, the Democrats of the District, have fought for home rule earnestly in every national convention since 1912, and it has been in our platform since 1892.

I am thoroughly familiar with S. 1527, the Kefauver bill. I have given testimony before the Senate District Committee on this bill, and have had opportunity to know and familiarize myself with its contents. I have analyzed it carefully, and for the sake of the District of Columbia and the people living here, and for our country itself, I respectfully recommend to you its immediate clearance to the House.

Knowing these matters as I do, I am in utter bewilderment why this committee has not long since reported this bill to the floor of the House, where, we are confident, it will pass with an overwhelming majority.

Is it that you do not believe the District really wants suffrage? In answer to that permit me to offer a figure of speech. Push back these walls so as to have them include one of the largest stadiums in the world, with tens upon tens upon tens of thousands of citizens. If you did so, a member of the central committee of the Democratic and Republican central committees could stand by the gate and call from rosters in their possession continuously for approximately 4,000 hours, calling the names and the addresses of people, residents of Washington, who most recently had expressed that interest in suffrage and franchise in the District, and thereby have reestablished their determination to exercise their rights as American citizens. I refer, of course, to the 200,000 people here in Washington who voted through our committees in the last Presidential election; who, despite the impediment of absentee voting thus demonstrated their vital interest in the exercise of the franchise, and helped to carry the glorious election of Mr. Truman.

If you could or did hold such a show, the board of trade, of course, would come in on a pass; but it would make little difference, for we could sit the entire membership on the stage where they scarcely would be noticed at all in such a crowd.

As the duly authorized Democratic spokesman of the District, I earnestly request the members of our party and this committee to vote this measure out of committee. Moreover, I cite you the long list of prominent citizens, associations, and other organizations who are already listed and who have testified on behalf of this bill, and labored for it many, many years.

But, of course, the one conclusive and final test as to whether the Americans living in the District of Columbia resent being denied the vote, resent taxation without respresentation, and resent gratitous and capricious dictation-is to put home rule to the vote. This bill provided for a plebiscite; or, as it is more politely called, a referendum. Nine hundred thousand people live here by, but not under the flag, and it is a national disgrace.

Perhaps it is the so-called problem of minority groups-or, to be specific, the Negro or colored question, which has caused this committee to delay its action.

Gentlemen, I am of the South, the deep South. I was born thereborn and raised there, educated and lived my early manhood there. I am steeped in all of the southern traditions and philosophies. Whether there be a Negro problem or racial tension-whether it can be solved or not-are subjects beyond this immediate discussion; but one thing I know: As a native-born American I know it, as a believer in our country and its tenents of faith, and as our history clearly shows, I know that the ballot is the one and only known remedy, the only just appeal, to resolve such questions. Earnestly I ask you, gentlemen: Is it better to have such matters decided by edict from the White House, by fiat of a bureaucrat, or even by Congress? Isn't it better that such questions be decided by all the people-black and white-who must live here together?

Do you hesitate because you fear Negro domination in the Nation's Capital? This is without foundation. The Negro can no more dominate than the Irish, than the Jews, the Methodists, the Catholics, labor, or management. I have known brown-skinned Democrats as ardent as any "lily-white." I have known black-skinned Republicans more hide-bound than the maple sugar cookers in the backwoods of Vermont. Every class and every shade of political leanings are reflected in the Negroes as well as in any other group or class. The United States of America is the melting pot of the world. It It represents every kind of people-all races and all religions and all concepts. is a healthy thing that this is true, and we have no more to fear and no more to hope for in the dominance or the control of any group in the District of Columbia than we have in all America.

It

My bewilderment increases when I realize, in the face of my long experience, that these self-same problems with which you struggle today have been studied for many years, and during the last few years repeatedly have been exhaustively reviewed by counsel and staff of the committees, both in the Senate and the House. Indeed, this committee's own record in the Eightieth Congress in itself creates an unanswerable argument for home rule. For instance, much in these hearings has been heard concerning the "constitutional question." While I have read a bit of law but have never practiced, I have served as a law clerk for my father and his fellow judges in Tennessee. I by no means claim to be a constitutional expert, but early I learned two things concerning that hallowed document and preserver of our liberties, and they were that, like the Scriptures, it may be quoted by the devil as well as the saint. [Laughter.] And that it seldom means what it says as you and I read it.

The Constitution means, always has meant, and shall ever mean but one thing and one thing only and nothing else-and that is the intent that was in the minds of the men who wrote it; and when you refer to the authorship of the Constitution, you are speaking largely and almost solely of one man, James Madison. At least, such is the tribute paid him by his fellow members on the Constitutional Committee, who called him the Father of the Constitution.

Frequently in these hearings you heard Mr. Madison's words concerning the intent of Congress as published by him in The Federalist, which have been quoted; but far more potent than these or any other words by Mr. Madison or others is the action taken. Unanimously and without a dissenting vote the men who wrote the Constitution, the self-same men who created the District of Columbia, granted as