No Single Action Will Counter Hate Crimes

I am proud to live in and represent the most diverse region in the most diverse country in the history of the world. Such a country clearly needs to take strong action against crimes that threaten to tear apart the very fabric of our society.

In the most recent year, 9,000 hate crimes were reported throughout the United States. More than 40% of those hate crimes were against African Americans, roughly 13% were against Jews, about 12% were targeted against the victims’ sexual orientation.

A recent rash of hate and violence has grabbed national headlines and shaken our collective sense of community--Jonesboro, Ark.; Laramie, Wyo.; Jasper, Tex.; Littleton, Colo.; Conyers and Atlanta, Ga.

For those of us in Southern California, the destructive combination of hate and guns was driven home when children at the North Valley Jewish Community Center in the San Fernando Valley were fired upon and Filipino American mailman Joseph Ileto was shot and killed, both allegedly by reputed white supremacist Buford Furrow.

Precisely because no single action is likely to block more than a few future hate crimes, we should adopt several different responses.

* We need to teach tolerance and respect as an integral part of our school curricula from kindergarten through 12th grade.

* We need better enforcement of existing gun laws, and we need to close loopholes in them. For example, gun shows do not require background checks on would-be purchasers.

* We need to put chemical “tags” in explosives, so that we may find those who commit acts of domestic terrorism--such as the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma.

* We need to prevent children from gaining access to guns, and ban the import of large military-style ammunition clips.

* We need to solve problems with our mental health system. Too many of those who kill seek professional help, only to be turned away. The street is not the place to send our mentally ill to prevent them from hurting themselves or others.

* We need the FBI and federal law enforcement agencies to infiltrate groups that not only preach hate but clearly show that they are willing to violently act out that hate.

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I have participated in a number of demonstrations against hate, but the demonstration in which I most want to participate has not yet occurred. That is when I join the other 434 members of Congress in a march down to the floor of the House of Representatives to vote for the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1999.

We have a hate crimes law on the books today that deals with only attacks designed to prevent victims from exercising their federal constitutional rights. Those children at the Jewish Community Center in Granada Hills were not engaged in a voter registration campaign so it was not a federal crime when Furrow allegedly opened fire on them. The FBI only got involved in the case because Furrow was accused of killing a federal employee, the postal worker.

Just one a week before those shootings in Southern California I was on television debating Rep. Asa Hutchinson, an Arkansas Republican, about the hate crimes bill. His argument is basically that a crime is a crime--if you kill somebody it does not matter whom you kill or why you kill, the same rules should apply.

The difference is that hate crimes injure not only the individual victim and his or her family, but can sow the seeds of fear and intolerance throughout the region and sometimes throughout the country. I have talked to members of Congress from New York, Florida and Chicago and learned that the attack at the Jewish Community Center caused fear in Jewish parents and children across the country, and has necessitated increased security in facilities from coast to coast.

The killing of Joseph Ileto in Chatsworth, and the slayings in Arkansas, Texas and Wyoming similarly cause fear and increase tensions. Certainly crimes that cause such additional harm should be met with additional punishment.

No one thing we do will stop these crimes of hatred and violence. But a package of actions offers an opportunity to do something to reduce these heinous crimes.