US Congress passes first-ever law making lynching a federal hate crime – National

The US Congress on Monday gave final approval to a law that would go into effect for the first time Lynch a federal hate crime in the US, sending the bill to the President Joe Biden to sign the law.

The Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act is among some 200 bills introduced over the last century that have attempted to outlaw lynching in America.

It’s named for the black teenager whose brutal murder in Mississippi in 1955 — and his mother’s insistence on an open coffin to show the world what was done to her child — became a defining moment in the civil rights era.

“After more than 200 failed attempts to outlaw lynching, Congress is finally succeeding in taking a long-overdue action by passing the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer told DN.Y.

The law would allow a crime to be prosecuted as a lynching if a conspiracy to commit a hate crime results in death or serious bodily harm, according to the bill’s proponent, Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill. The maximum sentence under the anti-lynching law is 30 years.

The House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a similar measure in 2020, but it was blocked in the Senate.

Last week, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a revised text, and the Senate unanimously passed the bill late Monday.

“Lynching is a longstanding and uniquely American weapon of racial terror, used for decades to uphold white hierarchy,” Rush said.

The congressman said the passage of the Emmett Till anti-lynching bill “sends a clear and powerful message that our nation will no longer ignore this shameful chapter of our history and that the full force of the U.S. federal government will always be used against it.” come will commit this heinous deed.”

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