I do not accept the statement that it "endangers the national security and the general welfare." I have seen no evidence, in my own contacts, that it "adversely affects the domestic and foreign commerce of the United States." I seriously question that statement.

I would like to know what "right" means; that is, "the right to employment without discrimination" is declared to be a "civil right of all of the people of the United States." I have been around Washington most of the time since-or half of the time-since 1941, and I have heard much here about rights. This is declared to be a civil right, and it is a little bit obscure to me as to what that means is a "civil right."

Can you declare a thing to be right? I have been very much impressed by your legal ability, and I would like to know.

Senator DONNELL. I am not undertaking to express the power of declaration of civil rights at this time. We would be glad to have your views on it.

Mr. QUIGG. I would very much like to know what a right is; that is, a civil right. There has been much said here about what the various rights are. There are many rights. There is a right to employment set forth, and the only place that I can find that in American history, a statement of rights, is again in the Declaration of Independence. The rights are mentioned there as "unalienable rights," but there is nothing in the Declaration of Independence about those unalienable rights being given by the Government. They are "endowed by their Creator," as I recall. They certainly derive from the Creator. Men who are created equal are endowed by their Creator with these rights, and the function of government-if I recall the Declaration of Indenedence correctly-the function of government is to secure those rights. I do not find in the Declaration of Independence any other function of government except to secure those rights.

If there are any questions that I can answer I would be very glad to do so at this time.

Senator ELLENDER. Aside from your views on the declaration of policy, why, in your opinion, would this law not be workable in the South, or in any other State that you can think of other than what would fall within the limits of the South?

Mr. QUIGG. The law could be made to work after a fashion. It would require a very large staff, I should think, and I note that the bill provides for as large a staff as the Commission should decide is necessary. Whether the Congress would then agree with the Commission is questionable, because I think you all remember Leon Henderson stated that it would require 90,000 people to properly administer OPA and he never did get that large a staff.

Senator ELLENDER. How many people would it require to actually administer this as intended?

Mr. QUIGG. I do not know; I do not think anybody knows.

Senator ELLENDER. Do you think that the passage of this law would be more effective in order to give to the colored people, and other minority races, this equality of opportunity that we have all been discussing here today?"

Mr. QUIGG. I think that from my own observation of the lumber industry, some of it quite close at hand in the backwoods down South, you can just multiply the statement of the gentleman from Richmond.

If you will recall, he kept coming back to this: "We would find it hard to refute this," or "We would at least have to come into court to do it, and defend litigation in that respect." The lumbermen that I have talked to about it-and I have listened to them in meetings, and I have heard them discuss it with each other in trying to buy and sell lumber-have been very much worried about the time that they had to take in complying with the regulations. It was not so much the regulations, but what they had to do, that was necessary to meet the requirements of a Federal bureau to satisfy the bureau that they were complying. The man in the bureau has only rules by which he can operate. He does not have authority to go beyond the rules.

This Commission as proposed has possibilities of a tremendous number of rules. To do any good you would have to have a great number of rules. The best comparison would be the OPA.

In lumber, in Chicago, which is my home, the regional OPA had a great many men on the staff that knew nothing about lumber. They had two people there who did know something about lumber. In order to acquaint these people that did not know anything about lumber, out in the district where they had to apply the rules company by company, one man in the Chicago office wrote a large book. I saw it the last time I was in Chicago and it was a tremendous work. It was very well done, but by the time he got the book completed the OPA was out the window. It still was not really complete, even then. You still could not take that large book and do a good job with OPA.

You are going to run into the same job in the administration of this law, as it relates to lumber. I do not speak for any other industry. You have to bear in mind that in the South, alone, there are somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 sawmill operations. How many woodworking plants, like Mr. Saunders has, I do not know. There are thousands of them. They range from large operations down to very small ones. I visited one in 1943, and took movies that I showed to the Patman committee, where there were seven men in the whole operation. As I recall it, three of them were running the mill and the others were in the woods, or were delivering lumber when it was sawed, to the concentration yard that bought their lumber.

To give you an idea how well a small sawmill operator may understand these Bureau regulations, I came there with an Army lumber buyer. He had a Government shield on the side of his car. (He took me around all over Mississippi to these different small mills.) There was a Government shield on the door of the car, as I mentioned, and the mill operator's wife saw that shield, and she did not want to tell where the mill was. She thought that we were coming there to take her husband into the Army. He had just been reclassified in the draft. He had been given an occupational deferment, but his wife thought that I was the agent of the United States Government to take him into the Army. They were both greatly relieved when I told them that the classification he had meant that he was not going into the Army. Senator ELLENDER. That is a little off the subject, but do you think that in effect the administration of the law would be rather difficult? Can you assign any specific reasons why, in your own mind, this bill would not operate adequately in the South, and would not obtain the goal that is sought to be accomplished by some of the proponents of

this measure? That is what I am more interested in rather than the OPA, and other agencies.

Mr. QUIGG. The only thing I can say is that you will have the same trouble that the OPA had in the operation of this bill to try to achieve these ends. You will have the same problems. All of these thousands of mills in the South would present their problems to you. There are no two trees alike. Out of one tree, there are no two boards alike. You have the same thing in the administration of this bill, that no two men are alike. The people in the South, I have found, resent someone else coming in and telling them how to conduct their business.

There were some of them that I visited that were inclined to resent my coming there from Chicago, until they found out I was not trying to tell them how to run their business, but simply to listen to them. It took me several years to reach the point where the people in the South did not figure that I was trying to run their business. They resent that. I found numerous instances where they resented what they thought was this Government attempting to tell them how to run their business.

The things that I have encountered in the lumber business bear out what you have been told here today. The man from Texas told about the progress that they are making there, without the Federal Government doing it. I heard the same thing to be true of Alabama. This lumberman was explaining his interest in the Negroes. His neighbors thought that the situation presented a necessity to look after them. I had some of these ideas that you have heard, as to improving the lot of the Negro by possibly writing about it, or legislating about it, until I visited the South, and since I have come to Washington.

Senator DONNELL. We thank you very much for giving us the benefit of your views.

The committee will recess until tomorrow morning at 9:30.

(Whereupon, at 3:50 p. m., the committee adjourned until 9:30 a. m., Thursday, July 17, 1947.)

ANTIDISCRIMINATION IN EMPLOYMENT

THURSDAY, JULY 17, 1947

UNITED STATES SENATE,

COMMITTEE ON LABOR AND PUBLIC WELFARE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ANTIDISCRIMINATION, Washington, D. C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 9:30 a. m., in the committee room, Capitol Building, Senator Forrest C. Donnell presiding.

Present: Senators Donnell (presiding), Smith, Ives, and Ellender. Senator DONNELL. The committee will be in order.

The first witness is the Honorable Fielding L. Wright, the Governor of the State of Mississippi.

Governor Wright.

STATEMENT OF HON. FIELDING L. WRIGHT, GOVERNOR OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI, JACKSON, MISS.

Senator DONNELL. Governor Wright, will you be kind enough to state your full name and your address?

Governor WRIGHT. Fielding L. Wright, Jackson, Miss.

Senator DONNELL. You are the present Governor of the State of Mississippi?

Governor WRIGHT. Yes, sir.

Senator DONNELL. When were you elected Governor of Mississippi? Governor WRIGHT. I succeeded to the governorship on the 2d day of November 1946, at the death of Gov. Thomas L. Bailey.

Senator DONNELL. Governor, would you state, please, so that we may have something of your background, where you were born and, if you have no objection, when?

Governor WRIGHT. I was born on the 16th day of May 1895, at Rolling Fork, Miss.

Senator DONNELL. Have you lived all of your life, this far, in Mississippi?

Governor WRIGHT. Yes, sir; I have lived all my life in Rolling Fork, where I was born.

Senator DONNELL. You have undoubtedly been over large portions of Mississippi in the course of your experience?

Governor WRIGHT. Yes, sir.

Senator DONNELL. And are widely acquainted in that State, undoubtedly. Have you had occasion, Governor, also to visit, from time to time, other States in the southern section of our country? Governor WRIGHT. Yes, sir.