CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



205 



levy war against the United States, or to oppose by 

 force the authority of the Government of the United 

 States, or by force, intimidation, or threat to pre- 

 vent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of 

 the United States, or by force to seize, take, or pos- 

 sess any property of the United States against the will 

 and contrary to the authority of the United States, or 

 by force, intimidation, or threat to prevent any per- 

 son from accepting or holding any office of trust or 

 place of confidence under the United States, or from 

 discharging the duties thereof, or by force, intimi- 

 dation, or threat to induce any officer of the United 

 States to leave any State, district, or place where his 

 duties as such officer might lawfully be performed, 

 or to injure him in his person or property on account 

 of his lawful discharge of the duties of his office, or 

 by force, intimidation, or threat to deter any witness 

 in any court of the United States from testifying in 

 any matter pending in such court fully, freely, and 

 truthfully, or to injure any such witness in his per- 

 son or property on account of his having so testified, 

 or by force, intimidation, or threat to influence the 

 verdict of any juror in any court of the United States, 

 or to injure such person in his person or property on 

 account of any verdict lawfully assented to by him, 

 or shall conspire together for the purpose, either di- 

 rectly or indirectly, of depriving any person or any 

 class of persons of the equal protection of the laws, 

 or of equal privileges or immunities under the laws, 

 or for the purpose of preventing or hindering the 

 constituted authorities of any State from giving or 

 securing to all persons within such. State the equal 



Protection of the laws, or to injure any person in 

 is person or his property for lawfully enforcing the 

 right of any person or class of persons to the equal 

 protection of the laws, each and every person so 

 offending shall be deemed guilty of a high crime, 

 and, upon conviction thereof in any district or cir- 

 cuit court of the United States, or district or supreme 

 court of any Territory of the United States having 

 jurisdiction o'f similar offences, shall be punished by 

 a fine not less than $500 nor more than $5,000, or by 

 imprisonment, with or without hard labor, as the 

 court may determine, for a period of not less than 

 six months nor more than six years, as the court may 

 determine, or by both such fine and imprisonment as 

 the court shall determine; and^if any one or^more 

 persons engaged in such conspiracy, such as is de- 

 fined in the preceding section, shall do or cause to be 

 done any act in furtherance of the object of such con- 

 spiracy, whereby any person shall be injured in his 

 person or property, or deprived of having and exer- 

 cising any right or privilege of a citizen of the United 

 States, the person so injured or deprived of such 

 rights and privileges may have and maintain an ac- 

 tion for the recovery of damages occasioned by suclx 

 injury or deprivation of rights and privileges against 

 any one or more of the persons engaged in such con- 

 spiracy, such action to be prosecuted in the proper 

 district or circuit court of the United States, with and 

 subject to the same rights of appeal, review upon 

 error, and other remedies provided in like cases in 

 such courts under the provisions of the act of April 9, 

 1866, entitled "An act to protect all persons in the 

 United States in their civil rights, and to furnish the 

 means for their vindication.'' 



SEC. 3. That in all cases where insurrection, do- 

 mestic violence, unlawful combinations, or conspira- 

 cies in any State shall so far obstruct or hinder the 

 execution of the laws thereof and of the United 

 States as to deprive any portion or class of peo- 

 ple of such State of any of the rights, privileges, or 

 immunities named in and secured by this act, and 

 the constituted authorities of such State shall either 

 be unable to or shall, from any cause, fail in or re- 

 fuse protection of the people in such rights, and shall 

 fail or neglect, through the proper authorities, to ap- 

 ply to the President of the United States for aid in 

 that behalf, such facts shall be deemed a denial by 

 such State of the equal protection of the laws to which 



they are entitled under the fourteenth article of 

 amendments to the Constitution of the United States ; 

 and in all such cases it shall be lawful for the Presi- 

 dent, and it shall be his duty, to take such measures, 

 by the employment of the militia or the land and 

 naval forces of the United States, or of either, or by 

 other means, as he may deem necessary for the sup- 

 pression of such insurrection, domestic violence, or 

 combinations ; and any person who shall be arrest- 

 ed under the provisions of this and the preceding 

 section shall be delivered to the marshal of the 

 proper district to be dealt with according to law : 

 Provided, That the President of the United States be, 

 and he is hereby, authorized, if in his judgment it 

 should be deemed expedient, to direct voluntary en- 

 listments of any of the militia of the United States in 

 lieu of all or any part of the forces herein authorized, 

 to be employed for the purposes aforesaid, for a term 

 of service not exceeding thirty days, after the final 

 adjournment of the next session of Congress. 



SEC. 4. That whenever in _any State or part of a 

 State the unlawful combinations named in the pre- 

 ceding section of this act shall be organized and 

 armed, and so numerous and powerful as to be able, 

 by violence, to either overthrow or set at defiance 

 the constituted authorities of such State, and of the 

 United States, within such StatCj or when the con- 

 stituted authorities are in complicity with, or shall 

 connive at the unlawful purposes of, such powerful 

 and armed combinations ; and whenever, by reason 

 of either or all of the causes aforesaid, the conviction 

 of such offenders and the preservation of the public 

 safety shall become in such district impracticable, in 

 every such case such combinations shall be deemed 

 a rebellion against the Government of the United 

 States, and during the continuance of such rebellion, 

 and within the limits of the district which shall be 

 so under the sway thereof, such limits to be pre- 

 scribed by proclamation, it shall be lawful for the 

 President of the United StateSj when in his judgment 

 the public safety shall require it, to suspend the privi- 

 leges of the writ of habeas corpus, to the end that such 

 rebellion may be overthrown : Provided, That the 

 President shall have first made proclamation, as now 

 provided by law, commanding such insurgents to 

 disperse : And provided also, That the provisions of 

 this section shall not be in force after the 1st day of 

 June, A. D. 1872. 



SEC. 5. That nothing herein contained shall be 

 construed to supersede or repeal any former act or 

 law except so far as the same may be repugnant there- 

 to ; and any offences heretofore committed against 

 the tenor of any former act shall be prosecuted, and 

 any proceeding already commenced for the prose- 

 cution thereof shall be continued and completed, the 

 same as if this act had not been passed, except so far 

 as the provisions of this act may go to sustain and 

 validate such proceedings. 



Mr. Shellabarger: "I shall state, as well as 

 I can in ten minutes, the effect of this amend- 

 ment. It will have been observed by the read- 

 ing of it that it leaves the first section of the 

 bill as reported by the committee unaffected. 

 The second, third, and fourth sections are 

 stricken out, and are supplied by the amend- 

 ment. 



" That which is substituted in the place of 

 the second section will be found in substance 

 in what was printed and laid on the desks of 

 members this morning as the proposition sub- 

 mitted yesterday by the gentleman from Illi- 

 nois (Mr. Cook), with some verbal amend- 

 ments, and striking out of Mr. Cook's proposed 

 amendment that part of it which relates to the 

 matter of voting, that being supplied now more 



