We appreciate that the guarantee of the rights of the individual under the Constitution is one of the things which makes our country the envy of most of the civilized world. We would not have it otherwise. However, we feel that sometimes in our zealous endeavors to protect individual rights, the rights of the community are lost sight of. Now is such a time. The incidence of crimes and violence in the District of Columbia has risen to the point where it affects the daily lives of all of us. Citizens of the District are afraid for their personal safety on buses, at the District of Columbia Stadium, and on the public streets, both day and during the night. Our newspapers editorialize on the subject almost daily. National news magazínes carry lead stories of our unhappy plight. Only yesterday, a local business establishment took a full page newspaper ad to bring this to the attention of the public and the Congress. I wish we could recommend to this committee some universal panacea. We cannot. Like many others, we believe that the Mallory rule, the Durham rule, and the ban on investigative arrests have made law enforcement in the District more difficult. As one to assist law enforcement officials, the federation has recommended that the distinguished group of citizens which recommended abolition of investigative arrests be reconstituted and requested promptly to recommend a substitute procedure which would be available to the Police Department without violating constitutional guarantees. We believe that the Mallory rule has had unfortunate consequences, and we recommend that your committee report out a bill making confessions of crime more readily available to our local prosecutors. We urge you to seriously consider ways of protecting the community at large from those who are acquitted of crime by reason of mental disorder and are released upon the community and commit further crimes for which they are also not held responsible by reason of a mental disorder. Finally, we urge you to heed most seriously the request of Chief Murray and his Department for the necessary men, equipment, and police dogs adequately to patrol the public areas in the District. It is false economy of the worst sort to save a few tax dollars on police salaries at the expense of losing your life in the bargain. Perhaps educators and sociologists can eventually get to the roots of the crime problem in the District and devise countermeasures, but at best this will require a great deal of time. The situation today calls for immediate action and increased police protection appears to be the only immediate answer. I had intended, sir, to speak to the various bills that you had before the committee today. Mr. WHITENER. Why don't you do that? Off the record. (Discussion off the record.) Mr. ULMAN. I would like to say, sir, that in principle our association is in agreement with the testimony that was given here by former Commissioner McLaughlin this morning. Mr. WHITENER. Let me ask you this: Your organization would recommend, as I understand it, legislative change to the judicial Mallory rule? Mr. ULMAN. That is right. Mr. WHITENER. The Durham rule, which is a judicial rule, you would recommend a legislative change? Mr. ULMAN. Yes. Mr. WHITENER. On the questioning and detaining of witnesses, your organization would go along with the recommendation made by Chief Murray of the Police Department? Mr. ULMAN. That is right, sir. Mr. WHITENER. On the so-called Baumes or four-time-loser bill, you have no position? Mr. ULMAN. No, sir; we have taken a position on that four-time loser and we felt that it refers, as I recall, to commission-fourth commission of a felony. There are some offenses which are felonies, such as a violation of the Securities and Exchange Act-some of the technical provisions of that can be a felony. Therefore, that was our feeling, that before legislation of this sort was adopted, the field should be narrowed somewhat as to what felonies were involved. Mr. WHITENER. Well, I have made this suggestion and it seemed to me if you are going to do this, you ought to put, instead of saying a crime which is committed in the District of Columbia, it would be a felony. That is not a very good definition, because as you point out, there are some Federal offenses for which there would be no strictly District of Columbia act. So it seems to me if you are going to base it on the quality of the crime committed, you ought to say a crime punishable by 5 or more years, or 10 years, in the place where it was committed. Mr. ULMAN. That was the feeling of our committee, that it should be more specific. Mr. WHITENER. Your committee does it take a position on this barring the door to parole, assuming a man was a four-time loser? Mr. ULMAN. No, sir; we did not. Mr. WHITENER. Now, on the activation of Police Reserve, I take it from your testimony that your organization feels that the money will be better spent in paying professional policemen rather than spending it to activate the Police Reserve? Mr. ULMAN. That is correct, sir. Mr. WHITENER. Now, on the firearms and dangerous weapons legislation, have you taken a position? Mr. ULMAN. We have not. Mr. WHITENER. Now, before you go, I wish you would tell us for the record something about the Federation of Citizens Associations of the District of Columbia which you represent. Mr. ULMAN. Well, sir, the federation is an organization which speaks for 50-odd member citizens' associations in the District. Because of the fact that we have no local self-government here, the citizens' association takes the place of a local political organization, or has to date. This is where the citizens bring their complaints. These associations are the voice of the citizens' groups. Mr. WHITENER. These 50-odd associations, do they select, each one of them select a certain number of their membership to become members of the federation? Mr. ULMAN. That is right, sir. Two elected delegates from each federation, each association, make up the membership of the federa tion. As Commissioner McLaughlin pointed out, he has been very active in that. As Witness Norwood pointed out, he was a former president of it. Mr. WHITENER. Then the legislative position you take is the result of resolutions by these various local groups as brought into the federation by the delegates from that Mr. ULMAN. That is correct, sir; and it has been considered by a committee there and ruled upon by the membership in regular meeting. Mr. WHITENER. So the federation is really an organization which correlates the activities of various community citizens' associations? Mr. ULMAN. Yes, sir; and it speaks for a great number of citizens in the District. My association, for instance, is the Palisades. We have over 2,500 members in that organization. This is just one member body. Mr. WHITENER. Would you have any idea as to total number of members in the 50-odd citizens' associations? Mr. ULMAN. I have never seen any figures compiled on that. I would be glad to supply them to the committee if they are available. Mr. WHITENER. It would run into several thousand? Mr. ULMAN. Oh, yes, sir; considerably more than that, I think. I would like to say in closing that we in the federation are extremely interested in the activities of the Crime Commission, for whom former Commissioner McLaughlin testified this morning. We intend to cooperate in every way with that Commission. Many of us are also members of that Commission. I feel, as I think has been expressed by the members of this committee, that possibly we will not get to the solution of this problem by legislation. We have got to get at that by activity at the community level. And this we intend to do. Mr. WHITENER. Mr. Dowdy? Mr. Dowdy. I have no questions. Mr. WHITENER. Mr. Broyhill? Mr. BROYHILL. Mr. Ulman, this may be beside the point, but you did mention that the Federation of Citizens' Associations was somewhat of a voice of the people in the absence of home rule or government. Do you see any relationship to the crime situation here in Washington and the lack of self-government, or do you feel that there would be a change or an improvement in the picture with local seal of government? Or is there any relationship? Mr. ULMAN. I don't think there is any relationship at all, sir, in my opinion. I think that we have a very serious problem here and I don't, offhand, see how it would be affected one way or the other by local self-government. Mr. WHITENER. Well, Mr. Ulman, if you have concluded your statement, we thank you for coming. I believe this is the last of the witnesses on our schedule. Thank you very much. I am sorry we kept you away from your engagement. But it is sort of like trying a case in court. You can't take all the witnesses at one time. At this point, we will put into the record a communication dated April 24, 1963, of the Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association and another communication dated January 18, 1963, from the same organization. (The documents referred to are as follows:) Hon. JOHN MCMILLAN, CAPITOL HILL SOUTHEAST CITIZENS ASSOCIATION, Chairman, House District Committee, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, D.C. DEAR MR. MCMILLAN: At the November 1962 meeting of the Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association, it passed a most important resolution concerning the increase of crime in Washington, D.C. I started to clip crime items from the newspaper to emphasize the resolution. Then the stadium episode occurred, and the organization has waited until the investigation took place and the reports were prepared. This has now been done, and the association sends the following: "Whereas crime is on the increase in the Capitol Hill area, such as citizens being attacked in their homes, in churches, and on the streets both day and night, as well as brutal attacks on arresting officers; and "Whereas many of the meetings at churches and by other organizations held in the evenings are either poorly attended or discontinued entirely or are being held during the day; and "Whereas some officials are against the police making detention for investigation arrests, thereby weakening police efforts to prevent and control crime, and no money is available for additional police officers and police dogs and their training in order to protect citizens; and "Whereas the nations of the world are looking to this Nation's Capital for a pattern of leadership in the preservation of law and order; and "Whereas the present emergency demands law and order on the streets of Washington: Therefore be it "Resolved, That in the absence of law and order, the officials of our Government place sufficient military and civilian personnel on our streets to restore law and order, and that copies of this resolution be forwarded to such offices and officials as may be deemed helpful in securing additional military and civilian personnel." Sincerely yours, ELIZABETH DRAPER, Secretary. CAPITOL HILL SOUTHEAST CITIZENS ASSOCIATION, Mr. BASIL L. WHITENER, Chairman, Subcommittee on Crime, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, D.C. DEAR MR. WHITENER: The Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association unanimously passed the following resolutions at its recent meeting and asks that the action of the organization be included in the printed record of the hearing on crime legislation to be held April 25, 1963: 1. "Resolved, That the Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association endorses the District of Columbia Commissioners' bill to strengthen the hands of the law-enforcement officials in dealing with material witnesses to crime." 2. "Resolved, That the Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association endorses the District of Columbia Commissioners' recommendations for amending the Mallory court rule on admissibility of confessions. "Under the bar association's measure, a confession otherwise admissible would not be ruled inadmissible because of the time between arrest and court action." 3. "Resolved, That the Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association endorses the District of Columbia Commissioners' bill, to use members of the city's police reserve corps for street duty. The corps members would be armed and be teamed with members of the regular police force. The suggestion was made that the experienced police be used for regular crime-prevention activities, and the members of the reserve corps be used for directing traffic and for special events such as diplomatic receptions." 4. "Resolved, That the Capitol Hill Southeast Citizens Association requests congressional authority to pay the off-duty men for police work when the men on duty are being used for such special events as a parade for a visiting dignitary. "Whenever possible, the Metropolitan Police force should be increased by experienced men, rather than by raw recruits that require such a long period of training before their usefulness on the force can begin." Thank you for including this material in the printed record. Sincerely yours, ELIZABETH DRAPER, Secretary. Mr. BROYHILL. May I at this point ask consent to have inserted in the record, possibly at this point, two letters that I have received from an arms manufacturer or arms distributor concerning the weapons bill? I would like to have it in the record. Mr. WHITENER. All right. (The documents referred to are as follows:) Reference: B-1/27013. Congressman JOEL T. BROYHILL, U.S. Congress, Washington, D.C. INTERARMCO, LTD., Alexandria, Va., April 25, 1963. MY DEAR CONGRESSMAN: I wish to bring briefly to your attention certain arguments that we would appreciate being used against the passage of Congressman Multer's bill, H.R. 5608, which is now being discussed before the Commissioners of the District of Columbia and your committee. (1) The bill, as it is now written, has not been endorsed, to our knowledge, by any law enforcement agency in the District of Columbia. (2) The bill, as it is now written, could be interpreted to require of the Commissioners that they set up their own Licensing Department, Permit Department, and Enforcement Department. (3) It has been expressed by representatives of various segments of the gun industry, as well as by representatives of associations, such as the National Rifle Association, that the proposed law is basically unenforceable, since the neighboring communities do not have such legislation nor will they tolerate same. (4) Passage of such a bill would place in jeopardy all the honest citizens from neighboring communities, or those whom the District is honored to have as tourists, since they would not be cognizant of the implications of such a law, and could be traveling in an automobile with a weapon in the trunk. Such a weapon being unaccessible is not considered as a concealed weapon, so it is possible that they would not, as visitors or as transients, realize that they were in violation. I would respectively bring to your attention the fact that the Senate Subcommittee for Juvenile Delinquency is currently holding hearings with regard to an amendment to the Federal Firearms Act, which we believe would solve much of the District's problems with regard to receipt of firearn:s by any individual. These hearings should be concluded in the not-too-ditsant future, and we think it advisable that the District of Columbia Commissioners restrain from making any recommendations until such time as they have had an opportunity to examine the amendment to the Federal Firearms Act, as will be submitted, most probably, by Senator Dodd. Two other minor, but pertinent, facts are as follows: (a) There are a considerable number of guns now legitimately owned by residents of the District of Columbia, which are kept in their homes. The passage of H.R. 5608 would cause, obviously, a considerable problem in this regard. (b) It should be determined whether or not the present judicial punishments for the use of a concealed weapon within the District of Columbia, in commission of a felony or crime of violation, are actually being enforced. In conclusion we would be most grateful if you could bring to the attention of the Commissioners and your committee the problems that the passage of bill H.R. 5608 would cause, and request of them that action be abated until such time as the Senate Subcommittee for Juvenile Delinquency can finalize their proposed amendment to the Federal Firearms Act. Sincerely yours, INTERARMCO, LTD, Vice President. |