Duncan Faircloth: “over the weekend in my home State of North Carolina, a small black church--the Matthew Murkland Presbyterian Church was…”

“over the weekend in my home State of North Carolina, a small black church--the Matthew Murkland Presbyterian Church was destroyed by fire. This is truly a terrible act. I cannot think of a more despicable act than to burn any church. Nevertheless, this is the 30th such fire for a black church in the last 18 months. In fact, there are reports of another occurring last night. At this time, we do not know if this is a nationwide effort by some hate group, or the acts of crazed individuals. I would suspect that some of this has been organized, and that some of these are copycat crimes. Whatever the motivation, the legislation I am introducing would clarify that to burn any church is a Federal crime. Further, this lowers the threshold of damage necessary to make it a Federal crime from $10,000 in damages to $5,000 in damages. This makes certain that those that are doing this on an organized basis across the Nation will surely be brought to justice for the crimes they are committing. This is the same bill that Congressmen Hyde and Conyers have introduced in the House of Representatives. The President has announced his support for this legislation. It is my hope that the Congress can act on this bill soon and send it to the President.”