Compromised Compromise

"I'm an old campaigner," growled House Republican Leader Joe Martin, "and when I want votes, I go after 'em. Now Sam's an old campaigner too. When he needs votes, he'll go after them too." In jockeying for position on the first U.S. civil rights bill since Reconstruction, Martin and Democrat Sam Rayburn had gone after votes so skillfully that they were deadlocked. Result: late last week, after days of glaring at each other from a distance, the old campaigners were forced to get together on a compromise of a compromise of a compromise.

The week began with this tactical situation: the civil rights bill, with the Senate amendment requiring jury trials in all criminal contempt cases, was stuck fast in the House Rules Committee and needed G.O.P. votes to bring it out. But Joe Martin, who is not even certain that he has any Negroes in his district ("I've seen one or two of them on the streets in Attleboro, but I can't say I can recall the names of any of them"), was determined to place a Republican stamp on what then stood as a Democratic bill. Said Martin:

"We're not at all interested in pushing a Democratic bill through, particularly when it does not provide anything."

Strong Kidneys. Martin persuaded the four Republican members of the Rules Committee to hold out against the Senate bill, set New York's Republican Representative Kenneth Keating to working out a party position on the bill with Acting Attorney General Bill Rogers. Then Joe Martin, who ordinarily confers a dozen or so times a day with his old friend Sam Rayburn, announced that he was not on "talking terms" with "Mr. Rayburn."

With everyone on Capitol Hill wondering when they would get together, the two entered on a war of nerves, each refusing to go to the other. Said Martin: "I wouldn't be so presumptuous as to see the Speaker on a subject like this. I'd be an interloper." Replied Rayburn: "My door is never locked. I'm always glad to see Mr. Martin or any other member of the House." How long would the waiting game go on? Grinned Joe Martin: "My kidneys are good."

Deep Stuff. Martin did not even send Rayburn the proposal worked out by Keating and Rogers. Instead, newsmen handed Sam a copy. He read it once, grunted, read it again, then again and again, finally announced: "This is very deep stuff. I'll have to have a little more time to digest it." Whereupon he disappeared into his office, taking with him four fellow Texans to aid in the digestive process. The Republicans' "deep stuff": 1) the contempt of court provisions of the bill would apply to violations of voting rights only, and not to all criminal contempt cases, as the Senate bill provided; 2) in criminal contempt cases based on denial of the right to vote, federal judges would be allowed to set sentences of up to 90 days and fines of up to $300, but jury trials would be required for greater penalties.

Sam Rayburn consulted with Northern liberal Democrats, who warned him that the Republican plan would be politically difficult for them to oppose. Late one afternoon, Rayburn went over to the other side of the Capitol for a heart-to-heart talk with Senate Democratic Leader Lyndon Johnson. They agreed that some sort of civil rights bill had to be passed at this session; otherwise, the party-splitting issue would return to plague the Democrats in Election Year, 1958. Next morning Lyndon went to work to find out just what kind of a jury trial compromise could get past the Senate. He talked to Southern Senators--Georgia's Richard Russell, Mississippi's John Stennis, North Carolina's Sam Ervin--and gauged the intensity of their reaction. That night Lyndon and Sam met secretly: the Senate, said Lyndon, would probably accept 30 days in jail and a $200 fine as the dividing line between judicial decree and jury trials in criminal contempt cases having to do with voting rights.

Call from a Cadillac. Next morning, on his way to the Capitol, Johnson called Republican Senate Leader Bill Knowland on the ship-to-shore radiophone in his Cadillac limousine. "Sounds like you're in Texas," said Knowland. Replied Johnson, thinking of the congressional adjournment that would come soon after a civil rights agreement: "That's where I'm going to be--if you agree with what I want to talk about."

The Senate leaders scheduled a meeting in Knowland's office. Johnson made his 30-day, $200 offer. Knowland countered with a 60-day, $300 formula. They parted without agreement--but both knew the bargain was near. Later Lyndon Johnson made a telephone call to the President of the U.S. The gist of his message to Ike: Make another offer, and we can probably get together. The chance soon came; negotiating on the Senate floor, Knowland came down to 45 days, and Lyndon upped the ante to $300.

A few minutes later the two old House leaders, both in close touch with developments, finally got together. Joe Martin arose from .his minority leader's table and trudged the 30 feet up to the Speaker's dais. Joe and Sam whispered together for about five minutes. Could they have been talking about civil rights? "Oh, no." said Joe Martin. "We were just talking about when we're going home."

It was all over but the voting. Late that afternoon Martin, Rayburn, Johnson and Knowland held a joint press conference, announced their agreement on the 45-day, $300 compromise of a compromise of a compromise. With that lineup of congressional leadership behind it, not even the outside chance of a Southern Senate filibuster was likely to stand in the way of a civil rights bill. Washington's most knowing advocates of civil rights legislation thought it would be a good, effective law. Their reasoning: most of the acts denying Negroes in the South the right to vote are performed by men widely known and respected in their communities, i.e., local public officials. Not many such men will want to risk 45 days in jail any more than they would want to risk a greater penalty.

The victory for civil rights came 338 years, to the week, after the first shipment of Negro slaves to the British colonies landed at Jamestown, Va.

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