Senate called to order at 11:05 a.m.
President Hammargren presiding.
Roll called
All present.
Prayer by the Chaplain, Pastor Albert Tilstra.
Today, dear Lord, we come again to renew our commitment with You. We ask that You teach us how to look at things we see, and to look at them without bias or prejudice. We may not know how much of our troubles are caused by refusing to look at the facts or by viewing them so differently.
If You will help us cast the mote of prejudice and pride out of our eyes, then we will be able to see clearly. We pray for good sight and good sense. Grant us these requests we pray.

Amen.

Pledge of allegiance to the Flag.

Senator Raggio moved that further reading of the Journal be dispensed with, and the President and Secretary be authorized to make the necessary corrections and additions.
Motion carried.

Your Committee on Commerce and Labor, to which was referred Senate Bill No. 87, has had the same under consideration, and begs leave to report the same back with the recommendation: Do pass.

Randolph J. Townsend,

Chairman

Mr. President:

Your Committee on Judiciary, to which was referred Senate Bill No. 12, has had the same under consideration, and begs leave to report the same back with the recommendation: Amend, and do pass as amended.

Mark A. James,

Chairman

Mr. President:

Your Committee on Judiciary, to which was referred Senate Bill No. 8, has had the same under consideration, and begs leave to report the same back with the recommendation: Do pass.

Mark A. James,

Chairman

Mr. President:

Your Committee on Legislative Affairs and Operations, to which was referred Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 5, has had the same under consideration, and begs leave to report the same back with the recommendation: Be adopted.

Kathy Augustine,

Chairman

Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 6--Commemorating African-American History Month.

Senator Neal moved the adoption of the resolution.
Remarks by Senators Neal and Jacobsen.
Senator Neal requested that the following remarks be entered in the Journal.
Senator Neal:
Thank you, Mr. President. I do not think that the subject of black history can be adequately addressed without looking at this subject from the standpoint of its political and legal history in this country. In order to address this particular subject from the standpoint of political and legal history, I would like to start during the period of 1619 when a Dutch warship sailed up the Jamestown River carrying some 20 slaves which were sold to the colonists in exchange for food. Hence began the strange tradition of selling human beings in this country even though, prior to that period, we had blacks who were working as indentured servants. Anthony Johnson was one who owned land during that period of time. So, we had this strange development of slavery and freedom existing during the same period of time. But, it was not long before we began to see the separation of the race by identifying whites and blacks as being separate. The terms "white" and "black" became in vogue when referring to these two races in the late 1600s. From that period on, we saw strange developments as the colonies began to grow cash crops of indigo, tobacco which they were able to sell to Europe for other goods and services. We saw the development of the African-American slave triangle as it was called. These ships went to Africa, picked up slaves, dropped them off in Haiti and other places such as this country and picking up crops of tobacco and rum which they in turn delivered to other sections of the world. As I said, it was a strange period which led to certain developments. You might question what the "blacks" were doing during this period; were they not trying to correct this particular condition? Of course they were! And you had "whites" who abhorred slavery. Of course you did! Yet, the political system failed to adequately address the problem of slavery during this particular time.
In order to segregate a human being you must engage the institutions of the church to de-humanize an individual and make him less than a human being. The church and the state participated in this activity.
We did not see until later, during the 1800s, when we began to have this condition of slavery sanctioned by our government. In the case of Dred Scott vs. Stanton, Dred Scott was an individual who had lived in a free state for some time. Under the law, it stated that if you lived there for a period of time you would become free. But, it did not happen so Dred Scott sued. When the case went before the Supreme Court of the United States, the court found that Dred Scott was still chattel and that his body and soul were owned by others to be traded as a commodity on the open market. That, my friends, brought about the Civil War.
The Civil War was supposed to address these conditions. We had the passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States. Following that, we passed the first Civil Rights Act in 1868 which was supposed to address the conditions of inequality. Yet, the government was somewhat reluctant to enforce these amendments and this particular law. Whereas the constitutional amendments had declared that "blacks" were free, should have voting rights and equal protection of the law, yet somehow this country did not recognize those conditions. As a result, we saw blacks being placed into a caste system in which they became sharecroppers and working in servitude which was a condition akin to slavery. Servitude meant that you worked for a person for wages toward a debt which you were never able to pay off.
If I might go back to the developing of that grand document we call the Constitution in 1789, when this document was being considered they did not consider "blacks" as being free. As I mentioned previously when I was addressing Martin Luther King's birthday resolution, the framers of the Constitution considered "blacks" as three-fifths of a person in order to give white southerners equal representation in Congress. This was the first affirmative action for whites. That condition remained as part of the Constitution until the 1860s.
During the 1870s, you might say there was a bit of a Camelot, a period in which African-Americans sought freedom. Businesses were developed and many had ownerships of land. Many also escaped to other areas such as the West where they settled. You just heard the mention of the name Benjamin Palmer who came to the Carson Valley in 1848. He owned 360 acres of land in the Carson Valley where he raised 700 head of cattle which he sold to miners and other ranchers.
When opportunity presented itself, "blacks" readily accepted it. Even accepting those opportunities, since most of the "blacks" were concentrated in the South, it was very difficult for them to leave. These people were the laboring force. White gangs were developed in order to keep black laborers on the farms. Even in my area, Tensaw Parish, they would not allow "blacks" to leave on wagon trains traveling westward. You may have seen the movie with Sidney Poitier, a few years ago, called "Buck and the Preacher." It exemplified that particular period where "blacks" who tried to leave these conditions and go westward in order to make a better living. Some of them made it but some did not. Some of them arrived in Tulsa, Oklahoma as well as setting up cities in Kansas. These were good places where the lives of "blacks" were enhanced. If I may skip ahead, in the 1920s Tulsa, Oklahoma was known as the Wall Street of the West. Somehow we lost that.
The franchise given in the 1860s by the constitutional amendment was not enforced. The troops stationed in the South were pulled out by a political arrangement to give the presidency to Rutherford B. Hayes. During the election of 1876, there was a tie vote. In order to break that tie, the election was thrown into the House of Representatives. The southern representatives made a deal to cast their votes for Hayes if the troops were pulled from the South and end the franchise for "blacks." That essentially was what he did. This brought about the night riders called the "Ku Klux Klans." In 1896, we got the sanction of segregation. The separate but equal doctrine was brought about by a man by the name of Plessey who stepped aboard a train in New Orleans. He sat in a section that was commonly reserved for "whites." He was told to move. He didn't and was arrested. The Supreme Court eventually got the case and expressed in its ruling that you could have separate but equal facilities. Those were the facilities that the Majority Leader observed when he was in the South. There were separate water fountains, separate restrooms and separate schools, but they were not equal. During that period, from 1890 to 1894, there were more than 5,000 lynchings of "blacks." This condition led to the development of such organizations as the NAACP in the early 1900s. Strangely enough, the founder of the NAACP was a white woman by the name of Mary White Covington. I wanted to tell you that because when I tell you this history concerning what happened to "black" Americans and why I cannot get angry over what happened. If I get angry with you, because you are "white" then I have to be angry at Mary White Covington who founded the NAACP. I would have to get angry at John Brown who, in the early days of slavery, thought it was not palatable for a country to segregate human beings and sought to arm the slaves to fight for freedom. I would be angry with many of those citizens who were at great risk to themselves during a period in our history when they could very well have been killed and some were. Some of you may remember Mary Luzzio of the Civil Rights' Movement who was killed in Alabama during the march between Selma and Montgomery. So, when I talk about this history, as painful as it is, we can not be angry because we have to look at those who tried to correct the problem.
Beyond all of that, why is it important for me today to talk to you about this particular history? It is important today because many of those same divisions, however differently characterized, do exist today. We just saw that division in the trial of O. J. Simpson. We saw two trials, the criminal trial and the civil trial. We saw the lack of understanding of the citizens, both black and white, the justice of that system. "Whites" said that he was guilty. "Blacks" said that he was innocent. When they had a black criminal jury, whites would not accept the verdict. When they had a white civil jury, blacks did not accept the verdict. So that tells you in Nevada and my colleagues in the Senate as well as the Nation that Americans still has a racial problem. This a problem I think can be overcome. This is a problem which is going to take a great deal of understanding because if "blacks" perceive as the conservative Edmund Burke has said that when citizens are crushed by laws, there is no hope. If "blacks" perceive that they are being crushed by laws, there is no hope. When citizens, blacks or whoever, think the laws become the enemy then they will become the enemy of laws. It is important for us, as lawmakers, to understand these conditions and try to address them in a way which they can be and should be resolved. It is not a question of whether or not we can. Do we have the will? That becomes the key question. We have the ability to solve problems, the question is whether or not we have the will. I can say to you, as a person who is black in this body, who has both experienced and lived in a segregated system, who has been discriminated against, if we do not address this problem of race in this country in a few years we are subject to undergo one of the most devastating, tragic incidents - a race war. This, my friends, is not idle talk. Where a Joe Neal would be willing to sit down and talk, those youngsters coming after me are not so ready to do that. As long as we have a history where we do not recognize the ability and service of one group because of color, then we are prone to fall into this abyss of racial conflict.
The other day, I listened with great concern when our President awarded seven Medals of Honor to seven "black" men who fought in World War II. The tragic part of that entire situation was that only one of these men lived to receive that award. Six of those men were awarded the medal posthumously. These were men who fought to maintain this democracy. Yet, on the battlefield where some died, they could not be given the heroic recognition at the time it was so deserved. I commend our President, even at this late date, for going back and rectifying this problem.
Let me say to you, speaking again from observation, that when at our most difficult times of racial conflict, it is usually a period when this country is not at war. When this country does not have to face an enemy such as Russia. Some of us, who have observed with great concern and patience the political activity of this country, very well know that in periods of conflict there is always a rush to include those of us. This goes back my friends from the War of Independence, the War of 1812 up to the threat from Communist Russia which we only recently were rid of. Once that threat died down, somehow we have gotten comfortable in our feelings concerning others. We then go back to doing the same old thing. George Washington did it during the War of Independence. He marched into Valley Forge with 9,000 troops. On the verge of defeat, he solicited the slaves and raised his troop count to 30,000. Five thousand of these consisted of slaves. As the British did, he promised them freedom after the war was over. It did not happen. The British allowed their 25,000 slave troops to go free and sent them to other places. There's a message here. The same thing happened during World War I. During World War II, Roosevelt issued an executive order integrating certain aspects of the armed services. In the early 1960s, the United Nations met in New York. At that time Nikita Kruschev was head of the USSR. You might remember him as pounding his shoe on the desk. He brought with him members of most all of the Communist nations including Cuba. Fidel Castro came to New York and stayed at the Teresa Hotel which was a "black" hotel in Harlem. All of a sudden, the Voter's Rights Act came to the forefront, the Civil Rights Act started to move forward because something had to be done. This was because our condition, the condition of the question of race was being used by Kruschev as well as many other communist countries around the world to divide this country and make it difficult for this country to function on a world stage. Why did we have to wait for that to happen for action to be taken on this problem. As many "black" people would ask "am I not a citizen in my own right? Why do you have to have conditions where I'm needed, before you might consider me a man and an equal citizen of this country?" That is still a crucial question today. We can try to hide it, but it is here with us. Until we are able to stand up and recognize it and until we are able to stand up and say, as a gentleman says in that old song "am I too your native son?" Until we are able to recognize that and stand up and say it with true meaning, then the conflict of race will never go away. The "whites" will be applauding on one side and the "blacks" applauding on the other. Then the country becomes divided. There are 37 million "black" people in this country. Even as Thomas Jefferson once dreamed, the great emancipator who wanted to put us on a boat and send us back to Africa, we are not going anywhere! We are going to be here until hell freezes over. If that should happen, then we'll skate.
So, America, let's wake up to the problem. If it is going to be about justice, let it be about equal justice. If it is going to be about opportunity, let is be about equal opportunity. I do not think any "black" person or any group of "black" people do not have the industrial ability to survive in this country. When we caught the wagon trains and hitchhiked a ride to the West, we came here with Brigham Young, Elijah Able was one of those who died. Because, when conditions are bad, people do not just stay around wait out the storm, they seek to correct it. You cannot continue to hem them up in a corner and expect them to be docile. You cannot do that. So, America you have to understand that "black" people too are native sons.
Some of you might have wondered why "blacks," in this state and many other states, do not have ownership of businesses, don't have much ownership of property, or don't own a hotel in the State of Nevada. You might wonder about that. Well, that is a long, long story. I can tell you, since I mentioned about Tulsa which was at one time called the Wall Street of the West and was owned, serviced and controlled by "blacks." Rosewood, Florida, a lumbering town was owned and controlled by "Blacks." What happened to these towns? It became a question of race which destroyed. In them, one person claimed to have been raped by a "black." In both of these instances these towns were burned to the ground, one in 1909 and one in 1919. Burned to the ground. You would think, if a crime was committed, you would want the individual who committed the crime to be punished. But no, it was the one race the people of Florida and the white people of Oklahoma went after. It is not because "blacks" do not have the ability to be industrious, to create. We have suffered the pains of racism which stifle our opportunity. You probably could not turn on the lights in this building or use the elevator to go to the third floor if it had not been for our ability to create the light bulb and the elevator. What I am saying, ladies and gentlemen who are lawmakers, you who can make a difference in giving my people opportunity and not stifle their creativity, and the world becomes a better place. But, in this country and this legislature, it is about control. Who has the power and who does not. I am telling you that it is time to share that power and share that control because, if you want a nation that benefits your generation in the future, it is time to start building now. Things are changing. The world is changing all around us. Twenty-four years ago, when I entered this legislature, South Africa had a white, segregationist government. Today, that government is black. One of the things I have noticed in talking with some of our friends from Taiwan, who wanted to do some developing in South Africa, for whatever reason Nelson Mandela wanted to recognize the Republic of China. I do not know what his reasons were, but I can tell you that bodes of great significance for the United States. It should bode great concern for you personally for there is a message there. As long as you look at one because of the color of his skin or the texture of his hair and thereby determine the ability or usefulness of that person, we are headed down the wrong road.
In closing, let me say that for those of you who applauded the O. J. Simpson verdict, I hope you understand that it is not about winners or losers. It is about understanding the abyss which divides us. It is about trying to determine the reason for the applause and eliminate that cause. Justice can only come when there is a greater understanding of our differences, of our cultures, about background, our hopes and our fears. Thank you.

Senator Jacobsen:
Thank you, Mr. President. I certainly stand in support of this resolution. I think we all realize that history never responds at the same time, same place and same instance. I heard my good colleague mention that Ben Palmer was a cattle rancher in Douglas County. I can vividly remember that my grandparents or my parents never talked disrespectfully about him or his family. I think it is also interesting to note that today, between the old timers and not so old timers, that ranch is still referred to as the Palmer ranch. However, I admit that the young people in our valley probably do not realize that the Palmer ranch was owned and operated by a "black" person. I think that is our fault because history does not go quite far enough. In school, we remember only Greek and Roman history and often times forget our own history.

Resolution adopted.

By the Committee on Human Resources and Facilities:
Senate Bill No. 115--An Act relating to the bureau of alcohol and drug abuse; revising the provisions regarding the priorities for allocation of the money received by the bureau from the tax on certain liquor; and providing other matters properly relating thereto.
Senator O'Connell moved that the bill be referred to the Committee on Finance.
Motion carried.

By Senators Adler, Mathews, Regan, Schneider, Shaffer, Titus and Wiener:
Senate Bill No. 116--An Act relating to elections; reducing the monetary threshold for campaign contributions that must be separately identified by candidates and certain persons and committees for political action; requiring certain committees sponsored by a political party to report the campaign contributions received; reducing the monetary threshold for campaign expenditures that must be reported by certain persons, committees for political action, political parties and committees sponsored by a political party; and providing other matters properly relating thereto.
Senator Adler moved that the bill be referred to the Committee on Government Affairs.
Motion carried.

By Senator Rawson (by request):
Senate Bill No. 117--An Act relating to taxes on retail sales; providing for the submission to the voters of the question whether the Sales and Use Tax Act of 1955 should be amended to provide an exemption from the tax for medicines for domestic animals if prescribed or administered by a licensed veterinarian; contingently providing the same exemption from certain analogous taxes; and providing other matters properly relating thereto.
Senator Rawson moved that the bill be referred to the Committee on Taxation.
Motion carried.

By the Committee on Judiciary:
Senate Bill No. 118--An Act relating to crimes; changing the penalties for certain crimes related to theft; and providing other matters properly relating thereto.
Senator James moved that the bill be referred to the Committee on Judiciary.
Motion carried.

On request of Senator Washington, the privilege of the floor of the Senate Chamber for this day was extended to Eloise Anderson.

Senator Raggio moved that the Senate Adjourn until Thursday, February 6, 1997 at 11 a.m.
Motion carried.

Senate adjourned at 12:07 p.m.

Approved:

Lonnie L. Hammargren, M.D.

President of the Senate
Attest: Janice L. Thomas
Secretary of the Senate