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Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts

Judicial Conference Questions Need for New Federal Statute

Hate crimes legislation is the latest congressional initiative that appears to expand the criminal jurisdiction of federal courts into areas previously prosecuted exclusively by state courts, a representative of the federal Judiciary told a Senate committee today.

"This trend to federalize state offenses places the viability of judicial federalism...unquestionably at risk," said Judge Richard J. Arcara, a district court judge and a member of the Criminal Law Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. "S 1529 (the Hate Crimes Prevention Act) appears to be emblematic of that trend." Arcara testified today before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The bill, Judge Arcara told the Committee, "presents a difficult but crucial issue for Congress to consider. That issue is not whether we are `for' or `against' the prosecution of hate crimes. All decent, right thinking people abhor hate crimes. The real issue before you is whether the acts of violence covered by the proposed statute, which are already criminal offenses under state law, and which may already be federal crimes as well, are not adequately prosecuted and punished at the present time."

The scope of S. 1529 is extremely broad. The bill would provide for federal prosecution of a significant number of crimes that are traditionally prosecuted in the state systems. For example, it would make a federal crime of any act resulting in the bodily injury of someone, or the attempt thereof, when it is motivated by the actual or perceived race, color, religion or national origin of any person. The bill also authorizes appropriations to increase the number of personnel to prevent and respond to these crimes, an aggressive use of federal resources to enforce the proposed law.

"While the Judicial Conference has taken no official position on this bill," said Judge Arcara, "we believe S. 1529 appears to be but the latest proposal in a trend that seeks¾unwisely in our view¾to expand the criminal jurisdiction of the federal courts into matters previously prosecuted exclusively in the state courts."

During the past decade and a half, a steady stream of Congressional enactments have expanded the jurisdiction of federal courts over larger and larger areas of criminal activities traditionally reserved to prosecution in the state courts. The Judicial Conference has regularly expressed concern over this trend, and consistently urged that the prosecution of most crime should remain the responsibility of the states so that the federal criminal justice system may devote its limited resources to prosecuting those offenses that it is uniquely suited to investigate and prosecute.

"We believe that a rapidly expanding jurisdictional base will affect the federal Judiciary's ability to manage its core responsibility, which is the expeditious adjudication of cases involving issues of traditional federal interest," Judge Arcara told the Committee. "With its limited resources, the federal criminal justice system was never designed for, and is not capable of, being the criminal court of primary resort. . . .We strongly believe that the interests of crime victims ultimately are best served by a criminal justice system which strikes the right jurisdictional balance between the federal and state courts. Preserving the integrity of our federal system will, in the long run significantly strengthen our criminal justice system and allow it to effectively deal with crimes that truly cannot be effectively handled in the state court systems."