The historical prosecution of hate crimes in the United States of America
Hate crimes refer to criminal conduct that is motivated by the personal prejudice or bias of the perpetrator. This article examines the laws that were historically used by the American federal government to prosecute hate crimes prior to the passing of a federal hate crime law. Within the American federal system, the prosecution of crimes is largely left to states that comprise the federation. In the nineteenth century, however, the recalcitrance of states to prosecute racially motivated hate crimes led to the passing of numerous federal criminal civil rights laws which permitted greater federal intervention in the investigation and prosecution of such crimes. Despite the laudable intentions underpinning the enactment of federal criminal civil rights laws, these laws were costly to implement and poorly interpreted by the courts. The Civil Rights Act of 1968 which was passed after the Civil Rights Movement allowed for greater federal intervention in the investigation and prosecution of hate crimes at state and local level. However, the Civil Rights Act of 1968 contained burdensome evidentiary requirements which placed the onus on the prosecution to prove that 1 Since there is no globally accepted definition of a hate crime, a hate crime can be described as a crime against the person or property that is motivated by the perpetrator's bias or prejudice towards the victim. In crimes against the person, the bias or prejudice could have been directed against a personal characteristic of the victim, such as, inter alia, the victim's race, ethnicity or sexual orientation. In property crimes, the perpetrator's bias or prejudice could have been directed against a personal characteristic of the owner, the possessor or the occupier of the property. Senior Lecturer, Department of Criminal and Procedural Law, University of South Africa.