A Policymaker's Guide to Hate Crimes

Despite the best efforts of political and community leaders to foster tolerance and understanding, deep-seated racial tensions continue to plague the Nation. News stories of bias-motivated incidents fill the national pages of major U.S. newspapers. A rash of arsons at African-American churches in the South, for example, has spurred the Federal Government to launch a major investigation that, so far, has led to the arrest of 120 suspects. Of the 298 Federal arson investigations carried out between January 1995 and November 1996, approximately 43 percent involved fires at black churches, although white churches far outnumber black churches in the Nation. Political and religious leaders said that the disproportionate number of black churches being burned indicated that the Nation was experiencing a serious wave of hate crimes.