fields of Government contracts and Government employment, and in the armed services. Instead of establishing a new Presidential Committee, as was done in these other Executive orders, the President could request the Commission on Civil Rights, if its life is extended, to conduct the necessary continuing studies and investigations and make further recommendations. Recommendations Nos. 2 and 3 Therefore, it is recommended: That the President issue an Executive order stating the constitutional objective of equal opportunity in housing, directing all Federal agencies to shape their policies and practices to make the maximum contribution to the achievement of this goal, and requesting the Commission on Civil Rights, if extended, to continue to study and appraise the policies of Federal housing agencies, to prepare and propose plans to bring about the end of discrimination in all federally assisted housing, and to make appropriate recommendations. That the Administrator of the Housing and Home Finance Agency give high priority to the problem of gearing the policies and the operations of his constitutent housing agencies to the attainment of equal opportunity in housing. Findings FHA AND VA The present policy of the Federal Housing Administration and the Veterans Administration is not to do further business with a builder who is in violation of a State or city law against discrimination. However, waiting upon the appropriate State or city agency to make a finding of violation of State or city law may result in Federal assistance to a builder who is openly or manifestly evading such law. By the time any State or city action against such a builder has been completed the projects may well have been built and sold or rented on a discriminatory basis. Recommendation No. 4 Therefore, it is recommended that in support of State and city laws the Federal Housing Administration and the Veterans Administration should strengthen their present agreements with States and cities having laws against discrimination in housing by requiring that builders subject to these laws who desire the benefits of Federal mortgage insurance and loan guaranty programs agree in writing that they will abide by such laws. FHA and VA should establish their own. factfinding machinery to determine whether such builders are violating State and city laws, and, if it is found that they are, immediate steps should be taken to withdraw Federal benefits from them, pending final action by the appropriate State agency or court. PUBLIC HOUSING Findings The location of sites for public housing projects and the kind of housing provided play an important part in determining whether public housing becomes almost entirely nonwhite housing, whether it accentuates or decreases the present patterns of racial concentrations, and whether it contributes to a rise in housing standards generally. A policy of "scatteration" of smaller projects throughout the whole metropolitan area may remedy some of the present defects of public housing. Public housing projects can serve as schools for better housing and homekeeping. A large number of the tenants are recent migrants from rural areas, unprepared for urban life. Placing them in decent housing units and requiring that decent standards be maintained will help them make a successful adjustment to city life. Locating these projects in better neighborhoods and making them less institutional in appearance will add to this educational process. As a result of the large number of nonwhites in need of low-cost housing and the tendency of whites to avoid living in the midst of a nonwhite majority, many projects are all or predominantly nonwhite. This may result in a proportion of nonwhite occupancy higher than that actually warranted under the Public Housing Administration's "racial equity" formula based on the estimated needs of the two racial groups. In one city the Commission found that the location of public housing sites within areas of Negro concentration resulted in de facto discrimination against low-income white citizens. Recommendation No. 5 Therefore, it is recomended that the Public Housing Administration take affirmative action to encourage the selection of sites on open land in good areas outside the present centers of racial concentrations. PHA should put the local housing authorities on notice that their proposals will be evaluated in this light. PHA should further encourage the construction of smaller projects that fit better into residential neighborhoods, rather than large developments of tall “highrise" apartments that set a special group apart in a community of its own. Findings URBAN RENEWAL City and private programs of slum clearance, conservation and redevelopment, assisted by Federal aid from the Urban Renewal Administration, are changing the face of the Nation. Since nonwhite residents comprise a large proportion of the persons displaced by these programs and since nonwhites do not have equal opportunity to housing, it is important that special needs and problems of the nonwhite minority receive adequate and fair consideration in all such programs. Recommendation No. 6 Therefore, it is recommended that the Urban Renewal Administration take positive steps to assure that in the preparation of overall community "workable programs" for urban renewal, spokesmen for minority groups are in fact included among the citizens whose participation is required. SUPPLEMENTARY STATEMENT ON HOUSING By Vice Chairman Storey and Commissioners Battle and Carlton We yield to no one in our goodwill and anxiety for equal justice to all races, in the field of housing as elsewhere. A good home should be the goal of everyone regardless of color, and the Government should aid in providing housing in keeping with the means and ambitions of the people. Government aid is important where public improvements have displaced people and where slums become a liability to the community. This does not mean, however, that the Government owes everyone a house regardless of his ambition, industry, or will to provide for himself. When generosity takes away self-reliance or the determination of one to improve his own lot, it ceases to be a blessing. We should help, but not pamper. But there remains a financial limit beyond which the Government cannot go. In dealing with the problem of housing, we must face realities and recognize the fact that no one pattern will serve the country as a whole. Some parts of the foregoing report are argumentative, with suggestions keyed to integration rather than housing, and if carried out in full will result in delay and in many cases defeat of adequate housing, which is our prime objective. The repeated expressions, "freedom of choice," "open housing," "open market," and "scatteration" suggest a fixed program of mixing the races anywhere and everywhere regardless of the wishes of either race and particular problems involved. The result would be dissension, strife, and even violence evident in sections where you would least expect it. To us it is not only wise, but imperative that biracial committees be set up in different sections to provide areas for adequate housing in keeping with just requirements for the people involved. This can be done, it is being done in different sections such as Atlanta, Ga., in keeping with the wishes of both races. This responsibility, however, must be met in a positive, courageous, and constructive manner in keeping with the requirement at the local level. SUPPLEMENTARY STATEMENT ON HOUSING By Commissioners Hesburgh and Johnson While the Commission has not had time to consider many important aspects of the complicated housing problem in view of its primary attention to investigations of alleged denials of the right to vote, and of its studies in the education field, three points that were much under discussion in the Commission's housing hearings in our opinion deserve special attention. (1) Relocation of persons displaced by federally aided projects.— The Commission has found that nonwhite Americans constitute a high proportion of those displaced by urban renewal programs (and, it should be added, by federally-aided highway programs), and that such nonwhites are severely restricted in their housing opportunities. We believe that, in addition to the recommendation of the Commission that in the preparation of local "workable programs" for urban renewal there be adequate nonwhite participation, other measures should be taken to assure that the human side of slum clearance and redevelopment is given adequate attention. For instance, the Federal-aid highway program, which is displacing an increasing number of urban residents and is often being used to clear slums, has no provision requiring that displaced families be rehoused in accordance with specific standards, nor is any financial assistance provided for their relocation. While property owners receive compensation for property condemned, the problem of relocation arises largely in urban areas where those displaced, many of them tenants who receive no compensation, have great difficulty finding, or cannot find, decent, safe, and sanitary dwellings within their means. In the urban renewal program, on the other hand, the act of Congress requires that "decent, safe, and sanitary dwellings" be available at rents and prices within the financial means of the displaced families, either in the urban renewal area itself, or in areas "not generally less desirable." However, the Commission received evidence that such housing for relocation is in some places not in fact available. President Eisenhower has said that steps must be taken "to insure that families of minority groups displaced by urban redevelopment operations have an opportunity to acquire adequate housing." It seems to us essential that all the Federal agencies take such positive steps to assure that these minimum human requirements of slum clearance and redevelopment are in fact met by the local communities. While the Federal-aid highway program should not be turned into a housing program, the act should be amended to provide that in any urban area where any substantial number of low-income persons are to be displaced by the construction of a federally aided highway, the locality must incorporate the highway program in its urban renewal program, and the relocation requirements and standards of the Urban Renewal Administration must be met in regard to all such displaced persons, or the localities must otherwise see that decent, safe, and sanitary housing is available to such persons. (2) Racial patterns in urban renewal.-As President Eisenhower has also said, the Federal Government must "prevent the dislocation of such [minority-group] families through the misuse of slum clearance programs." In the Commission's housing hearings there were allegations that urban renewal programs are being used in some instances for "Negro clearance" and that new patterns of segregated neighborhoods are either being created or existing patterns of segregation are being substantially accentuated. With the nonwhite citizens' participation in planning urban renewal at the local level which the Commission has recommended such questions should be raised at an early stage. In addition, we recommend that communities' workable programs and specific urban renewal projects be examined by the Urban Renewal Administration and the Housing and Home Finance Administrator to assure that no community is using Federal urban renewal assistance to accomplish such results. Examination of each urban renewal project in this light will require the services of persons of special competence in the field of intergroup relations. (3) The shortage of low-cost housing.—The studies and hearings of the Commission have shown that progress in remedying the lack of opportunity to decent housing by nonwhite Americans depends in large part upon progress in overcoming the general housing shortage for lower income Americans. This is also directly connected with relocation and urban renewal. Slum clearance and urban redevelopment are necessary, but they require the provision of decent low-cost housing for those displaced. President Eisenhower has said that the Government will "encourage adequate market financing and the construction of new housing for such families on good, well-located sites." In the absence of better answers, it seems imperative that the present programs of urban renewal, public housing, home mortgage insurance and assistance, including the Voluntary Home Mortgage Credit Program, be continued on a sufficiently long-term basis to make sound planning by local housing authorities possible. Beyond this, most officials, housing experts, and industry leaders testified that further efforts must still be undertaken to encourage the construction and sale of decent, low-cost private housing. The Commission did not try to make specific recommendations in these areas that require expert knowledge, but we would like to stress |