House Republicans have called for Manhattan District Attorney Albert Bragg to appear before Congress to answer questions about his office’s pursuit of legal actions against former President Donald Trump. While some, such as National Review columnist Andy McCarthy have been very critical of Bragg’s legal actions, they are also critical of the House Republicans for interfering in a matter involving a local court in New York City. In McCarthy’s words, the Republican House members need to “stay in their lane.”

Contrary to McCarthy’s view, there is historic precedence for Congressional action to deal with local legal matters. In the 1960s, Congress passed laws to protect the civil rights of Blacks in the segregated South. A big reason Jim Crow persisted for so many years, was the existence of a dual system of justice that discriminated against Black people and suppressed the civil rights of people openly opposed to such discrimination.

Blacks were prevented from voting by a variety of subterfuges such as requiring that Blacks, and only Blacks, memorize the entire content of the Mississippi Constitution or accurately guessing the number of jelly beans in a jar, in order to register to vote. Those Blacks who tried to register were, in addition to being denied the ability to register, often fired from their jobs or subjected to Klan violence.

Cartoon shows man "Mr. Solid South" writing on wall, "Eddikazhun Qualifukazhun. The Blak man orter be eddikated afore he kin vote with us Wites, signed Mr. Solid South." An African American looks on. Illustration in: Harper's Weekly, v. 23 (1879 Jan. 18), p. 52 (Library of Congress collection)

During the civil rights movement of the fifties and sixties, civil rights workers were subjected to harassment by unequal application of the law, where they routinely faced biased all-White juries and even such petty harassment as selective enforcement of minor traffic violations. Worst of all, people who had murdered civil rights workers were acquitted by local juries simply because the perpetrators were White and the victims were Black or civil rights workers.

For decades the federal government refused to intervene on the grounds that it would be a violation of state sovereignty. Eventually, in response to this flagrant violation of the most basic human rights, Congress passed a number of civil rights statutes. These laws allowed federal charges to be filed against clearly guilty defendants who had committed racially motivated crimes against Black people but were found innocent as a result of jury nullification. This injustice was re-enforced by Democrat presidents who appointed racist federal judges in deep South states at the request of local Democrat party elected officials.

Eventually, the federal government was forced to step in and in the most famous case, indicted and convicted the murderers of three civil rights workers in Philadelphia, Mississippi of violating their civil rights after a state court had acquitted them of murder.

It seems to me that when state prosecutors take the law into their own hands for partisan political reasons, the Congress is justified in holding hearings to determine if federal legislation is necessary to protect the political rights of those being abused. Bragg's partisan political attack on Trump is much more than an attack on one man. It is an attack on his political supporters and as such is an attack on democracy itself. Under the circumstances, it seems not only justifiable for the House Judiciary to hold hearings on the matter, it is their duty to do so.