Mamie Till-Mobley Memorial Stamp Act
This bill directs the U.S. Postal Service to issue a commemorative postage stamp in honor of Mamie Till-Mobley, the mother of Emmett Till (who was kidnapped and lynched in 1955).
[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4581 Introduced in House (IH)]
<DOC>
117th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 4581
To provide for the issuance of a commemorative postage stamp in honor
of Mamie Till-Mobley, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
July 20, 2021
Mr. Rush (for himself, Mr. Carson, Mrs. Hayes, Mr. Khanna, Ms. Norton,
Ms. Jackson Lee, Ms. Pressley, and Mr. Thompson of Mississippi)
introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on
Oversight and Reform
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To provide for the issuance of a commemorative postage stamp in honor
of Mamie Till-Mobley, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Mamie Till-Mobley Memorial Stamp
Act''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
The Congress finds the following:
(1) Emmett Louis Till was born to Mamie Elizabeth Till-
Mobley on July 25, 1941, in Chicago, Illinois.
(2) Emmett Till was raised by Mamie Till-Mobley in the
Woodlawn neighborhood of Chicago's South Side, attending the
nearby McCosh Elementary School.
(3) In August of 1955, Emmett Till traveled to Tallahatchie
County, Mississippi, to visit his great uncle, Moses Wright.
(4) Before Emmett Till traveled to Tallahatchie County,
Mamie Till-Mobley cautioned him about the dangers of the
segregated South, instructing him to ``be very careful . . .
humble himself to the extent of getting down on his knees''.
(5) When purchasing bubble gum in Money, Mississippi,
Emmett Till was falsely accused of flirting with shopkeeper
Carolyn Bryant, who would acknowledge that her own claims were
false in 2017.
(6) Emmett Till was abducted at gunpoint from Moses
Wright's home by Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam on August 28, 1955.
(7) Full of vitriol and racial hatred, Roy Bryant and J.W.
Milam beat, tortured, and killed Emmett Till with senseless
brutality.
(8) Emmett Till's body was found in the Tallahatchie River,
having been so gruesomely tortured that it was only
recognizable from his father's ring on his finger.
(9) When Emmett Till's body was recovered, his ear was
found torn, his eye was displaced, his teeth were missing, and
the iron cotton gin fan used in his murder was still attached
to his corpse.
(10) On September 2, 1955, Mamie Till-Mobley received her
son's casket at the Illinois Central Terminal, falling in grief
at its sight.
(11) Mamie Till-Mobley demonstrated exemplary bravery,
requesting an open-casket funeral for her son, because in her
words, ``everybody needed to know what had happened to Emmett
Till''.
(12) Over a four-day period, over 50,000 visitors viewed
Emmett Till's body at the Roberts Temple Church of God in
Christ.
(13) The horror and grief caused across the country and
across the world by the photos of Emmet Till's body helped
spark the civil rights movement.
(14) The Reverend Jesse Jackson would describe Emmett
Till's open-casket funeral as the ``big-bang'' of the civil
rights movement.
(15) Emmett Till was laid to rest at Burr Oak Cemetery on
September 6, 1955, in Alsip, Illinois.
(16) During the trial, Moses Wright and other local
residents demonstrated unspeakable courage by identifying Roy
Bryant and J.W. Milam as Emmett Till's killers in open court.
(17) The all White jury deliberated for just 67 minutes,
arriving at their preposterous verdict to acquit Roy Bryant and
J.W. Milam.
(18) In a January 1965 interview with Look magazine, Roy
Bryant and J.W. Milam admitted to having gruesomely killed
Emmett Till.
(19) Mamie Till-Mobley continued to be a champion for civil
rights after Emmett Till's death and funeral.
(20) Mamie Till-Mobley would earn a bachelor's degree cum
laude from Chicago Teachers College in 1956 and earned a
master's degree in administration and supervision from Loyola
University Chicago in 1975.
(21) Mamie Till-Mobley distinguished herself as a special
education teacher in Chicago.
(22) Mamie Till-Mobley authored ``Death of Innocence'',
with Christopher Benson, which was published months after her
passing.
(23) Mamie Till-Mobley passed away on January 7, 2003, at
the age of 81.
(24) On February 26, 2020, the House passed H.R. 35, the
Emmett Till Antilynching Act to commemorate the life of Emmett
Till, make lynching a Federal crime, and correct a deep
historical injustice.
SEC. 3. MAMIE TILL-MOBLEY COMMEMORATIVE POSTAGE STAMP.
(a) In General.--The Postmaster General shall issue a commemorative
postage stamp in honor of Mamie Till-Mobley.
(b) Denomination; Designs.--The commemorative postage stamp issued
under this Act shall be issued in the denomination used for first class
mail up to one ounce in weight and shall bear such designs as the
Postmaster General shall determine.
(c) Issuance Period.--The commemorative postage stamp issued under
this Act shall be placed on sale as soon as practicable after the date
of the enactment of this Act and shall be sold for such period
thereafter as the Postmaster General shall determine.
<all>
Introduced in House
Introduced in House
Referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.
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