Student Group Sets Capital Trip To Seek Legislation for Perdew

A delegation of at least ten University students will travel to Washington on Monday to urge legislation that could speed the release of John W. Perdew '64 and the four other civil rights workers now in their third month of imprisonment in Americus, Ga.

Personal interviews will be arranged for the students with their congressmen and senators, in order to lobby for the enactment of Title X of the House Judiciary Subcommittee civil rights bill, it was announced last night at a meeting of an ad hoc committee for Perdew's release.

William R. Crout, teaching fellow in Gen Ed, explained that the Title would facilitate removal of the case from local to federal courts, where the committee feels it would be dismissed for lack of evidence. Meetings with other senators concerning the bill's passage might also be arranged, Crout said.

Gary T. Schwarts '65 told the group that the bill, if passed, would allow the five Student Non-Violent Co-ordinating Committee members to appeal to the U.S. Circuit Court or the Supreme Court for the removal of their case to a federal court. District Judge J. Robert Elliott of Albany, Ga., recently remanded their case to the state courts, where, under the present statute, it must remain.

Meanwhile, the fund drive to raise $5,000 for Perdew's legal counsel continued at Harvard. He has been charged with inciting an insurrection, an offense that carries a possible death penalty in the state of Georgia.

The student delegation plans to leave Cambridge Sunday evening and return Monday night. Other students wishing to go to Washington with the group may contact Perry Bullard at UN 4-7464 before 1 p.m. today.