Nation: WHAT THE CIVIL RIGHTS BILL WOULD DO

DOES anyone really know what the civil rights bill now proposes? It has been kicked around for an awfully long while. First sent to the Congress by President Kennedy last June, it was partly changed by the House of Representatives and sent on to the Senate in February. It has languished in the chamber of winds during the longest filibuster in history, still faces substantive amendment under a bipartisan agreement achieved by Republican Everett Dirksen. Civil rights groups, without being specific, claim that it is too weak. The bill's opponents, without being specific, insist that it is so strong as to ruin the framework of the Republic. Herewith, what the civil rights bill, including the Dirksen amendments, would do:

VOTING RIGHTS

The House-passed measure requires that within a given county the procedure under which residents seek the right to vote in a federal election must be uniform for all persons. No one could be disqualified for some irrelevant error or omission in his application papers. Any person who has completed six grades in an accredited school could be presumed literate. Where a literacy test is required, the applicant could demand a certified copy of the test and of the answers he gave. The bill would cover any election "held solely or in part" to elect or nominate a candidate for federal office.

PUBLIC ACCOMMODATIONS

The House bill bans discrimination in hotels, motels, inns, restaurants, cafeterias, lunch counters, soda fountains, theaters, concert halls, sports arenas and gas stations. It exempts private clubs and rooming houses with fewer than five rentable rooms in buildings occupied by the owner.

If a person were denied access to such a public place, his remedy would be to file a civil suit asking a federal court to order the proprietors to cease such discrimination. Also the Attorney General could file such a suit on behalf of the U.S. Where state or local laws ban such discrimination, the Attorney General would have to give state or local officials "reasonable time" to act before filing suit. The Attorney General could, if he wished, use the services of local agencies to seek a voluntary solution. But if he decided that any delay would "adversely affect the interests of the U.S." or that referral to state officials would "prove ineffective," he could so notify the court and proceed with the suit.

Dirksen would alter this procedure sharply. If there were a local public-accommodations law, an individual could not file a federal suit until 30 days after he had notified local officials of his complaint. The federal court could delay the suit until local officials completed their action. If there were no local law, he could file federal suit immediately. The court then would have the power to ask a newly created Community Relations Service to investigate and to seek voluntary compliance with the law for up to 180 days. These negotiations would be secret. If they failed, the suit would proceed.