Arkansas State press. [volume] (Little Rock, Ark.) 1941-1959, 1946-10-11
EDITORIALS
BI-RACIAL CASES AND
NON-RACIAL STATISTICS
By S. S. Taylor

X Summaries of building conditions in Little Rock and
North Little Rock except the housing survey published some
ago and the last data for which was gathered IN
around l940 make little attempt to give picture OF con
dtions by This line with the general policy except
in the departments of health and education In employment
crime and most the public and private activities that
are matter of public record the recorded by
but they are tabuated without regard to race
This gives excellent opportunity for prejudiced
person discriminate individual gives no OPP
poruny for the public to determine by glance at the sta
tscs annual other reports what the trend IN deal
ing with The published reports of the labor depart
ment give opportunity to determine racial trends The
published reports Of crime give opportunity to determine
racial trends Fines Jail sentences and arrests have not been
presented to the public in such way that racial records can
be readily compared The of the employment service
are faithfully tabled with symbols denotng white
"coored But when those summarized we know
only the totals and never the comparative racial figures
Such procedure may not be malicious 1t may not even
be deliberate But has the effect of giving opportunity for
individual discrimination and hiding the determinations
mass of general statistics The Negro who applies for
ploymen the employment service has chance at any
thing except mental employment The Negro who applies
for unemployment compensation can be offered Job out OF
his line and below his working pay level ana refused benefits
when he refuses work But hint of this out In the
reports of the agency Those reports only show totals
This sin is confined to Arkansas In large Northern
city where Negroes boast that the schools mixed and
where large numbers of Negroes reside in certain sections
zons the writer applied at the school board for racial
figures He grandlosey told We make no racial dis
tinctons All of them just pupils to US Personal in
vestgaton showed concusivey that white children who v
ed the heavily Negopopuated districts being
ferred of those districts white schools and that
those Negroes who moved typical Negro district
typical white district refused transfers to the
district unless they able to bring tremendous political
pressure Yet the gulbe Negroes of that city any
tabulatng of statistics by because they consider that
discrimination. On the other hand they unable de
tect the real discrimination which hidden underneath
refusal to tabulate statistics by
We wonder just what would be the public reaction if
bracia statistics of veterans and their relations
benefits published in Arkansas Even with the
special adjustments of teachers salaries which have been
credaby made recently by the local board conditions
talked from mouth to mouth which many of would
like to cleared by accurate voluntary bracal
port from the local board
It is rumored in connection with the recreation situation
there undercover effort the city that the
New Phander Smith site cannot be used for colored park
1t rumored that arrangements being where
by that site will become white property permanently When
Negroes remember that the City Council turned down gift
of fifteen Of that site for Negro park they wonder
The Community Chest Survey remains the only frank and
open document the subject except of course the
cellent articles in the Gazette and Democrat and this
Up this time, this section has boosted of its franlness
in dealing with the Negro problem Whatever its defects
hypocrisy has not been numbered these To label
individual that they may be readily recognized and
dealt with, and then hide both their labelling and their
treatment in of ndiscrminate statistics savors of
departure from frankness and openness and to the
subteruges and hypocrisy often observable certain
complicated racial procedures in the North and West
We cannot build enduring and harmonious bi-racal
structure foundation of deceit, deception and double
meaning statistics.