The Catholic times. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1951-current, 1959-05-15
BREIC-
Two Signs Make
A Difference

One of the troubled moments of my life came a
few years ago when ! walked from a train into a rail-
road station In a southern city.
A Negro porter took my suitcase, and just Their
7 saw the people / had come to visit. / started toward
them; and my heart sank.
To reach them / had to pass through an entrance
that was nothing more than two arched openings of
equal size, separated by nothing more than a post.
Above each opening was a sign. The sign on the
left read White the sign on the right read 'Colored.'
IN II MOMENT during which the porter and
/ approached that entrance-way, a lot of thoughts
went through my mind.
For one thing, I felt ~resentful over the division
Of Americans into two groups or classes.
Nothing has ever burned deeper into me than
the statement in the Declaration of Independence that
all men are created equal.
My impulse was to walk under the sign that read
"colored. / wanted to make that much Of a protest,
as an American.
l realized, however, that l was a guest. It is not
the part OF a good guest to 60 out of his way to make
himself CONSPICUOUS, or to criticize the ways of his
hosts.
l had to consider, also, that if l did what / felt
like doing. ! might embarrass the porter.
THE UPSHOT was that l walked under the
White sign, and he under the sColored' sign. We were
only a few feet apart as we did so; and afterward we
were side by side again.
Ifelt like scowling and laughing at the same time.
The whole performance was as ludicrous as it was de-
Sldul1lS " uuIIldu UlSuIy.
For hours ~afterward, / wondered whether the
Negro porter had thought that | considered myself
superior to him..
didn't; L couldn't; and I hoped that somehow he
l do not think that ever in my life have / felt
superior to anybody. My faith as a Catholic forbids il,
my common sense forbids it, and my Americanism
forbids it.
EVEN NOW, I wish I could hand this article to
that porter, so he would know that | felt acutely I'M
happy as I walked under the white sign, and saw
him 60 under the 'Colored' sign.
Christianity says that this sort of thing Is all
wrong. The Declaration of independence and the Con-
~stitution also say it is all wrong. And as / said, common
sense says 50 too.
What else, then, could the us. Supreme Court
have said, when the issue of racial segregation in the
public school systems was laid before the justices?
All the same, | understand something of the
South's problem. l know how %damnably difficult and
+ WAS BORN AND REARED in the North, but
| feel very much at home in the ~South-except for
this one thing.
am descended from people whose farm was
right on the Mason.Dixon line between Maryland
and Pennsylvania; between the South and the North.
My wife and I honeymooned in the South, and
often went on auto trips there later. u
A few years ago, we toured Kentucky, Tennessee,
Alabama and Mississippi, and saw how the South's
moderate leaders had been silenced, and extremists
encouraged, by the emotions aroused by the Supreme
Courts decision.
know that much time and patience will be need.
ed; but in the long run, the South will solve its vexing
problem.
KNOW Too-and this / know weIl-that most
southerners are shamed by the low sort of thing that
happened not long ago outside St. Joseph the Worker
Church in Marrero, Louisiana.
Ten Catholic white men, on a Sunday morning,
came out Of the church after mass-after the renewal
of Christ's sacrifice of Himself for our salvation and
our brotherhood.
The men waited until three Catholic Negroes
emerged. They set upon them and beat them with
fists, tire irons and pistols, because the Negroes had
dared to kneel in pews toward the front of the church.
know that this kind Of thing sickens good south
erners. It sickens every Christian and every decent,
manly man. It sickens me; and I will say no more
about It.