"The Minorities Question"

Toward a Better World November 1946

I was brought up in a home where learning Bible verses, collects and hymns was a daily and Sunday practice. As children we were often asked if we had read our portion of the Scriptures every morning and every night as we were expected to do, and though I am afraid that those good habits have slid away from me in this busy world of today, when decisive moments come in life it is curious how often the Bible verses that fit the occasion come to mind.³

The second commandment, "Love thy neighbor as thyself," has often been before me when I have heard people generalize about groups of their neighbors who, like them, are citizens of the United States of America.⁴

There is no use in shutting our eyes to the fact that racial and religious tensions in this country are becoming more acute. They arise partly from experiences back in the past, experiences very often in other countries where wars were carried on between people of various nationalities. I think they persist in this country largely because of the insecurity of some of our people under our economic system. If times are hard, jobs scarce and food hard to get, we always prefer that someone else be the victim of these difficult situations and we fight to keep ourselves on top. We come to attribute certain characteristics to different races and nationalities. We differentiate too little, and even where religions are concerned, if they are not our own, we are apt to lump people all together as doing certain things because they are Jew or Gentile, Catholic or Protestant.

I have come to think, therefore, that the basic thing we must do is to stop generalizing about people. If we no longer thought of them as groups but as individuals, we would soon find that they varied in their different groups as much as we do in our own. It seems to me quite natural to say: "I do not like John Jones." The reasons may be many. But to say: "I do not like Catholics or Jews" is complete nonsense. Sometimes people go further and say, "All the Irish here are Catholics and all Irish Catholics are politicians, therefore they are corrupt," or, "All Jews engage in sharp business practice." More nonsense and futile generalities. Because the Jews have been oppressed through the ages and have learned in a hard school, since their opportunities are restricted, to work harder when opportunities open up for them is not strange. All disadvantaged people do the same. When opportunities are open to them the Negroes will work hard too.⁵

The Negroes perhaps suffer more from this lumping together of people than any other race. Because the South has created a picture, a charming one of mammies, old fashioned butlers and gardeners and day laborers, we must not believe that that is the whole picture. They have rarely shown us the picture of the intellectual, or of the soldier, or of the inventor. Because of circumstances there are relatively fewer of them in the colored group, but they do exist. I think many people, if they closed their eyes and talked to a mixed racial group, would find it hard to tell the difference, from either the voice or the sentiments expressed, between the cultivated white man and the cultivated Negro.⁶

If we really believe in democracy, we must face the fact that equality of opportunity is basic to any kind of democracy. Equality of opportunity means that all of our people, not just white people, not just people descended from English or Scandinavian ancestors, but all our people, must have decent homes, a decent standard of health, and educational opportunities to develop their abilities as far as they are able. Thus they may be equipped with the tools for the work which they wish to do, and there must be equality of opportunity to obtain that work regardless of race or religion or color.

Where the Negro is concerned, I think he has a legitimate complaint. We have expected Negroes to be good citizens and yet in a large part of our country we haven't given them an opportunity to take part in our government. We have, however, made them subject to our laws and we have drafted them into our Army and Navy. We have done better than ever before, I think, in really integrating some of them with their white brothers in the various services. It has been an uphill fight, however, and the tendency has been to keep them in the menial positions, performing services which are needed, but which do not give an opportunity for glory or for compensation to the same extent that other services might do.⁷

It is true that because of lack of opportunity for education, many of our colored people are not capable of rising to great heights, but we should have differentiated between those who were capable and those who were not. We would not then find so many men with such a deep sense of injustice who, when they return to civilian status and find themselves confronted with discrimination and segregation, may easily become a real menace in our communities.

I am prepared to believe that it will take us some time as a nation to accept the Commandment: "Love thy neighbor as thyself," but I am a little nervous lest the time allowed for readjustment should not be so long as it seemed to be before the war. The day we dropped our atomic bomb we closed an era. Our only real defense in a very insecure world is friendship among peoples. We are the strongest and richest nation today. We are richer in manpower and in national resources than most of the other nations. Our manpower has gained self-confidence as it has rolled up a victory in two distant parts of the world. Our manpower will not lack initiative. They haven't been starved. They haven't been under the heel of a conqueror. Neither has our whole civilian population. Therefore the rest of the world looks to us for leadership.

How much can we give them? If we cannot solve our economic questions, who else in the world has the strength and resources to do so? If we cannot and will not learn to live side by side in peace and unity, how can we expect that the people of the world are going to learn this most difficult lesson? It is much easier to fight about things than to settle them by law. We have come to a rule of law within our borders for most of our citizens. We are ashamed when we hear of a lynching. Most of us hope the day will come when justice is even-handed and the laws operate for all people alike within our borders. The responsibility, therefore, is great. We must find a way to live with our neighbors in peace, in order that we may help the rest of the world with the job of peaceful understanding which must be achieved if we are all of us to remain on this globe and continue to develop our civilization.

What is needed is really not a self-conscious virtue which makes us treat our neighbors as we want to be treated, but an acceptance of the fact that all human beings have dignity and the potentiality of development into the same kind of people we ourselves are. When we look at each individual without thinking of him as a Jew or as a Negro, but only as a person, then we may get to like him or we may dislike him, but he stands on his own feet as an individual and we stand with him on an equal basis. Together we are citizens of a great country. I may have had greater opportunity and greater happiness than he has had, and fewer obstacles to overcome, but basically we build our lives together and what we build today sets the pattern for the future of the world.

Toward a Better World, FDRL

1. For more background on William Scarlett, see n3 Document 65.

2. Scarlett, 1-3; William Scarlett to ER, 12 July 1945, and ER's response, 26 July 1945, AERP; "For the Joint Commission on Social Reconstruction" draft, October 1945, AERP. Article later published in William Scarlett, ed., Toward a Better World (Philadelphia: John C. Winston, 1946), 35-39.

3. In her autobiography ER recalled that each morning during the summer when she was six years old she recited Bible verses to her mother. After her mother died, ER lived with her grandmother, who insisted not only that ER recite verses to her, but also that she spend Sunday mornings with the coachman's daughter, teaching her verses, hymns, collects, and the catechism (TIR, 8, 16).

4. This exhortation is the second of Jesus's two Great Commandments as recorded in the Gospels of the New Testament (Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27).

5. The October 1945 and March 19, 1946, drafts included the following paragraph:

The Irish Catholic can be as scrupulously honest in public office as anyone else. I have known Jews who lived according to the highest ethical standards and were generous not only to people but to causes. It is individuals we must know, not groups! ("For the Joint Commission on Social Reconstruction" draft, October 1945, and "The Minorities Problem," 19 March 1946, AERP).

6. ER's original drafts included a paragraph on miscegenation:

Many people will tell you they object to breaking down the barriers between the races or to allowing them to associate together without self-consciousness from the time they are children because of their disapproval of inter-marriage between races. They feel that races should stay pure blooded as far as possible. When people say that to me, I sometimes wonder if they have taken a good look at our population. If there ever was a nation where people have mixed blood, it is right here in the United States, and yet we seem to have remained a strong and virile nation. Besides, this particular objection which people advance is somewhat irrelevant since when people want to marry, they are usually past reasoning with! Reason is swallowed up by emotion and the people involved usually say to all objections: "This is my life and I shall live it as I see fit". It is such a peculiarly personal thing to decide as to whom you will marry that I have a feeling it is a very bad basis on which to decide how people shall live in the year 1945 in a free country under a democratic form of government.

Scarlett, acting upon ER's invitation to "feel free to criticize" her essay, asked her:

… Would you mind greatly if we left out the paragraph … which deals with intermarriage? We have a number of Southerners on the Commission and to them this paragraph seemed to imply approval of intermarriage. As the Commission had adopted a very strong statement against segregation and for complete equality of opportunity, and as any suggestion regarding intermarriage gives rise to such a blind reaction of prejudice, it was felt that our whole position would be stronger if that paragraph were deleted.

This, however, is only a suggestion and if you have any objection to eliminating it the paper will be printed as written.

"Of course leave out the paragraph," ER replied, "I should be very glad to have you delete anything you think might do harm" (For the Joint Commission on Social Reconstruction, draft, October 1945, AERP; William Scarlett to ER, 19 March 1946 and ER's response, AERP).

7. During World War II, ER served as a liaison between civil rights leaders and the Roosevelt administration. She urged FDR, Secretary of War Henry Stimson, General George Marshall, and other members of the administration to integrate African Americans into the armed services, provide black soldiers with better training, and place African American units in combat roles. In 1943 for example, as a result of ER's pressure, the War Department ceased designating recreational facilities as "White" and "Colored only." Also, through her intervention, the first unit of African American combat pilots, the 99th Pursuit Squadron or Tuskegee Airmen, saw action in Europe. The unit won 100 Distinguished Flying Crosses and was the only escort group never to lose a single bomber to enemy fire. Although African Americans made progress during the war, the armed services would not be desegregated until July 1948 when Truman issued Executive Order 9981, ending discrimination in the military (Goodwin, 170-72, 421-24, 626-28).

Debating Vyshinsky and United Nations Refugee Policy, Part 2

On February 12, 1946, the General Assembly passed a resolution that recommended that the Economic and Social Council set up a special committee to study the refugee issue and propose a plan for meeting the situation. This resulted in the drafting of the constitution of the International Refugee Organization (IRO), which was designed to take over the refugee functions of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) when it would cease to exist on June 30, 1947. In November 1946, the Third Committee began debate on the draft constitution of the IRO, which had been submitted to all the member governments for comment. Many governments proposed amendments, which the Third Committee had to assess and debate. The Soviet Union opposed the constitution because it allowed refugees, who did not wish to return to their countries of origin in Eastern Europe where Communist governments had assumed power, to choose resettlement elsewhere. ER debated Vyshinsky on this point in the Third Committee and then debated Gromyko on the same point in the General Assembly.¹