AMERICA'S COLOUR LINE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume LXV, Issue 11755, 19 August 1913, Page 4

AMERICA'S COLOUR LINE.

Ten million American citizens of African descent are furious because of the decision of the United States Supreme Court pronouncing the Federal Eights Act illegal. This -decision removes the only ground upon which coloured persona in America could contend for equal accommodation with whites when travelling by train and boat, when seeking hotel quarters, in desiring to be served in restaurants, drug stores, and. other places, and in demanding other equal privileges. Some years ago, the Supreme Court held that Congress had exceeded its powers in passing the Civil Eights Act, and declared that; so far as it interfered with the rights of a State, it wag repugnant. Mary Butts, a negress, bought a first-class ticket on the Merchants and Miners Transportation Lines from Boston to Norfolk. During the trip she claimed that she had twelve times been denied equal accommodation. Under the Civil Eights Act, she brought a suit to recover £1200. She declared that she had been refused the same eating and sleeping accommodation as was furnished to white people, and was required to take her njeals at the secon-d ~ .1 '

table and sleep on tho lower deck. In many American towns, negroes aro assumed to possess equal privileges with tho whites, but if they were to present themselves in a fashionable restaurant for example, and ask for a small steak, tho price charged would bo five guineas or thereabouts, so that tho blacks usually keep away.