Notes & Comments

Like the reasoning in Brown v. Board of Education a decade earlier, this new law will be extremely difficult to put into effect. Ruling that racial discrimination is unconstitutional does not put an end to it. A very large segment of the public is conditioned to resist any regulation of private property, especially if it is owned individually or by a family or other small group. In no area will discrimination be more fiercely resisted than in housing. The home is sacrosanct, and by no means does everyone see that a house advertised or "listed" for sale is instantly different from the home that is one's castle, exempt from social tensions and conflicts.

*****

In February 1965, I have an unexpected visitor in my office at the University of Akron: Henry Aronson, who normally represents the NAACP Legal Defense in Jackson, Mississippi. He is in Akron to work with Mrs. Idell Ferguson of Advance Realty, and local civic leaders, seeking access to housing without regard to the prospective buyer's race. At about this time, the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee is being made aware of new research which indicates that property values, long used as an excuse or justification for racial segregation of neighborhoods and communities, actually tend to hold firm or even appreciate with desegregation. In Ohio, some economists produce compelling arguments for a State Fair Housing Law. Social scientists are increasingly aware that race is a terribly flawed concept.

I am an assistant professor of history, also assistant to the vice president and dean of administration. After my Ph.D., I published some articles on American values, and I've signed a book contract with Washington Square Press. Now my wife Anne and I have decided to take an opportunity for me to join the faculty of my alma mater, Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. We live with our little daughters, two and three, in Cuyahoga Falls, the main suburb of Akron towards Cleveland. Our modest Cape Cod house is about to be put on the market.

My visitor, Henry Aronson, explains what the NAACP Legal Defense would like to have us do: simply attempt to list our house for sale to any qualified buyer, regardless of race. He was undoubtedly referred to me by colleagues at the university and in the Urban League, as a Euro-American person suited by convictions and circumstances for this project. The proposal has to be discussed with Anne, of course, especially because of the risks. Aronson comes to our house that evening, and briefs us frankly about the possible danger in this small all-Euro-American city contiguous with Akron. He points out, for example, that the draperies on our big living room windows will need to be kept drawn at some point, because of possible attacks. We readily agree to do as he asks, hardly imagining that Anne will soon be keeping a loaded handgun on the lunch counter when I am at work.

Idell Ferguson of Advance Realty calls the next day, and comes to the house to see it, introduce herself, and relate her role to ours. She is a brisk but engaging African American broker who will represent potential purchasers, starting with an African American couple of unimpeachable probity. The husband, who has a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, is a scientist just hired by Goodyear. 

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