By 1879, most white Southerners were hell-bent on saying no.

Slavery was abolished in 1865, but for most of Mary Church’s young life, Americans-in Congress, in the South, and all over the country-had been arguing and battling over whether Black people like her could finally enjoy the rights and freedoms promised by the Constitution. The Civil War had ended fourteen years earlier. She found herself on a train car separated by a wooden screen into two parts: the front, where white men sat in the smoking section, puffing on pipes and cigarettes, and the back, where African American men and women squeezed uncomfortably onto crowded benches. But after mounting the steps, she discovered that his instructions led her to the wrong place. When her train approached, Mary asked a white porter for directions to the first-class car. Sixteen-year-old Mary Church lingered on the bustling train platform in Bowling Green, Kentucky, clasping a first-class ticket to Memphis. MARY CHURCH TERRELL Fights Back Against Segregation

Color coding and the battle against white spaces are part of the story of America. Black parents learned it from their parents, who learned it from theirs. Black people are careful to teach their children about color-coded places being color conscious is a matter of safety for kids who might get mistaken as a threat. White places are parks, streets, stores, neighborhoods, even schools-anywhere white people decide that they should be in control. No American, Black or white, is surprised when stories like these make the news, because we all take these color-coded places for granted, even though America pretends to be color-blind. Black people followed in stores, Black drivers trailed by police in white parts of town. Two Black men in Philadelphia arrested for simply being in a Starbucks. Do what she says, she ordered, or she’d call the police. On April 29, 2018, a white woman named Jennifer Schulte aimed the same message at a Black family picnicking in a park in Oakland, California. I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life.”Īmy had decided to remind Christian where he was. “I’m taking a picture and calling the cops…. Amy pulled out her cell phone and started to dial.

CHRISTIAN COOPER, a Black man, out for an afternoon of bird watching in Central Park, had asked Amy Cooper to put her dog on a leash in a place where it was forbidden for dogs to roam free.

Unequal by Michael Eric Dyson