ABSTRACT
THIRTY YEARS AGO, whites were taught to fear difference. The sight of a black man in a suit was enough to cause alarm in some areas. One of the purposes of segregation was to prevent the potential contamination that might be caused by contact with “others.” The others in question were not only different in appearance, language and lifestyle: they were inferior. Neither the moral nor the constitutional imperative behind the separate-butequal idea had any force at all.
