The Technician (Raleigh, NC), May 4, 1951
Title
The Technician (Raleigh, NC), May 4, 1951
Description
First published in 1920, The Technician is North Carolina State University's oldest student newspaper. This issue from 1951 addresses the controversy surrounding a letter published in The Daily Tar Heel, the student newspaper at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The letter made "caustic reference" to an African-American student admitted to UNC's medical school. Because editors at The Technician deemed the "question of Negro students in the Greater University [to be] a question which should interest equally all students," The Technician reprinted UNC students' responses to the letter in the "Open Forum" section on page four.
Creator
Bill Haas, Editor
Source
Bill Haas, ed., The Technician (Raleigh, NC), vol. 31, no. 27, May 4, 1951.
Date
1951-05-04
Contributor
Rose Buchanan
Subject
Integration
Format
PDF
Language
English
Type
document
Text
OPEN FORUM
Carolina Controversy
On Tuesday, May 1, our brother publication at Chapel Hill, THE DAILY TAR HEEL printed a letter which made caustic reference to the admittance of a Negro student to the University Medical School. On May 2 the columns of the paper were swamped with replies. Because question of Negro students in the Greater University is a question which should interest equally all students of the Greater University the TECHNICIAN is reprinting in full all the letters which appeared in the TAR HEEL.
Editor:
Ken Wright, Jr.,
Your letter to the Tar Heel was the most disgusting, selfish, narrow-minded, snobbish piece of trash that I have ever read. You little unmitigated punk, who in the hell do you think you are that you are so much more qualified than a Negro? In the first place, Med. Students are selected purely on the basis of ability and qualifications. And if a Negro has more on the ball than you, more power to him. Your terminology of “dark Congo boy†is the sort of mean, contemptible slander that brings abuse on the heads of all of us in the South. You don’t deserve to be called an American, must less a human being. You had better lose that rotten, puffed-up pride first.
A s for the front-door, backdoor nonsense, you don’t even rate being allowed in thru [sic] a crack in the roof. You belong in the sewage! Wise up fellow, you’re not in Fascist Germany or Communist Russia. If allowing capable Negroes to enter Med. School is an injustice, I want to see more o f that injustice.
--Jerry Jones.
Editor:
It hits deep in my heart that a Carolina student should write such a letter to the Tar Heel like the one Ken Wright, Jr., wrote yesterday. I am thoroughly ashamed now each time I pass a Negro—ashamed that any of my race advocate such warped, prejudiced views.
A “ tradition†has been broken at Carolina, but it was one which violated the greater, more sweeping Carolina tradition of liberal democratic thought and action.
No person — white, black or polka-dotted—enters U N C ’s Med School “graciously.†Only by the sweat of his brow and a broad scope of ability may an individual now enter Medical School. Nor did the Negro in question enter Med School via the “back door,†as Mr. Wright stipulated. He was one of many who applied for entrance, met the qualifications, and was accepted. No underhanded methods were used to “push†the Negro into Med School. He was simply one of the best qualified to make the best doctors, which, after all, is or should be the desired end.
In my short 19 years , I have heard views from many radically prejudiced, and have even expressed similar views m yse lf a t one time; but Wright tops them all! He himself is a disproof of his own implied argument that white Carolina students have undoubtedly better qualifications than “dark congo boys.†With such reasoning Wright would have a tough time on a logic
test.
It seems obvious to me that he is arguing that color makes the difference, but should his intended thought be that Carolina students are just better qualified than Negroes, then the “equal protection†clause of the 14th Amendment is being violated, and Negroes would have grounds to demand entrance to UNC’s undergraduate schools. I feel reasonably sure this isn’t what Mr. Wright intended; it would be too great a blow to his “pride.†It is understandable, but I think unfortunate, that people yet support views so seemingly detrimental to democracy and beneficial to idealogies [sic] and philosophies adverse to democracy, the moral and ethical standards of the whole society must be, as they are being, changed.
Our democracy is a growing democracy; and while in practice it is yet far from its ideals, I think the admission of the Negro to UNC's Med School is one step of many necessary steps in the right direction; and I hope the others soon follow. As for the immediate present, there seems no way to retaliate against these greater injustices. God forgive those who think like Wright—and God bless all the “congo boys†who have had the patience and tolerance to hold up under such injustice and for their forbearance to restrain from further, greater embitteredness against those who inflict such in justice. It really takes guts on their part to endure so many injustices for so long!
--Dan Duke
Dear Editor:
Until Tuesday’s paper (1 May 1951 ) appeared, I doubted that even Carolina's eastern end could produce a college senior so filled with bigotry as Ken Wright, Jr. It is against my deepest convictions to sit idly by while hate, uninformed prejudice, and malicious untruths are spread across our newspapers by unthinking, naive bigots who resist any progressive efforts to extricate them from the binding mud of southern traditions. It is vilely disgusting to witness printed crocodile tears shed over the “diligently †laboring Carolina student— white, of course—who will miss out on Medical School because a better qualified Negro is accepted. Does your type of pigment produce more brains, Wright? Does a brown skin cancel off intellect, mechanical ability, and social decency? Perhaps we should admit all white students, including the idiots and morons, then [sic] take the genius class of Negroes. In other words, Wright, no matter how low, how stupid, how filthy, degraded, uncouth a white man is—do you wish to place him above any Negro, no matter how brilliant? I consider your typical slur, “congo-boy,†an insult to intelligent people of both races. You have told us of “utter* contemptible injustice†from your point o f view; I refer you to Myrdal’s An American Dilemma for the other side. Obviously you’ve neglected to profit from observation of your environment—perhaps this good book would fill the oblivious gaps.
--Jack W. Hopkins.
Carolina Controversy
On Tuesday, May 1, our brother publication at Chapel Hill, THE DAILY TAR HEEL printed a letter which made caustic reference to the admittance of a Negro student to the University Medical School. On May 2 the columns of the paper were swamped with replies. Because question of Negro students in the Greater University is a question which should interest equally all students of the Greater University the TECHNICIAN is reprinting in full all the letters which appeared in the TAR HEEL.
Editor:
Ken Wright, Jr.,
Your letter to the Tar Heel was the most disgusting, selfish, narrow-minded, snobbish piece of trash that I have ever read. You little unmitigated punk, who in the hell do you think you are that you are so much more qualified than a Negro? In the first place, Med. Students are selected purely on the basis of ability and qualifications. And if a Negro has more on the ball than you, more power to him. Your terminology of “dark Congo boy†is the sort of mean, contemptible slander that brings abuse on the heads of all of us in the South. You don’t deserve to be called an American, must less a human being. You had better lose that rotten, puffed-up pride first.
A s for the front-door, backdoor nonsense, you don’t even rate being allowed in thru [sic] a crack in the roof. You belong in the sewage! Wise up fellow, you’re not in Fascist Germany or Communist Russia. If allowing capable Negroes to enter Med. School is an injustice, I want to see more o f that injustice.
--Jerry Jones.
Editor:
It hits deep in my heart that a Carolina student should write such a letter to the Tar Heel like the one Ken Wright, Jr., wrote yesterday. I am thoroughly ashamed now each time I pass a Negro—ashamed that any of my race advocate such warped, prejudiced views.
A “ tradition†has been broken at Carolina, but it was one which violated the greater, more sweeping Carolina tradition of liberal democratic thought and action.
No person — white, black or polka-dotted—enters U N C ’s Med School “graciously.†Only by the sweat of his brow and a broad scope of ability may an individual now enter Medical School. Nor did the Negro in question enter Med School via the “back door,†as Mr. Wright stipulated. He was one of many who applied for entrance, met the qualifications, and was accepted. No underhanded methods were used to “push†the Negro into Med School. He was simply one of the best qualified to make the best doctors, which, after all, is or should be the desired end.
In my short 19 years , I have heard views from many radically prejudiced, and have even expressed similar views m yse lf a t one time; but Wright tops them all! He himself is a disproof of his own implied argument that white Carolina students have undoubtedly better qualifications than “dark congo boys.†With such reasoning Wright would have a tough time on a logic
test.
It seems obvious to me that he is arguing that color makes the difference, but should his intended thought be that Carolina students are just better qualified than Negroes, then the “equal protection†clause of the 14th Amendment is being violated, and Negroes would have grounds to demand entrance to UNC’s undergraduate schools. I feel reasonably sure this isn’t what Mr. Wright intended; it would be too great a blow to his “pride.†It is understandable, but I think unfortunate, that people yet support views so seemingly detrimental to democracy and beneficial to idealogies [sic] and philosophies adverse to democracy, the moral and ethical standards of the whole society must be, as they are being, changed.
Our democracy is a growing democracy; and while in practice it is yet far from its ideals, I think the admission of the Negro to UNC's Med School is one step of many necessary steps in the right direction; and I hope the others soon follow. As for the immediate present, there seems no way to retaliate against these greater injustices. God forgive those who think like Wright—and God bless all the “congo boys†who have had the patience and tolerance to hold up under such injustice and for their forbearance to restrain from further, greater embitteredness against those who inflict such in justice. It really takes guts on their part to endure so many injustices for so long!
--Dan Duke
Dear Editor:
Until Tuesday’s paper (1 May 1951 ) appeared, I doubted that even Carolina's eastern end could produce a college senior so filled with bigotry as Ken Wright, Jr. It is against my deepest convictions to sit idly by while hate, uninformed prejudice, and malicious untruths are spread across our newspapers by unthinking, naive bigots who resist any progressive efforts to extricate them from the binding mud of southern traditions. It is vilely disgusting to witness printed crocodile tears shed over the “diligently †laboring Carolina student— white, of course—who will miss out on Medical School because a better qualified Negro is accepted. Does your type of pigment produce more brains, Wright? Does a brown skin cancel off intellect, mechanical ability, and social decency? Perhaps we should admit all white students, including the idiots and morons, then [sic] take the genius class of Negroes. In other words, Wright, no matter how low, how stupid, how filthy, degraded, uncouth a white man is—do you wish to place him above any Negro, no matter how brilliant? I consider your typical slur, “congo-boy,†an insult to intelligent people of both races. You have told us of “utter* contemptible injustice†from your point o f view; I refer you to Myrdal’s An American Dilemma for the other side. Obviously you’ve neglected to profit from observation of your environment—perhaps this good book would fill the oblivious gaps.
--Jack W. Hopkins.
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Bill Haas, Editor, “The Technician (Raleigh, NC), May 4, 1951,” The State of History, accessed April 27, 2024, https://soh.omeka.chass.ncsu.edu/items/show/546.