Race Rule Erased

The oldest and snootiest U.S. pedagogue's fraternity, Phi Delta Kappa, which for 31 years has drawn a sharp color line, manfully erased it last week. Observing that if their country's black-brown-yellow allies were good enough to die for they were good enough to live with, Phi Delta Kappans decided to admit Negroes, Chinese, et al. as fellow members.

Phi Delta Kappa is the No. 1 professional society of U.S. educators, with 28,000 big & little wigs as members. Ever since the fraternity wrote its constitution in 1911, restricting membership to "white males of good character," there has been wig-pulling over this clause. Two years ago the Ohio State chapter ruled that Negro George Wright and Chinese Dai Ho-chun were "white men" despite the color of their skin, admitted them as members. The chapter was promptly suspended by Phi Delta Kappa's national council.

Though some Phi Delta Kappans protested, and the Harvard chapter went so far as to stage a defiant meeting with Negro Philosopher Alain Locke as lecturer, Ohio State remained in Coventry--until Pearl Harbor. Then the fraternity's biggest chapter, at Columbia's Teachers College, led a revolt which forced a national referendum. Result: for keeping the color line: 20 chapters (mostly Southern); for repeal: 67 chapters, more than the necessary two-thirds.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.