Integration & Profits

Caught in the midst of the South's battle over integrating lunch counters. Southern store owners often fear that they will be boycotted by the Negroes if they do not integrate, boycotted by white customers if they do. Last week a report by the Southern Regional Council, an interracial group formed to promote better race relations, sought to calm at least one of their fears. Merchants in eight Southern cities that have desegregated their lunch counters--Austin, Corpus Christi, Dallas, San Antonio, Galveston; Nashville, Tenn.; Winston-Salem and Salisbury, N.C.--have suffered no financial hurt. Said the report : "No store in the South which has opened its lunch counters to Negroes has reported a loss of business. Managers have reported business as usual or noted an increase. In contrast, reports from the change-resistant towns have indicated that business in some variety stores--key targets of the demonstrators--has fallen off by from 15% to as much as 65% in one store in Charlotte, N.C."

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