Five States—Connecticut,[[292]] Massachusetts,[[293]] Ohio,[[294]] New York,[[295]] and Michigan,[[296]]—have deemed it necessary to pass laws prohibiting any discrimination on account of race or color by life insurance companies. All of the statutes are essentially the same. They declare that no life insurance company shall make any distinction or discrimination between white and colored persons wholly or partly of African descent, as to premiums or rates charged for policies; nor shall such company demand higher premiums from colored persons than from whites of the same age, sex, general condition of health, and hope of longevity; nor shall it make or require any rebate, diminution, or discount upon the sum to be paid on the policy in case of the death of the colored person. Such a company is forbidden to add any stipulation by which the insured binds himself, his heirs, executors, assigns, etc., to accept any sum less than the face value of the policy. Massachusetts provides that if a company refuses to insure a colored person making application, it must, upon his request, give him a certificate of the regular examining physician, saying that the refusal was not because the applicant is a person of color, but solely upon the grounds of general health and prospect of longevity as would be applicable to white persons of the same age and sex.
The Connecticut statute enacts that any condition or stipulation in the policy, inserted because of the color or race of the insured, shall be void. Ohio provides that any corporation, or officer or agent of such corporation, violating the provisions of its statute, shall be fined for each offence not less than one hundred dollars nor more than two hundred dollars, but that nothing in the act shall be construed as to require any agent or company to take or receive the application for insurance of any person. New York makes the violation of the law a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of from fifty dollars to five hundred dollars. Michigan goes a step further and declares that anyone violating the law shall forfeit to the State five hundred dollars, to be recovered by the attorney general, and that any officer or agent who violates it shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and punished by imprisonment in the county jail not over one year or by a fine of from fifty dollars to five hundred dollars, or both.
There must have been instances of discrimination by life insurance companies against Negroes, else these States would not have thought it necessary to enact such statutes. The explanation of this discrimination is probably not so much race prejudice as the general belief, based upon statistics, that the Negro, particularly in the colder climate of the North and West, has not the same hope of longevity as the white man, being more subject to pulmonary and other mortal diseases. If the risk of mortality of the Negro is greater, the insurance company argued that it was justified in seeking compensation for assuming this increased risk by charging a higher premium. No case has been found arising under these statutes.
RACE DISCRIMINATIONS BY LABOR UNIONS
The attitude of labor organizations toward Negroes has of late been the subject of much comment, especially by the Negroes themselves, who complain that they are handicapped in the struggle for existence because of the hostility of such organizations. Mr. Baker,[[297]] speaking of the North, said: “And yet, although I expected to find the Negro wholly ostracised by union labor, I discovered that where the Negro becomes numerous or skilful enough, he, like the Italian or Russian Jew, begins to force his way into the unions.... They have got in, ... not because they are wanted, or because they are liked, but because, by being prepared, skilled, and energetic, the unions have had to take them in as a matter of self-protection.... In several great industries North and South, indeed, the Negro is as much a part of labor unionism as the white man.” There seems to be more opposition to Negroes joining the unions of Philadelphia than most Northern cities.[[298]]
One would expect to find, where the conflict between white and colored laborers exists, some evidence of it in statutes or court reports. But this resolution of the General Court of Massachusetts,[[299]] passed in 1904, is the only trace that has been found: “Whereas, the national league of American wheelmen, at their convention held in Louisville, Kentucky, on the twentieth day of February, in the present year, voted to exclude colored persons from membership in said organization, which exclusion affects the members of the organization resident in Massachusetts; Resolved, That the General Court deprecates the action of the organization above referred to, and regards the enforcement of discriminations of this character as a revival of baseless and obsolete prejudices.”
CHURCHES
Colorado is the only State that has undertaken by legislation to guarantee to Negroes full and equal accommodations in churches. The rest have left it to the churches themselves to decide the matter.
It is generally known that during slavery the Negroes, for the most part, attended the white churches, where galleries were set apart for them, were members thereof, and were served by white ministers. After Emancipation, the Negroes withdrew from the white churches and built places of worship of their own. To-day, in all parts of the country, where Negroes live in considerable numbers, they have their own churches. In such cities as Boston, where the doors of all churches are in theory open to every race, Negro churches are found in the Negro districts.
Although there is practically race separation in the churches of the whole country, all the difficulties have not been solved. In 1903, the Freedman’s Aid and Southern Educational Society, an organization of the bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church, general secretaries of the church department, and leading laymen, met in session in Lincoln, Nebraska. Inasmuch as the purpose of this body was to devise and discuss means of improving the educational opportunities of the Southern Negroes, the churchmen of that race were present in good numbers. Some of the hotels in the city gave notice that they could not allow the colored delegates to eat in the main dining rooms, but that they could furnish them sleeping accommodations and serve them meals in their apartments.[[300]] It is along this line that the difficulty usually comes.