“And yet you demand perfect equality of man with man, absolutely in form and substance without reservation or subterfuge!”
“Yes, political equality.”
“Politics is but a secondary phenomenon of society. You said absolute equality,” protested Harris.
“The question you broach is a question of taste, and the deeper social instincts of racial purity and self preservation. I care not what your culture, or your genius, or your position, I do not desire, and will not permit, a mixture of Negro blood in my family. The idea is nauseating, and to my daughter it would be repulsive beyond the power of words to express it!”
“And yet,” pleaded Harris, “you invited me to your home, introduced me to your daughter, seated me at your table, and used me in your appeal to your constituents, and now when I dare ask the privilege of seeking her hand in honourable marriage, you, the scholar, patriot, statesman and philosopher of Equality and Democracy, slam the door in my face and tell me that I am a negro! Is this fair or manly?”
“I fail to see its unfairness.”
“It is amazing. You are a master of history and sociology. You know as clearly as I do that social intercourse is the only possible pathway to love. And you opened it to me with your own hand. Could I control the beat of my heart? There are some powers within us that are involuntary. You could have prevented my meeting your daughter as an equal. But all the will power of earth could not prevent my loving her, when once I had seen her, and spoken to her. The sound of the human voice, the touch of the human hand in social equality are the divine sacraments that open the mystery of love.”
“Social rights are one thing, political rights another,” interrupted Lowell.
“I deny it. If you are honest with yourself, you know it is not true. Politics is but a manifestation of society. Society rests on the family. The family is the unit of civilisation. The right to love and wed where one loves is the badge of fellowship in the order of humanity. The man who is denied this right in any society is not a member of it. He is outside any manifestation of its essential life. You had as well talk about the importance of clothes for a dead man, as political rights for such a pariah. You have classed him with the beasts of the field. As a human unit he does not exist for you.”
“Harris, it is utterly useless to argue a point like this,” Lowell interrupted coldly. “This must be the end of our acquaintance. You must not enter my house again.”