The conductor is also given the authority of police officer to enforce the law.
The form of segregation which is receiving most attention in the South at present, however, is the effort of various cities,—great and small,—to provide by law, for (as nearly as possible) distinct residential sections for the two races. This question was first agitated in Baltimore in 1809. A segregation law was passed but it was soon pronounced invalid by the courts. In 1911, another such ordinance was put in force but it, too, was declared void, first by the Criminal Court of Baltimore, and later by the Maryland Court of Appeals. The latter Court, however, maintained that the city has the right to pass a segregation law. I quote the following words of the court:
“This Court is of the opinion that the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore may, in the exercise of its police power, validly pass an ordinance for the segregation of the white and colored races
without conflicting with the Constitution of the United States or of the State of Maryland.”[110:4]
Very soon after this, another ordinance was passed. It has now been in operation about four years (1917). However, the Maryland Court of Appeals is holding a case sub curia, awaiting a decision of the United States Supreme Court in a case testing the validity of the segregation law of Louisville.[110:4a]
In 1912 the Virginia Legislature enacted a law for the purpose, it seems, of encouraging the cities and towns of that State to segregate the whites and the Negroes. Richmond, however, had already passed a segregation ordinance in 1911. It is as follows:
“That it shall be unlawful for any white person to occupy as a residence or to establish and maintain as a place of public assembly, any house upon any street or alley between two adjacent streets in which a greater number of houses are occupied as residences by colored people than are occupied as residences by white people.
“That it shall be unlawful for any colored person to occupy as a residence or to establish and maintain as a place of public assembly any house
upon any street or alley between two adjacent streets on which a greater number of houses are occupied as residences by white people than are occupied as residences by colored people.
“That no person shall construct or locate on any block or square on which there is at that time no residence any house or other building intended to be used as a residence without declaring in his application for a permit to build whether the house or building so to be constructed is designed to be occupied by white or colored people, and the Building Inspector of the city of Richmond shall not issue any permit in such case unless the applicant complies with the provisions of this section.