Letter from Walter A. Groves to Chester B. Hall

Letter from Walter A. Groves to Chester B. Hall

Groves, Walter A.

1948-10-08

CC_2_3_A_Box2_018 (page 1)

CC_2_3_Box2_019 (page 2)

October 8, 1948 Mr. Chester B. Hall 1518 Starks Building Louisville 2, Kentucky Dear Mr. Hall: I appreciate your letter of October 7 with its comments on the recent incident reported in the newspapers. The college had no intention of making this story known to the press. This uncalled for publicity was the work of the attorney general's office. The college originally wrote to these applicants citing the Day Law as the reason for our inability to accept them and also recommended them to other institutions. They nonetheless replied, asking for further consideration, therefore, before replying to them a second time, I thought it advisable in a situation of this nature, to have an official opinion, on the subject. On this particular subject in these days a private institution might very will be held up to considerable censure for attempting to interpret the law in such matters. We did not know that to seek the counsel of the attorney general’s office is to invite publicity. I am willing to admit that we would have been confronted with a difficult solution had the attorney general ruled that we might accept them. Certainly there was no sense in arguing that question until such an interpretation had been given. However, in view of the editorial in the Courier Journal of October 8, I do not believe that the publicity in this incident is altogether negative. Possibly the attorney general had his own reasons for making this question from the college a public matter. I am interested in your experience of several years ago when you were president of the Pitkin Club. At one of the Y.M.C.A. forums last year a prominent Negro educator spoke to a group of fifty or more students, and I heard no objection to the invitation to him, nor did anything arise either during the discussion itself or following which indicated the slightest question as to the propriety of such a program. Maybe we are making progress. Very sincerely yours, Walter A. Groves President

Letter

Groves, Walter A.

Hall, Chester B.

Centre College