By Selwyn Duke
"Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!" so said the infamous Democrat segregationist, George Wallace, to a cheering crowd during his 1963 inaugural remarks. He was basking in the glow of success after emerging victorious in the Alabama gubernatorial race by peddling the race-baiting philosophy epitomized by those sentiments. His bullish stand on this issue ultimately led to showdowns with federalized National Guard troops at schoolhouse doors, as he fulfilled his promised to bend to nothing less than the point of a gun in his defiance of the court that ordered him to integrate his states' public school system. Now, the very fact that the highest government official in Alabama was advocating segregation in the public sphere was the problem. For, no one at the time took exception to the idea of individuals determining who they would associate with -- the right to the freedom of association is self-evident. So, most didn't mind the fact that certain people might only want to invite blacks or whites, Jews or Gentiles, or Catholics or Protestants to their dinner parties. Nor was the issue one of how people chose to discriminate within the context of their own businesses, clubs and organizations, because once again this is the private sector. The problem was one of that unjust government intrusion called forced segregation.
George Wallace died in 1998, but the practice of forced segregation that he once embraced and then repented of had been laid to rest long before. There is another practice of his that has proven to be a much tougher dragon to slay however, and that is the one called unjust government intrusion. In fact, it's breathing more fire and incinerating more freedoms than ever before. A good example of this is the forced integration that the government regularly visits upon private entities in the name of civil rights. For instance, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission often punishes businesses simply because they don't have a workforce that reflects the demographic make-up of their region. In fact, any private entity that exercises its freedom to choose to open itself up to the public is by judicial fiat labeled a "public accommodation," which then strips its owners of their freedom of association. But it goes even further than that, because our society has become so enthusiastic about forced integration that many of us take it as gospel that this must be applied to all manner and form of private organization -- through the iron fist of government if necessary.
This mentality is evident in the treatment of a couple of stories in the news right now: the suing of the Boy Scouts by an atheist who doesn't like being excluded from the organization because of his refusal to acknowledge a Creator, and the targeting of Augusta National Golf Club for persecution because it doesn't presently allow women to become members. When you hear these stories being discussed by many pundits, it's obvious that the assumption is that these organizations are guilty of the worst possible transgression and should be strong-armed into compliance with integration doctrine by any means necessary. For instance, I heard a female college professor comment on the Augusta National controversy on a popular news program, and to make the case for government intervention she questioned whether or not the golf club was truly a private organization. She said that the courts have ruled that this must be determined on a "case by case basis;" while her implication was asinine and wouldn't currently pass muster even in our wanting court system, this is a good example of the slippery slope you embark upon when you allow the government to become the arbiter of who can practice freedom of association. One thing leads to another -- businesses today, organizations tomorrow...what lies in the future?
What also was apparent as I watched that college professor was her self-righteousness, as she indignantly outlined the remedies that would placate her and her misguided ilk. She was self-righteous because like so many in her camp, she believes she occupies the moral high ground -- but she is wrong. It is important to note that many segregationists in the old south felt the same way. They believed that moral people wouldn't tolerate the mixing of the races, and that their "morally superior" position justified their using of government to prohibit association that didn't accord with it -- in just the same way that today's integrationists believe that their "morally superior" position does. And in reality, morality is the issue, so let's examine what morality truly dictates with respect to this. What the segregationists did sixty years ago was wrong because the government had no business segregating on the basis of race in public institutions, like it did in certain states' public school systems. This is because with responsibilities come rights, and since blacks had the same responsibili- ties placed upon them by government [i.e. - they had to pay taxes, fight for the nation, etc.], it was only just that government should afford them the same rights. But, what they did was also wrong because the government had no business telling people how to associate, like it did with anti-miscegenation laws [these laws barred one from marrying a person of a different race]. And this is where the integrationists of today find a tyrannical common ground with the segregationists of yesteryear -- they support the trumping of freedom of association as well. This makes them every bit as immoral as the segregationists they decry, and this is because the removal of the freedom of association is the removal of freedom association -- and having a popular reason for doing so validates this injustice not a whit. It is also because forced integration in the private realm is every bit as unjust as forced segregation in the public one. They are just two sides of the same wooden nickel.
They say that the more things change the more they stay the same. This has proven true here, because the crux of the matter is the same today as it was decades ago below the Mason-Dixon line: unjust government intrusion. The government was guilty of this when it proscribed certain types of association, and it's guilty of this today when it prescribes certain types of association. The freedom of association is something that should be held sacrosanct, and he who pays the piper calls the tune. If you create a business, club or organization with your own money, create it by the sweat of your own brow, YOU have the right to determine who you will and won't associate with within it. This is why the desire to coerce the Boy Scouts, Augusta National and all the other targets of the integrationists' wrath into implementing their version of morality is nothing less than immorality itself. But I won't hold my breath waiting for the integrationists to live and let live, because they pursue their goals with the same fervor and moral blindness exhibited by the crowd that cheered Governor Wallace almost forty years ago. Ironically, these two groups have more in common than either one of them could imagine. Even today's cheering crowds' credo is eerily familiar: integration today, integration tomorrow, integration forever!
