Page:Race distinctions in American Law (IA racedistinctions00stepiala).pdf/148

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the restaurant room. The statute of Michigan required full and equal accommodation in restaurants. The court[55] held that the statute would not be satisfied if the Negro were given as good accommodations but in a different room, saying: "In Michigan there must be and is an absolute, unconditional equality of white and colored men before the law. . . . Whatever right a white man has in a public place, the black man has also."

In 1897 a colored man went into a restaurant in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. After sitting at the table forty minutes without having his order taken, he complained, and was told that he was not served because he was colored. He left, and later brought suit. At the trial, it appeared that the discrimination was not with the sanction of the proprietor, that he had told the waiter to serve Negroes, that the waiter had refused to do so and was discharged therefor. Nevertheless, the court[56] held that the proprietor was liable for the act of his servant, and gave compensatory damages to the Negro.

The next year, a restaurant keeper refused to accommodate a Negro in Lucas County, Ohio, and the court[57] allowed the Negro to recover the penalty prescribed by the law. The case was decided on a question of evidence.

In 1905 a Negro was serving on the jury in a civil case in Iowa. The bailiff had arranged with a boarding-house to serve meals. When the Negro, along with the other jurors, went for his meals, the boarding-house keeper refused to allow him to sit at the same table with the others. It was not questioned that this was in violation of the Civil Rights Bill of the State if the boarding-house was an "eating-house" within the terms of the statute. The