Do You Support the Civil Rights Act?

[JayTee]

In this post, I'm referring to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ( link ). I'm making this post to clarify a reply I made in another thread.

I said I disagree with parts of the Act. The parts about voters rights and access to government facilities is not what I'm addressing. I want to address the issue of banning discrimination in privately owned, public accommodations (restaurants, hotels, etc...).

In this scenario, the assumption is that the majority of people would choose to patronize an establishment that serves all people over an establishment that excludes one or more races of people. Hopefully, this is case, otherwise there is a much bigger problem with this Act.

Obviously, there is an argument to be made that ignoring property rights is always wrong, independent of the outcomes in these scenarios. I won't discuss those here.

Scenario 1:

In this scenario the Civil Rights Act wasn't passed. It is legal to advertise a restaurant as "Whites Only".

I'm driving into a town and I am hungry. I come to a street that has a restaurant on either side. One is labeled, "Whites Only" the other, "Everyone Welcome". I decide that I would rather have the owner of the "Everyone Welcome" restaurant make the profit from my business. Assuming that the majority of people would do the same, the non-racist (or at least not openly racist) owner would earn more profit than the racist owner (or at least the owner who caters to racists). In this scenario the free market has "punished" the racist owner through purely voluntary action.

Scenario 2:

In this scenario the Civil Rights Act has been passed. It is illegal to advertise a restaurant as "Whites Only".

Same opening scene as above. One thing is different, there are no signs. Myself and people like me will patronize each restaurant equally on average. Additionally, black patrons of the racist restaurant may receive poorer service than white customers. The racist owner's racism may actually be even more racist in this scenario, as he is now being forced to open his private property to people who he doesn't want there. He may retaliate by spitting in their drinks, undercooking their burgers, or whatever. He may not retaliate at all. In this scenario, we have no way of knowing that this is a racist owned establishment, or at the least a much less obvious way of knowing.

In this scenario, the racist owner profits more than in the first scenario, while the non-racist owner profits less. Also, the racist would very likely be even more racist in this scenario, and in a way has had his racism "legitimized" by being forced to accept customers that he doesn't want.


Any thoughts?