Clark McCall: Every ethnicity should be treated fairly

The terrible slaying of nine African Americans in a South Carolina church recently reminded me of a time back in the 1940s before the time of civil rights legislation.

The sign in the public swimming pool where I swam as a 10-year-old boy in Southern California read: “White Race Only.” I recall several times when Mrs. Camacho would call my dad and tell him they would not let her Hispanic son Eddie swim there.

Dad was very patriotic and kept track of the soldiers who had died serving their country. He knew Eddie’s father had been killed in the European theater of the war. Dad would go down and persuade the pool people to let Eddie swim. Dad believed that if Eddie’s dad was good enough to die to preserve freedoms for America’s citizens, then his son should have the civil liberty to swim in a public pool.

Today we have civil rights laws. Perhaps what we also need are more people like Dad who will do more than give lip service in seeing that citizens of every nationality are treated fairly and with equal respect.

This story was originally published July 20, 2015 at 12:04 PM with the headline "Clark McCall: Every ethnicity should be treated fairly."