Beyond Home Plate: Jackie Robinson on Life After Baseball

3. On Civil Rights

65 3 On Civil Rights It Comes Down to You and Me Robinson was a popular public speaker following his retirement from baseball , and it was a role he relished. He loved meeting people, pricking their consciences, and encouraging them to keep their eyes on the prize of racial justice. The column below is especially remarkable because it includes a hopeful, and personal, word to those who become frustrated in their efforts to effect change. Source: New York Post, June 10, 1959, 88. In our struggle for equal opportunity here in America, people very often ask: “What can I as an individual do to help?” For instance, I hear almost daily from both Negroes and whites who are anxious to be of some practical service in righting wrongs and opening doors. Well, I’m no race relations advisor or sociological expert, and certainly don’t claim to have all the answers. But for what it’s worth, I sometimes try to make a few constructive suggestions to those who ask, “What can I do?” For despite the tremendous progress over the years that we can all point to with pride, it comes down to you and me as individuals to keep the ball rolling. First, I think it’s up to each of us individually to try to straighten out our own thinking as best we can. Since none of us lives in a vacuum, I’d venture to suggest that hardly any of us can lay claim to being completely unprejudiced about other races and religions. And I think once we recognize that fact, and begin trying to change it, we’ve taken a giant step in preparing ourselves to be of service. 66 • Beyond Home Plate Prejudice means pre-judgment. It means judging another person or group by what you’ve heard or by what you’re afraid might be true, or by what in some cases you know is true of certain individuals, but which you apply from then on to everybody else in the same group. In short, it’s like condemning and executing a man before you’re sure that he might have committed a crime. So I think the first step for each of us, Negro or white, is to stop thinking in terms of what we’ve heard, or what our “friends” have told us, or in any of the other ways in which prejudice is planted and cultivated in our society—and instead make certain that we judge other people as individuals. When I see a Negro being boisterous on a bus or subway, I resent other people treating me as if that one Negro was proof Negroes are alike. Likewise , when I see a drunken white man in the street, I would resent anyone suspecting all white people are drunkards. People are individuals, good, bad and indifferent, no matter what their race or color or creed. And the sooner we begin to apply this to our own everyday thinking, by assuming the other fellow has just as much on the ball as we have—unless and until he proves otherwise—then the sooner we can set out on the task of convincing others. Secondly, I believe in the old adage that a picture is worth a thousand words. Taken a step further, a good example is worth a thousand sermons. So to those who ask, “What can I do?” I’d suggest being a good example in dealing with and talking about people of other groups. In your everyday dealings, show that you regard other people with exactly the same esteem and respect as you do your own group. Most people will respond to and follow a good example, even though they might not otherwise take the lead themselves. Next, I’d have to emphasize that Rome wasn’t built in a day. Nor is prejudice—in ourselves or in others—eradicated overnight. So don’t get discouraged if you don’t set the world on fire the first time you try. There will always be those who will try to hold you back, or who’ll be upset because you don’t “conform” to their own fears or prejudices or weaknesses . There’ll be those who want you to “let George do it,” or accuse you of ulterior motives because you insist upon doing to others as you would have them do to you. On Civil Rights • 67...