Tomlinson D. Todd (far right) interviewed this unidentified group of young people on his “Americans All,” radio program, circa 1950s. Henry P. Whitehead Collection, Anacostia Community Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
Issues with race and racial equity have a long history in
the United States, and so do interracial organizations forming to combat
discriminatory practices and demand social justice for all Americans. The story
of the Institute on Race Relations, founded by Tomlinson D. Todd (1910–1987),
is an example of a substantive but understudied history of collaborative
anti-racist activism in the District of Columbia.
Born in Reading, Pennsylvania, Tomlinson D. Todd grew up in
Washington, DC in a middle-class family. Todd’s father, Rev. Williams W. Todd, served
as pastor of the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church and his mother was a schoolteacher
in Virginia before marriage. Both parents were college educated and Tomlinson,
similarly, pursued higher education after attending Armstrong High School. He graduated
from Lincoln University in 1936, with a Bachelor of Arts Degree before studying
sociology at Howard University.
Mr. Todd fought against racial injustice and believed
bringing people together across racial lines would assist with harmony and
understanding among the races and foster greater economic and political
achievement in America. He started the
Institute on Race Relations in August 1943 with the aim to establish “true democracy”
in the nation’s capital.
One of the organization’s first undertakings was to protest discriminatory
practices and Jim Crowism in several restaurants and theatres in downtown
Washington, DC. They arranged for interracial groups to enter selected
restaurants and request service to test segregation and other inequitable
policies, strategically scheduled sit-ins with law enforcement to avoid arrest
if managers contacted authorities. The organization also secured letters of
support from local restaurants that catered to all people regardless of race.
The statements were then provided to other heads of companies to persuade them to
adopt non-discriminatory policies.
A letter of support from Arthur Capper (1865-1951) to
Tomlinson D. Todd. Capper was a U.S. Senator
from Kansas whom Mr. Todd interviewed on “Americans All,” broadcast before he retired
from the U.S. Senate in 1939. Henry P. Whitehead Collection, Anacostia Community Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
On March 31, 1946, the Institute started sponsoring Mr. Todd’s weekly Sunday night radio program, “Americans All.” The program aired from 1946–1962 on various Washington, DC radio stations including WOOK, WWDC, and WGMS. The broadcast featured dramas, interviews, addresses, roundtable discussions, and renditions from well-known musical aggregations. The program documented a range of perspectives on race and race relations and garnered a large radio audience, while enlightening the city to the injustices of segregation and racial discrimination.
In the wake of the
Institute on Race Relations’ work to bring racial justice to the nation’s
capital, the Coordinating Committee for the Enforcement of D.C.
Anti-Discrimination Laws, led by activists Mary Church Terrell (1863-1954) and Annie Stein,
brought a lawsuit against the Thompson Restaurant. On June 8, 1953, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled
unanimously in the Thompson Restaurant case that restaurants in the District of
Columbia must accommodate all people, regardless of race, color, or creed. The decision
ended discrimination and segregation in DC restaurants.
Help us make the records of the Institute on Race Relations
more accessible and searchable through transcription on the Smithsonian Digital
Volunteers Transcription Center: here!
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