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Would it be legal to open a restaraunt that practiced voluntary racial segregation?

Asked by gorillapaws (30519points) June 29th, 2012

I’m wondering if someone wanted to open a restaraunt in the US that allowed people to experience what racial segregation was like in the south, if this would be possible. I was thinking you could have one dining room where it was a historically faithful recreation of what a southern restaraunt might have been like at the time, with separate utincils, etc. Then there could be a separate dining room where the races would be reversed, and white people (as it would have been defined back then) would be treated as the “colored” people were at the time. Finally there would be a normal dining room for people who just want to eat food and not experience the historical portrayal of racial segregation.

By having the options, would that be sufficient for a restaraunt to not run afoul of desegregation laws? Do you think such a restaraunt would be able to bring history to life, to help people understand the nature of racism as it existed at the time. Or is the whole concept so offensive that it amounts to nothing more than pouring salt in wounds that are mostly healed?

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