Mixed Race Milestones

Last night, during President Obama's speech in Washington, a Congressman from South Carolina was moved to yell "You lie!" at him, an unprecedented outburst.

At almost the same time, more than 45,000 people in New York were cheering wildly as Derek Jeter reached an historic milestone in the annals of baseball.

Both the President and Jeter are the products of racially mixed marriages, which at the time of Barack Obama's birth, were illegal under miscegenation laws in South Carolina and 16 other states of the Union.

It's unlikely that anyone in the crowd at Yankee Stadium was thinking of Jeter's heritage, but it's hard not to believe that Rep. Joe Wilson's breach of protocol--prompted by the President's accurate statement that illegal immigrants would not be covered by his health plan--had no connection to either the President's race or that of the people he was talking about.

The juxtaposition of the two moments is a reminder of how far America has come in the last half-century and how far there is still to go.

Until the mid-1940s, African-Americans like Derek Jeter were not allowed to play major league baseball alongside Lou Gehrig, whose record he tied last night. During that time, as a soldier in South Carolina, I had to ride on segregated buses.

Now, with Obama in the White House and Jeter idolized by millions, all that is long gone but should not be forgotten. One encouraging sign is that, within hours of Wilson's outburst last night, more than $50,000 poured into the campaign of his opponent in next year's election, making it likely he will not have to be offended by Obama's speeches to Congress much longer.