The "Jim Crow" Street Car Proposition

The Committee on Roads of the legislature of Virginia reviews a new bill for segregated streetcars. Most whites oppose the bill, especially the conductors who must enforce it.

The Committee on Roads of the legislature of Virginia now has under consideration a bill offered by a Mr. Caton of Alexandria providing for “Jim Crow” street cars in this state. The measure has aroused the entire street-car interests of the commonwealth and every surface line is represented.
The motormen and conductors have forwarded long petitions against the measure, and the strongest possible language in condemnation of the proposition has been used.
The committee has visited the street car barns in this city, and the impracticability of the measure demonstrated.
As strange as it may seem, the colored people have treated the measure with utter indifference and those who are most pronounced against it are the white people, noticeable so, the conductors, to whom will be entrusted the duty of its enforcement.
The present indications are that the bill will be “put to sleep” and the vote against it overwhelming.

“The "Jim Crow" Street Car Proposition,” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed March 21, 2025, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/258.