Paul G. Levy ’58

2 Years Ago

Regret or Shame?

Elyse Graham ’07’s piece about Hon. Bruce M. Wright h’01 (Princeton Portrait, December issue) paints a wonderful portrait of a wonderful, accomplished man — a man who, although accepted at Princeton as an undergraduate, lost that opportunity when he arrived and it was discovered that he was Black.

I thought the article an excellent one, right up until the last two sentences, which I found disturbing: “If Princeton was a part of that story, we would never stop talking about it. Instead Wright will always be a point of regret for Princeton.” Regret? Surely the word is “shame,” not because Princeton missed the boat on a good thing, but because a bigoted, racist attitude sent a clearly qualified man away, simply because he was Black. Shame indeed on Princeton.

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