President Truman’s Committee on Civil Rights found in 1948: It is clear there is much discrimination, based on prejudice, in admission of students to private colleges, vocational schools, and graduate schools. . . . Application blanks of many American colleges and universities include questions pertaining to the candidate’s racial origin, religious preference, parents’ birthplace, etc. In many of our northern educational institutions enrollment of Jewish students seems never to exceed certain fixed points and there is never more than a token enrollment of Negroes.
