My aunt was blind in one eye. When she was a child in Czarist Russia, anti-Semitic gangs rode through the Jewish village where she lived, burning and shooting. A sliver of glass went into her eye. The reason for this destruction: a local child had gone missing, and the Christian peasants were convinced that the Jews had murdered the child and used his blood in the making of matzot, the ritual bread we Jews eat during the holiday of Passover.

Sixty-two years ago, in the landmark case of Brown vs Board of Education, a unanimous Supreme Court of the United States ruled that state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students were unconstitutional. Separate educational facilities, the Court said, “were inherently unequal.” The ruling paved the road to integration and was considered a major victory for the civil rights movement.

When I was 12 years old, my parents took me to hear Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. speak at an outdoor rally for civil rights in the Watts section of Los Angeles. We were some of the very few white folks in the crowd. I can still remember the eloquent words pouring out of the man on the stage, the triumphant voice thundering for justice. The day after hearing Dr. King speak, I was back in school, and I must have mentioned the event to my social studies teacher, because she asked me to give a report to the class. That afternoon, some boys followed me after school, yelling "n*gg*r lover" at me for a few blocks.