In 1900, a Reverend Mr. Upton delivered a temperance address near New Orleans. The reporters, desiring to be complimentary, referred to him as a “cultured gentleman.” In the transmission of the dispatch by wire to the New Orleans paper, the phrase was, by mistake, changed to “colored gentleman.” The _Times-Democrat_ of that city, unwilling to refer to a member of the Negro race as a “colored gentleman,” changed it to “Negro,” and that was the word finally printed in the report. As soon as he learned of the mistake, the editor of the paper duly retracted and apologized. But Mr. Upton, not appeased, brought a suit for libel and recovered fifty dollars damages.[49] The _News and Courier_, of Charleston, South Carolina, in 1905, in reporting a suit by A. M. Flood against a street car company, referred to Mr. Flood as “colored.” The latter brought suit against the newspaper and recovered damages. In the course of its opinion, the court said: “When we think of the radical distinction subsisting between the white man and the black man, it must be apparent that to impute the condition of the Negro to a white man would affect his [the white man’s] social status, and, in case anyone publish a white man to be a Negro, it would not only be galling to his pride, but would tend to interfere seriously with the social relation of the white man with his fellow white men; and, to protect the white man from such a publication, it is necessary to bring such charge to an issue quickly.”[50] The court adds that its decision does not violate the Amendments to the Federal Constitution, for these do not refer to the social condition of the two races, but serve rather to give the two races equal civil and political rights. Finally, the court says, quoting People v. Gallagher: “... if one race be inferior to the other socially, the Constitution of the United States cannot put them on the same plane.”[51] Where laws separating the races in railroad trains and street cars are in force, and the duty devolves upon the conductors to assign passengers of the two races to their respective coaches or compartments, it is surprising that they do not more often make the mistakes of assigning bright mulattoes to the white coach and dark-skinned white persons to the colored. There are several instances where the latter mistake has been made. One would not expect a mulatto to resent being assigned to the white coach and nothing would come of it, unless some white passenger recognized him as being a Negro and objected; but one would expect a white person to resent being assigned to the “Jim Crow” compartment.