Gov. Ralph Carr
Ralph Carr was a rare voice for tolerance. As fear swept the country after Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans were cast as the enemy. But Colorado’s Republican governor called for calm. American citizenship was not conditional on race or ancestry, he said. And as families fled the West Coast, Carr refused to close Colorado borders to them. When the federal government constructed an incarceration camp in southeastern Colorado, the governor accepted it, but continued to argue that to abandon minority rights in a crisis endangered everyone. “If you harm them,” he said to one angry crowd, “you must first harm me.” In the end, Carr's political career was harmed – he never held elected office again. But years after his death, Carr’s courage was recognized by a newspaper that once spurned him: in 1999, the Denver Post named Colorado governor Ralph Carr “Person of the Century.”
About Colorado Postcards
Colorado Postcards are snapshots of our colorful state in sound. They give brief insights into our people and places, our flora and fauna, and our past and present, from every corner of Colorado. See more postcards.
