Effect of Your Actions

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One of the great advantages of your company having a Real Estate School is that you can spot the students that you know are destined to become good real estate agents.

In early 1970 we had a very bright young man in one of our classes and after graduation he interviewed with our company and we hired him. Well this would not have been such a big deal except he was not only the first black real estate agent in our office; he was also the first black real estate agent in our city.  Just as we had expected Adel fit into our operation just perfect and all the other agents loved him.

I decided that I would give him a little help and I told our receptionist to send any black customers to Adel.  Adel loved this and my intentions I thought were good but I was in violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

This law carries Civil and Criminal Penalties and is different than most Criminal laws where you have to intent to commit a violation before you can be found guilty of a crime. As the lawyers would say to commit an actus reus (guilty act) the prosecution must show mens rea (guilty mind).

While my intentions I though were good because I was helping a new agent that happened to be black, it never dawned on me that I was limiting the choice of our customers. I just assumed because they were black they would want to work with a black agent.