Ever since the beginning of the Cold War, American leaders had worried about the impact of segregation on the country’s international reputation. President Truman had promoted his civil rights initiative, in part, by reminding Americans that they could not afford to “ignore what the world thinks of our record.” The State Department filed a brief in the Brown case noting the damage segregation was doing to the country’s image overseas.
Foreign nations and colonies paid close attention to the unfolding of the American civil rights movement. The global reaction to the Brown decision was overwhelmingly positive. “At Last! Whites and Blacks in the United States on the same school benches!” proclaimed a newspaper in Senegal, West Africa. But the slow pace of change led to criticism that embarrassed American diplomats seeking to win the loyalty of people in the non-white world. In a public forum in India, the American ambassador was peppered with questions about American race relations. Was it true that the Haitian ambassador to the United States had to live in a black ghetto in Washington? Why did no black person hold a high public office? Of course, the Soviet Union played up American race relations as part of the global “battle for hearts and minds of men” that was a key part of the Cold War.