Dear Sir,

Your recent RG Opinion piece (March 26), which was a glowing tribute to Miss Carol Hill, illustrated why we remain two Bermudas with a tiered society, in spite of her best efforts.

You wrote “those segregationist policies introduced to appease the sensibilities of wealthy east coast vacationers”.

But we all know that the racist segregation and the economic exclusion of the black community began in 1834, immediately after the emancipation of the slaves so that they would remain as close to their previous condition as possible.

It was a policy that was unabashedly reinforced in the 1840s by the importation of non-blacks to displace, replace and use instead the newly freed slaves.

This was decades before Princess Victoria helped to make Bermuda a tourist resort.

You also wrote, “to ensure Bermuda became a society in which all were free to pursue their highest potential and the artificial limitations imposed by second class citizenship were dispensed with forever”.

Again we all know that despite the changes that have taken place, qualified Bermudians can still be displaced by less qualified foreign expatriate despite the recent remarks by Minister Fahy.

Bermuda has not needed a minimum wage policy to ensure that racism still often exists in employment — and that is quite apart from the Governor’s recent appointments which ignored Bermudians.

We cannot solve a problem which we pretend does not exist.

We are still very much a two-tiered society with all of the social disadvantages and impediments accruing to the black community.

It also acts as a major obstacle to almost any and every solution that attempts to address Bermuda’s problems.

EVA N. HODGSON