color line

[ kuhl-er lahyn ]

noun

1. Also called col·or bar [kuhl, -er bahr]. social or political restriction or distinction based on differences of skin pigmentation, as between white and Black people.

Word History and Origins

Origin of color line¹

An Americanism dating back to 1860–65

Idioms and Phrases

Idioms

1. draw the color line, to observe a color line.

Example Sentences

Who did and didn’t have air-conditioning often fell starkly along the color line, too, especially in the South.

From Time

Private establishments held a firm color line, as did public transit.

From Time

Instead, the outrage and anger was defined by the color line.

From The Daily Beast

W.E.B. DuBois once prophesized that the 20th century would be about the color line.

From The Daily Beast

It would serve us all well to know how porously open we all are to models of behavior far beyond the color line.

From The Daily Beast

Wherever the discussion began it promptly shaded off toward the color-line and insult.

From Project Gutenberg

Across the color line I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where smiling men and welcoming women glide in gilded halls.

From Project Gutenberg

This amendment wiped out the color-line in politics so far as any written law could possibly do it.

From Project Gutenberg

They were not at all sure that the color-line could be peacefully drawn.

From Project Gutenberg

And yet no color line has excluded, no reservation boundary separated, this people from their fellow countrymen.

From Project Gutenberg