Let me start by saying that I know most of the readers of this blog dislike Ronald Reagan. Some despise him. Some remember that Reagan campaigned for the Presidency at the Neshoba County Fair in Mississippi in 1980 (not Philadelphia, Mississippi).

“But Reagan did somethingg in 1982 that is unimaginable from Trump. He read in the morning paper about a young black family in Maryland whose house Who won their civil case against a member of the Ku Klux Klan who burned a cross on their lawn. He and Mrs. Reagan paid them a visit.

“President Reagan read the story about the cross burning in his morning Washington Post. A black family in College Park, Md., had just won a civil suit against a young Ku Klux Klan leader who had been convicted of terrorizing them five years earlier.

“Reagan’s deputy press secretary, Larry Speakes, said the president was jarred by what had happened to Phillip and Barbara Butler. “That was the first thing on his mind this morning,” Speakes told The Post on May 3, 1982. White House Chief of Staff James Baker and Deputy Chief of Staff Michael Deaver walked into the Oval Office, and the first thing he said to them was, “ ‘I’ve read this story. I’d like to go see these people.’ ”

“Deaver found the Butlers at their jobs at the Government Printing Office, where they both worked as printers, and told them the president wanted to visit them at their home.”

“The Butlers had been newlyweds when they bought the house in 1976. They were the fifth black family to move into the neighborhood. They had lived there for five months when, on Jan. 30, 1977, the Klan burned the cross on their front lawn….

“He finished his last meetings at the White House at 4:15 p.m. Fifteen minutes later, he and first lady Nancy Reagan climbed aboard a helicopter on the White House lawn.

“A few minutes later, the helicopter landed in Beltsville, Md., and the president and first lady rode in a motorcade to the Butlers’ beige brick rambler in College Park Woods.

“The Butlers, their 4-year-old daughter, Natasha, and Barbara Butler’s mother, Dorothea Tolson, were waiting outside to greet them.

The Reagans arrived with a jar of gourmet jelly beans, the president’s favorite candy. The Butlers invited them inside, where they sat on the sofa in the living room.

“Rimer, who then was a Post Metro reporter, remembers how dignified the Butlers were. “My one memory is of how great the family was,” said Rimer, who now works in communications at Boston University. “My thought was, ‘How could someone do that to them?’ ”

“Inside the house, Reagan told the family: “I came out to let you know that this [cross burning] isn’t something that should happen in America.”

I can’t imagine Trump showing compassion to a black family.