Hampden-Sydney College reports post-election racial unrest

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Officials say about 40 students at a small all-men’s college in Virginia shouted racial slurs, threw bottles and set off fireworks outside the Minority Student Union within hours after President Barack Obama’s re-election.

Hampden-Sydney College President Chris Howard said in an email to parents Thursday that the disturbance early Wednesday also included threats of physical violence.

Howard is the college’s first African-American president. He said in the email that he was disappointed in the “harmful, senseless episode” and that bigotry has no place on the campus of 1,080. About 9 percent are black.

The racially tinged disturbance is the second reported protest sparked by Obama’s re-election. A protest at the University of Mississippi in Oxford late Tuesday involved about 400 people who shouted racial slurs. Two people were arrested.

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.