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SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS —Dec. I, 1954 —PAGE II
North Carolina
RALEIGH, N. C.
4 S expected, North Carolina’s brief
to the U. S. Supreme Court asked
the court to go slow in effecting its
desegregation decree, and urged that
federal district judges be given au
thority to supervise the change-over.
An alternative to gradual desegre
gation, the state said, could be de
struction of the public school system
and “racial bitterness.”
The brief referred to the late Jus
tice Jackson’s suggestion that to send
the cases back to lower courts with
out standards for guidance in fur
ther proceedings would mean a gen
eration of litigation.
“If so,” said the brief, “such a re
sult is far preferable to a generation
of strife outside the courts and of
chaos inside the schoolroom.”
No specific plan for ending segre
gation was advanced by the brief,
which contains 188 pages, including
141 paces of exhibits. It was signed by
Atty. Gen. Harry McMullan and As
sistant Attys. Gen. T. Wade Bruton,
Ralph Moody, Claude L. Love and I.
Beverly Lake.
Except for a few statistical tables,
the exhibits consisted of answers to
questionnaires sent to city and coun
ty school superintendents and police
officials. In substance, an overwhelm
ing number of the answers said im
mediate desegregation would not
work in the state and would lead to
violence.
When the Supreme Court invited
briefs from states not directlv in
volved in cases which led to the de
segregation decision, such as North
Carolina, it suggested ways of effect
ing the decree.
One way would be specific decrees,
with compliance required “forth
with.” Another would permit “grad
ual adiustment” under court guid
ance, and the third would permit dis
trict judges to frame decrees.
GRADUAL PROCESS URGED
North Carolina spoke out strongly
for the gradual process, handled by
district judges. A blanket decree cov
ering all states would be impractical,
this state argued, because conditions
in North Carolina are different from
those in other states and vary within
the state itself.
“If the public schools and the pub
lic peace are to be preserved,” the
brief said, “the decrees to be entered
in the South Carolina and Virginia
cases must be framed to fit the con
ditions in the actual communities.
“Only a court conversant with lo
cal conditions and granted wide dis
cretion can tailor the decree to fit the
local variations.”
As an example of the differences,
the brief noted that recent demon
strations against integration occurred
in Delaware, where there are 13 Ne
groes to 87 whites. In North Carolina,
the proportion of Negroes is one of
four. The brief added:
Even if every other condition were pre-
se ly the same, the intermixture of one
child with 99 white children in
Dakota is obviously a far different
blem for a school administrator from
r*Viu ,^ r °htcm of commingling 71 Negro
am * en w hh 29 white children in North-
N" County, North Carolina, or 45
ir, children with 55 white children
m Mississippi.
Besides the proportion of Negroes
, w hite in the state, the brief said,
e re are three other “maior differ
ences that distinguish North Caro-
tl? 3 * rom most of the states outside
e South. These were listed as “the
ermixture of white and Negro
ontes throughout rural areas, the
!T e . ra f reaction to this court’s ores-
n interpretation of the Fourteenth
hiendment. and the number of Ne-
810 machers employed.”
Ne^ rt * lern states with the largest
alm° poDu ^ at i° ns have the Negroes
a n j° S V en tirely confined to the cities.
the Negroes are “concentrated
wmcipally in certain areas through
j n natur al tendency of people to live
thermal Dro *’ mity to other people like
u A
can K resu ft> school district lines
hvelvfrawn S o that there are rela-
Sc v i ew Negro children in certain
dren - S an< ^ datively few white chil-
the bt- lri ,°^ er schools.” In such areas,
are lef sa ’d' the questions presented
^largely academic.”
e questions and answers in
North Carolina, said the brief, are
complicated by the fact that most
North Carolinians, white and colored,
do not live in cities but live in rural
areas where the residences of white
and Negro neighbors are inter
spersed.”
REACTION UNFAVORABLE
On the “major difference” of gen
eral reaction, the brief said, “in North
Carolina the opinion conflicts with
deepseated convictions and has been
generally regarded as extremely un
fortunate.
Of course, this court may not allow its
decisions as to the interpretation of the
Constitution to be guided by public
opinion, but, in determining the decree
to be issued, a court of equity is not re
quired to shut its eyes to reality, espe
cially when the victims of an unwise
decree will be children.
As to the last “major difference,”
the number of Negro teachers em
ployed, the brief said that North Car
olina, with about the same Negro
population as New York, “employs
five Negro teachers for every Negro
teacher employed by New York. New
York with six Negroes out of every
100 persons in its population, employs
fewer than two Negroes for each 100
school teachers. North Carolina, with
one Negro out of every four persons,
employs more than one Negro teacher
out of each four teachers.”
Questionnaires sent to school su
perintendents showed that 128 out of
131 “believe they would find it im
practicable to use Negro teachers,”
said the brief. At the present time,
the brief noted, “North Carolina em
ploys more Negro teachers than any
other state in the Union. The aver
age Negro teacher in North Carolina
has more college training and is bet
ter paid than the average white teach-
»»
er.
If immediate integration is ordered,
said the brief, “at least the following
dangers will result in North Car
olina:
1. Public schools may be abolished;
2. If the public schools are not abol
ished. the presence in the same classroom
of white children and Negro children may
well bring about daily confusion, physi
cal conflicts, ridicule of one group by an
other, and other conditions which will
make it difficult for children to study and
teachers to teach;
3. If public schools are not abolished,
parents financially able to do so may
send their children to private schools,
and public schools will come to be re
garded as a dole to paupers, repulsive to
everyone, black or white, having that
pride and self respect essential to good
citizenship in a democracy;
4. Conflicts in the schoolroom, on the
playground, and between parents and
teachers may lead to racial bitterness in
a community and bring to North Carolina
the bloody riots which have disgraced
cities and states where justifiable racial
ATTY. GEN. McMULLAN
Author of N. C. Brief
pride among both Negroes and white
people has been ignored.
Referring to the questionnaire an
swers of school superintendents and
police officers, the Tar Heel brief said
the opinions expressed by them “in
dicate that the mixture of the races
in the school buses is the most diffi
cult problem confronting them” as
a result of the court’s decision.
TRANSPORTATION PROBLEM
It pointed out that the State oper
ates 7,200 public school buses and
transports 452,000 children to and
from school each day. Over 6,000 of
these buses are driven by high school
students and no adult now rides on
most of them.
Around 2,000 are used for trans
porting Negro children, 5,000 for
transporting white children, and 85
for Indian children.
To require that Negro children and
white children be commingled forthwith
on these buses, without adult supervision
and police protection, is to invite con
flicts on the bus, which will make riding
on them so hazardous few parents will
consent to their children’s using them.
This is a substantial danger a court of
equity may well consider in formulating
its decree.
The diverse conditions within
North Carolina also were discussed.
In addition to a high proportion of
Negroes in the East compared with
the West, the state has about 30,000
Indians.
“The racial loyalties of the Indians
of North Carolina are as strong as
those of either of the other races, per
haps stronger,” the brief said. “The
Indians will be as resentful of any
compulsory integration of their chil
dren with the children of other races
as will be the people of either the
white or the Negro race.”
To illustrate the diversities within
North Carolina, the brief noted that
the 1950 census showed only 10 Ne
groes in Graham County, in the West,
compared to 18,189 in Northampton,
where whites number 10,182. “A de
cree which would be an annoyance
in Graham County could well bring
disaster in Northampton,” the brief
said.
DIFFERENT AGE LEVELS
The brief quoted from studies
showing that in the elementary
schools 17.47 per cent of the white
children are overage for their respec
tive grades while 33.95 per cent of the
Negro children were in that category.
“Thus one white child out of six
was retarded, as compared with one
Negro child out of three,” the brief
states.
Obviously, it would create more nu
merous and more serious administrative
and instructional difficulties to put in the
same classrooms with white children the
thousands of Negro children in North
ampton County, one-third of whom are
retarded, than it would cause to put into
the classrooms of Graham County a sin
gle Negro child or even two Negro chil
dren, even if both of them should hap
pen to be in the retarded one-third.
The brief asked the court to take
“judicial notice” that nearly every
school building is crowded to capac
ity. If a substantial number of Negro
children are admitted to a white
school, white children will have to go
elsewhere.
Thus, a decree requiring a school board
in North Carolina forthwith to admit
Negro children to the schools of their
choice will, if a substantial number of
them choose a school now used by white
children, necessarily require the school
board to deny to white children presently
enrolled in that school the right to con
tinue to attend it.
Discussing the development of the
state’s public school system, the
brief said, “North Carolina, today, is
educating more Negro children and
employing more Negro teachers than
any other state in the Union. She is
educating them in a statewide school
system, which means that, except in
sofar as local tax supplements pro
vide additional benefits, every child
in North Carolina, regardless of race,
residence or economic status, studies
the same subjects and uses the same
textbooks. . . .”
VIEWPOINT OUTLINED
It said the state’s “firm belief that
separate schools for the races will
train both white and Negro children
to live together in mutual respect and
friendship, while mixed schools in
North Carolina will cause racial con
flicts is the result not of emotions
and prejudice but of sober, earnest
thought by those who have desired
to see her children educated so as to
be prepared to demonstrate to all the
world that two races as fundamental
ly different as the Anglo-Saxon and
the Negro can live side by side in
freedom, peace, and mutual respect.
Hodges New Governor Of N. C.
RALEIGH, N. C.
T IEUTENANT GOVERNOR Luther
Hartwell Hodges became North
Carolina’s 91st Governor on Nov. 9,
the day Gov. William B. Umstead was
buried in his native Durham County.
Gov. Umstead, stricken with a
heart attack two days after his in
auguration in January, 1953, was a
periodic visitor to the hospital after
the initial attack. He died Nov. 7.
A political unknown until he made
his successful campaign for lieut
enant governor in 1952, Gov. Hodges
will serve during the remaining 26
months in Gov. Umstead’s term. At
the end of that time, he will be
eligible to run for the full four-year
term.
Within 60 days of his inauguration,
the new chief executive will have to
be prepared to submit recommenda
tions to the 1955 General Assembly
on tough twin problems. One con
cerns future public school policy in
the light of the desegregation deci
sion; the other concerns declining
state revenues and an almost-cer-
tain tax increase.
HAS WIDE EXPERIENCE
To both of these problems, Gov.
Hodges will bring far more know
ledge than his limited political ex
perience indicates. By virtue of his
office as lieutenant governor, he
served as chairman of the state board
of education and appointed a special
GOV. LUTHER HODGES
committee to go into the segregation
question.
At his first press conference, he
said in answer to a question that he
will lean heavily on advisory com
mittees established by his predeces
sor. The list includes an advisory
group appointed by Gov. Umstead to
help formulate policies, that, in the
Governor’s words, “would preserve
and strengthen the public school sys
tem.”
Gov. Hodges further increased his
fund of information about the state
government during the 1953 General
Assembly when he sat in on many
committee sessions at which a va
riety of subjects were under discus
sion. He also read a great deal. He
was known as a hard worker in what
had previously been a purely hon
orary office.
POLITICAL UNORTHODOXY
The new Governor in his brief
public career has earned a reputa
tion for unorthodoxy among the
strictly orthodox politicans. As
lieutenant governor, he was presid
ing officer of the State Senate at the
1953 session and thus charged with
naming important committee chair
men. In an unprecedented step, he
refused to disclose in advance who
would get what chairmanship, and
declined to make any promises.
In addition, he reduced the number
of Senate committees from 39 to" 26,
eliminating some of the patronage
plums available in the form of cler
ical and stenographic help. The
ceremony at which he took over the
governor’s office likewise was un
usual: it lasted nine minutes all told,
including Gov. Hodges’ acceptance
speech.
Gov. Hodges, who is 56, retired as a
Marshall Field & Co. vice president
in 1950.
As for the future, the North Caro
lina brief noted the people of the
state are “determined to maintain
their society as it now exists with
separate and distinct racial groups in
the North Carolina community. They
strongly oppose creating conditions in
the public schools which tend to
amalgamize the white and Negro
races.”
It added the people “also believe
that the achievements of the Negro
people of North Carolina demon
strate that such an educational sys
tem has not instilled in them (Ne
groes) any sense of inferiority which
handicaps them in their efforts to
make lasting and substantial contri
butions to their state.
A social order which is the product of
three centuries, and a public school sys
tem which is the product of one century
of conformity to the Constitution as in
terpreted by this court and by Congress,
cannot he transformed overnight into an
entirely different social order and educa
tion system notwithstanding the great
respect which the pople of North Carolina
have for constitutional government and
for this court.
The brief contended that a decree
directing a school board of the state
to admit Negro children forthwith to
a school of their choice within the
limits of normal geographical school
districting would exceed the author
ity of a federal court. However, it
said if the high court has such au
thority to issue such a decree, it is
not required to do so “but in the ex
ercise of its equity powers (it) can
permit a Gradual adiustment from the
existing school system to a system not
based on color distinctions.”
It also stated if the court has such
authority, it should not do so “if such
a decree is to be a pattern to be fol
lowed in other cases arising in other
states and other school districts.”
In averring that the North Carolina
brief did not intend to present a solu
tion to the problem, Atty. Gen. Mc
Mullan and his assistants wrote:
This brief is submitted for the purpose
of showing the unparalleled gravity of
nullifying the Constitution and laws of
North Carolina affecting its most cher
ished, important, and expensive enter
prise, its public schools, and for the pur
pose of stating sincerely and emphatically
that, the subsequent decrees of this court
in these cases should allow the greatest
possible latitude to the district judges in
conducting subsequent hearings and in
drafting final decrees, if any of the ob
jectives sought by this court’s decisions
are to be attained.
The questionnaires to school super
intendents, signed by Dr. Charles F.
Carroll as state superintendent of
public instruction and Atty. Gen. Mc
Mullan, consisted of 18 questions and
ranged from opinions on the results
of immediate and gradual integration
to school population.
In the brief, identity of the answer
ing superintendents is referred to by
a code number. The letters of trans
mittal pledged anonymity.
TYPICAL ANSWERS
McMullan’s questionnaires to the
sheriffs and chiefs of police asked
them for an estimate on the attitude
toward segregation and also asked
about the possibilities of violence if
immediate integration were ordered.
Typical questions and answers by
police:
“Do you think there would be like
lihood of violence among racial
groups of students which would se
riously interfere with the operations
of schools in your city or county?”
Answers: Yes, 193. No, 6. Don’t
know, 1.
“Do you consider your present po
lice force sufficient to preserve the
general peace and order in your ju
risdiction if such intermixing of white
and Negro children in the public
schools were to occur?”
Answers: Yes, 14. No, 182. Don’t
know, 3.
Asked about the prospects in their
school districts if integration were
ordered “forthwith,” seven of the 165
superintendents answering said they
believed the attempt would be ac
cepted peacefully and 145 said they
thought it would “seriously impair
the conduct of their schools.” Other
answers:
125 thought “serious complications”
would develop in school bus opera
tions, 148 thought “serious problems”
of discipline would be created, 135
thought it would be hard to get
enough properly trained white teach
ers and and “only three” thought
“it would be practicable to use Negro
teachers.”