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I ft 3 bb- ✓,/ 4 UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA FEB 7 1 "'5 libraries Factual Wthern School News Objective VOL. I, NO. 6 NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE FEBRUARY 3. 1955 II I- r C K >■ s: ti u i: £ It 7 L ! a w e- a- es IT ve MI re 3j li- Zi «l « he li on lis on to 31 on rt- ;as •a- ll* int its ur tfc is- ai ke oi rj oi n<3 a* ii- u* v- lg >n on a Legislatures Take Up Segregation Issue VV/HILE a majority of the 17 south- ” em and border states marked time pending rearguments before the U. S. Supreme Court, several of the state legislatures which convened in January received new legislative proposals either to strengthen their segregated school systems or provide for “delaying actions.” In South Carolina and Georgia, bills aimed at preserving segregation seemed certain of speedy passage. In North Carolina, a measure to increase authority of local school boards over the enrolling and assignment of pu pils got the backing of Gov. Luther H. Hodges. A similar measure was introduced in the Tennessee legisla ture, but faces powerful opposition. Pro-segregation bills had also been drafted in Alabama, but had not been introduced as this issue of Southern School News went to press. Similar measures were circulated in Mary land, but had not been introduced. The Oklahoma and Mississippi leg islatures were wrestling with school financing problems which had a di rect relationship to the segregation- desevregation issue. Following is a brief state-by-state summarv of significant developments during the month of January. Fuller details will be found elsewhere in this issue. ALABAMA Alabama’s legislature was called into special session by Gov. James E. Folsom for the purpose of author izing a big road bond issue. But sev eral bills to strengthen school seg regation have already been drafted, and Sen. Albert Boutwell said he would submit his legislative study committee’s recommendations at the first opportunity.” The Boutwell plan would make it possible for the state to discontinue public schools and allocate money to aid private schools. ARKANSAS The Arkansas SERS correspond ent reported that the most significant aspect of schools news in January was the lack of executive or legisla te comment on the segregation question. The new governor, Orval . Faubus, made no mention of the ls sue in his inaugural address, and school segregation wasn’t brought up ln the General Assembly during the rat two weeks of the biennial ses sion. Main school item on the leg- Jf. agenda: the provision of ad- ■tional revenues for education. DELAWARE Still awaiting a ruling by the State opreme Court on the readmission ° 10 Negro pupils to the Milford w te high school, Delawareans noted j num ber of other developments au nng January. NAAWP leader Bry- Notice rjm S '.- THE «N School News is ll Ed C ' a . Publication of the Southe 19 ,. cat > Reporting Service, 11< it 7. v< \ South, Nashville, Ten injj 8 _ oLtribiitf'd free to interest: re< pie.t 3 " anr * or 6 a nizations “P< $ c L" quirie s about SOUTHEI •o SPdd^' IWS should be address: Stan S ’ P - °- Box 6156, Ackl. ^“-Nashville, Tenn. tabli^L R e P°rting Service was « a 0d f ,,| the southern edito on th' Ucators whose names appe fin an 6 ."l^ihead on Page 4. It for t|, e * j a S rant from the Fui an i n |j f < van ceinent of Educatio l»v l,P en dent agency establish: W rd , Foundation - icy wi „ C . lal statement of SERS p< ^ e ad. 3 S ° f° un d in the mai A Special SERS Report Oak Ridge Maps Desegregation (Note: The Atomic Energy Commission announced in January that the public schools in Oak Ridge, Tenn., will be desegregated in September of 1955. Oak Ridge is hardly a typical southern community because of its unusual relationship to the federal government, but its school problems are not unlike those of other southern communities. Because of the widespread public interest in the AEC announce ment, Southern School News assigned one of its Tennessee correspondents to do the following report.) ^TVIC and educational leaders report a mild reaction to the announcement that Oak Ridge schools will be desegregated in September, 1955. Under the announced plan, 100 Negro students will be enrolled in two schools formerly attended by only white students. Fifty Negroes are scheduled to attend Oak Ridge high school, where the estimated attendance for 1955-56 will be 1,748. At Robertsville junior high school another 50 Negroes will be among the 1,025 students expected to enroll there. The lack of any immediate response, pro or con, leaves some Oak Ridgers puzzled and others cautiously con fident the transition will be accomplished with a minimum of disturbance. School Supt. Bertis E. Capehart made the desegregation announcement Jan. 11 at a monthly meeting of the Par ents’ Advisory Council after the date for desegregation at Oak Ridge had been set by the Atomic Energy Com mission in Washington. Dr. Capehart told the 21-member council that in carry ing out this reorganization the following principles will apply: 1. Pupils will not be favored nor discriminated against because of race or color. 2. School district boundary lines will be strictly ad hered to without reference to race. 3. All appointments of teachers (or other personnel) will be based on merit and not on race or color. Dr. Capehart, who joined the Oak Ridge school system in 1945 and became superintendent Jan. 6, said there are no plans to desegregate below the sixth grade. He said that neighborhood school district fines would be pre served. For this reason, elementary grades from kinder- See OAK RIDGE on Page 12 ant Bowles settled in south Delaware and announced a campaign to oust key state officials who have backed desegregation. The Delaware legisla ture met, but the first few weeks failed to produced rumored legisla tion to curb the powers of the state board of education. Gov. J. Caleb Boggs asked the legislature to cre ate a State Human Relations Coun cil. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA As January ended, the District of Columbia took another major step in its integration time-table when mid year graduates of junior high schools entered high schools according to new non-racial boundaries. The change involved 1,018 junior high graduates. Supt. Hobart M. Coming, re-elected to a new four-year term in January in spite of some opposi tion, began giving closer study to special “social adjustment” problems growing out of the integration pro- gram. FLORIDA Florida saw the second incident in which a family was forced to remove its children from a white school on the grounds that they were part Ne gro. The latest incident involved the twin stepsons of Monroe Taylor. Aft er the loss of his job, a midnight visit from a “crowd of men” and a Ku Klux Klan warning, Taylor decided to leave Florida. Taylor’s wife is part-Indian. Meanwhile an official investigation into an earlier incident involving the Platt children con tinued. GEORGIA Three proposed laws to strengthen public school segregation, explained in detail in earlier issues of South ern School News, were introduced shortly after the Georgia legislature convened, and seemed assured of speedy passage. By resolution, the Georgia House and Senate approved two proposals to amend the U. S. Constitution to make states solely re sponsible for the policies under which their schools are operated. The House approved another resolution to amend the Constitution to pre serve segregation in the nation s armed forces. Repeal of Georgia s compulsory school attendance law may also be sought. By JAMES ELLIOTT Staff Writer, The Nashville Banner KENTUCKY With an official policy oriented to ward compliance with the Supreme Court decrees when they are finally issued, Kentuckians began to think of the upcoming summer primaries when a new set of state officials will be nominated. To date, the segrega tion-desegregation issue has not been injected into the warm fight for the governorship brewing between Judge Bert T. Combs and A. B. “Happy” Chandler. A special advisory com mittee on desegregation continued its studies preparatory to making rec ommendations to the state board of education in March, and Supt. Omer Carmichael of Louisville told a Ne gro business group that “I expect to implement the integration program ... in whatever way the court de crees.” LOUISIANA As Louisiana officially marked time waiting for the Supreme Court to is sue formal decrees in the school seg regation cases, a struggle between the forces of Gov. Robert F. Kennon and those of ex-Gov. Earl Long shaped up over the use of tidelands oil revenues. Kennon’s group wants to use the money for a vast road- building program. Long’s group fa vors earmarking some 200 million dollars of the amount for equalizing school facilities. MARYLAND The Maryland legislature convened in January, but an earlier prediction that a “deluge of bills and propo sals” on the segregation issue would descend on the session failed to ma terialize. Copies of two pro-segrega tion proposals, however, were dis tributed by the Maryland Petition Committee. The proposals would (1) continue segregation by having a system of private schools supported by state aid, and (2) repeal Mary land’s compulsory school attendance law by stating that no white child shall be required to attend any school which has a Negro pupil or teacher. MISSISSIPPI Mississippi’s official policy on school segregation is directed toward full equalization of white-Negro fa cilities in the belief that equaliza tion will preserve “voluntary” seg regation. The Mississippi legislature met in special session in January to Oak Ridge, Tenn. appropriate new money for equaliza tion, but strong resistance was de veloping to all proposed sources for major tax increases. The 25-member Legal Educational Advisory Commit tee, meanwhile, was voted unlimited power to conduct hearings and com mand the appearances of witnesses to ascertain the effect of enforced pub lic school integration on “law and order.” MISSOURI Just at deadline for this issue of Southern School News, St. Louis was getting ready to integrate its high schools with the start of the second semester. A St. Louis County town became the first to announce plans for full integration of its teach ing staff next September, and six principals reported in detail how in tegration looks after a full semester of experience. NORTH CAROLINA The North Carolina General As sembly received, with the blessings of Gov. Luther H. Hodges, a meas ure to give city and county boards “complete authority” over the enroll ment and assignment of pupils in public schools. This step, recom mended by a study commission, will write into law sanction for current practices, and is seen as a device to forestall the introduction of more ex treme legislation pending issuance of final decrees by the Supreme Court. OKLAHOMA Oklahoma’s unique system for fi nancing a dual school system will get a major overhauling if the legislature and the voters of the state approve a constitutional amendment intro duced this month. The amendment would facilitate the transition to de segregated public schools. But while details of the amendment were being worked out, the chairman of the house education committee was sounding out his colleagues on a proposal to establish a “free transfer” plan that would, in effect, enable local school authorities to maintain a large measure of segregation. The author, however, has no immediate plans for introducing the proposal as a bill. SOUTH CAROLINA South Carolina’s outgoing gover nor, James F. Byrnes, and the new governor, George Bell Timmerman, in major speeches stressed the state’s official policy of preserving racial separation in public schools to the maximum degree possible. Against this background, the South Carolina legislature received a number of legislative proposals aimed at fortify ing the authority of local school of ficials to cope with problems growing out of the Supreme Court decision. The proposals came from the 15- member special study committee. One major suggestion would eliminate the state’s compulsory attendance law. TENNESSEE January saw several “firsts” in the desegregation issue in Tennessee: (1) The introduction of the first legisla tive proposal designed to maintain the separation of the races in the state’s public schools; (2) an an nouncement that the schools of Oak Ridge would be desegregated in Sep tember; (3) the preliminary step to ward creation of a regional organiza tion to support desegregation; (4) a public stand for desegregation by a parent-teacher group; and (5) en dorsement by a civic club of a pro posal to maintain segregation. TEXAS The opening days of the Texas legislative session failed to produce any new legislation on the segrega tion-desegregation issue, but there was a hint of future official policy in Gov. Allan Shivers’ address to the new legislature when he ad libbed four words—“and maybe not then” —into this sentence: “I recommend that no change be made in our system of public education until—and maybe not then—the United States Supreme Court gives us its complete mandate.” Meanwhile, steps are being taken to improve Texas Negro colleges. VIRGINIA In a preliminary report filed with Gov. Thomas B. Stanley, Virginia’s segregation study commission an nounced that it will search for legal means to prevent enforced integra tion in the public schools. The com mission then appointed special coun sel. Virginia’s attorney General, J. Lindsay Almond Jr., called the report “entirely consistent with the position I feel compelled to take before the Supreme Court,” but several Virginia newspapers voiced reservations about the report. WEST VIRGINIA As the West Virginia legislature moved through the first month of its session, expected measures to facili tate further school desegregation failed to materialize. The legislature did, however, appoint a special com mittee to study the state’s colleges and institutions to determine whether integration would permit the “moth balling” of some of them. Index State Page Alabama 2 Arkansas 2 Delaware 3 District of Columbia 4 Florida 5 Georgia 6 Kentucky 5 Louisiana 7 Maryland 8 Mississippi 9 Missouri 15 North Carolina 14 Oklahoma 10 South Carolina 3 Tennessee 16 Texas 7 Virginia 10 West Virginia 13