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PAGE 10—Feb. 3, 1955—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS Oklahoma OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. five-point proposed constitution al amendment to provide operat ing and building money for Okla homa schools was introduced in both legislative houses Jan. 27, and capitol leaders announced a timetable that would put the package program be fore state voters by late March. Introduced following weeks of con ferences and compromises, the bill includes a non-controversial measure replacing the present 4-mill county- wide levy restricted to Negro school use. The separate Negro'school re venue system, peculiar to Oklahoma, presumably will become illegal under desegregation. Although schoolmen have viewed integration as a major budget prob lem ever since the Supreme Court’s ruling last May, the new four-mill levy for all schools is not expected to figure in legislative battles, if any, over the proposed omnibus amend ment. The big stumbling block in pre liminary conferences was the ques tion of whether school districts should be enabled to vote operating millage beyond the current 20-mill limit. Finally presented, the amendment would allow extra millage elections on a formula basis, keyed to a work ing figure of $250 per pupil. That is, districts with high schools could vote extra mills up to 10 if necessary to reach the $250 per pupil and those with only grade schools could vote up to five extra mills. Oklahoma’s new Gov. Raymond Gary had first opposed any millage increase, then agreed to a raise for Oklahoma City and Tulsa, and finally to relief for other districts provided a workable formula could be mapped. Metropolitan districts had threat- RAYMOND D. GARY New Oklahoma Governor ened to bolt from the entire program unless an extra millage proposal were included, terming it their sole chance of meeting continuous and dangerous budget shortages. Capitol observers still expect legis lative hurdles before a final decision is reached on an extra millage pro posal to submit to state voters. OTHER PROVISIONS Other provisions have met with little or no opposition thus far. They would: 1. Liberalize the present five-mill building fund levy law to allow use of funds for repairs as well as new construction. 2. Create a building authority to issue bonds for common school build ings. Bonds would be retired by that portion of the school land trust fund income now going to increase the principal. 3. Permit school boards to extend teacher contracts past the present one-year limit. 4. Permit school districts to vote up to 10 percent of their assessed valuation in bonded indebtedness. No district can now vote more than five percent. House speaker B. E. Harkey of Oklahoma City has set a timetable for clearing the whole package through the legislature in time for a March vote. He wants legislative approval by mid-February and a statewide elec tion in late March. Harkey suggested a week-long legislative recess be taken just before the election, allow ing members of both houses to go home and explain proposed amend ments to their constituents. Under present plans the legislature can then vitalize all the provisions and open the way for combined- budget, integrated operations when Supreme Court instructions come down. In event the election is de layed, Harkey said, legislators may stay in session into summer months or return for a special session. ‘FREE TRANSFER’ PLAN An unexpected proposal for out right voluntary segregation in Okla homa school emerged in the house of representatives Jan. 19. But even its exponent conceded the idea will stand or fall on merits unrelated to interracial education. State Rep. Bill Shipley, Okmulgee, house education chairman, distrib uted mimeographed sheets to all house members asking their reaction REP. BILL SHIPLEY House Committee Chairman to a “free transfer” law. It was the first public proposal, from any quar ter, of a measure that could circum vent integrated education. Shipley said he would press for such legislation if support proves strong enough. He said patrons in both Oklahoma City and other school districts had favored the plan, but explained the proposal does not have endorsement of the city school sys tem or the Oklahoma Education As sociation. He made the suggestion on his own and not as a spokesman for the education committee, Shipley said. Text of the proposal, which was followed by “yes” and “no” blanks for noting reaction, follows: It has been suggested that legislation be prepared, designed to permit school children in grades one through twelve to transfer to the school district of their choice; that such transfers shall be made prior to May 15 but in event a change of residence occurs after the date of legal transfers, a transfer may be made at the time of the change in residence, subject to the approval of the receiving district. That such transfers shall not have to be made more than once in the school life of the child: that boards of education of a receiving district shall have the authority to reject transfers or assign pupils to buildings or schools within their district. A week later, Shipley told the Southern School News that he had received no strong response on either side of the issue. Shipley said, “This involves a lot of controversy. It’s an awful question. Most of the boys may be slow about deciding just how they would vote, and I doubt if some of them will turn in any response at all.” Shipley said he expects no con troversy on the racial phase, although such a law would, in effect, allow school boards to keep their schools all white or all Negro. He does anti cipate hot objections from small school districts, mainly white, which could be decimated if students had free right to transfer to larger dis tricts offering better facilities, easier transportation, bigger all-around programs and other lures. Oklahoma Education Association sources also harked back to 1949 when James C. Nance, Purcell, then a state senator, proposed a free transfer clause for the modernized school code then in preparation. Nance stumped the state arguing for the plan, but it was erased before the code reached the legislature, under fire from small school districts fearful of resulting losses. However, OEA sources speculated the new free transfer plan might find some backers among supporters of the current effort to reorganize state districts and eliminate small, alleged ly expensive schools. The state ex penditures council and the rural school teachers association are now involved in an open battle over the council’s campaign to modernize and tighten the high school structure. Shipley said he is still considering introducing the transfer measure, but “I am going to wait until I get some reaction from some of the boys.” He said he deemed separate schools the fairest route for both white and Negro children. Shipley said he cam paigned in Okmulgee last summer on a segregation platform and received 50 per cent of the county’s Negro ballots. “I told them the mixed schools should come last, after you have desegregation in cafes and theatres, and so on. I said the experi mentation shouldn’t be put on the children first,” he said. “I also think it would be fairer to the Negro teachers,” he added. “I haven’t found a place in the state— and I have traveled all over checking on this—where they are going to have mixed schools that the school boards will give a Negro teacher a job.” Shipley said he had received no official response from the Oklahoma Association of Negro Teachers after broaching his idea. F. W. Moon, OANT executive secretary and prin cipal of Oklahoma City’s Douglass high school, said the group’s legisla tive committee is studying the plan. Moon reiterated his former stand: “I know our teachers feel that if it is a question of losing our jobs or hav ing segregated schools, we will take the job loss.” Moon said he was “not much disturbed” at the new develop ment, and predicted free transfers would again be squelched by small school districts. Further, Moon ex- presed confidence the state will fol low the spirit of the U. S. Supreme Court integration order without circumvention attempts. “I don’t think we will do that way in Okla homa,” he said. Shipley’s county has the fourth largest Negro school population in the state. The 1954 school census showed 1,998 Negroes aged 6 to 17, and 938 pre-school children, com pared to 7,234 whites in the 6-17 barcket and 3,624 white pre-school ers. The senate education chairman, Sen. Oliver Walker, has made no public suggestions touching on de segregation. His committee, like Shipley’s, has been participating in SEN. OLIVER WALKER Heads Senate Committee capitol conferences with OEA leaders on a new public school finance pack age including a combined white and Negro education budget. Finances are the sole integration issue in that pro gram. Walker entered the senate in 1948 from Dale, where he has been school superintendent since 1929. Dale is in Pottawatomie county, central Okla homa, where present and potential Negro students total 527 compared to 12,998 whites. CHAIRMAN GARLAND GRAY, Vice-Chairman Harry B. Davis and Counsel David J. Mays (left to right) of the Virginia Commission on Public Education look over the preliminary report issued by the segregation study group on Jan. 19. Virginia RICHMOND, Va. r J T HE Virginia segregation study commission, in a preliminary re port filed with Gov. Thomas B. Stan ley on Jan. 19, declared that it will search for legal means to prevent en forced integration in the public schools of this state. The report said that the public hearing held in Richmond on Nov. 15, as well as other expressions of the people’s views concerning the segregation issue, “have convinced the commission that the overwhelm ing majority of the people of Vir ginia are not only opposed to integra tion of the white and Negro children of this state, but are firmly convinced that integration of the public school system without due regard to the con victions of the majority of the peo ple and without regard to local con ditions, would virtually destroy or seriously impair the public school system” in many sections of Virginia. “The welfare of the public school system,” the report continued, “is based on the support of the people who provide the revenues which maintain it, and unless that system is operated in accordance with the convictions of the people who pay the costs, it cannot survive; and this is particularly true in Virginia where a larffe percentage of the cost of pub lic education is dependent upon local revenues. “In view of the foregoing . . . the commission, working with its coun sel, will explore avenues toward for mulation of a program, within the framework of law, designed to pre vent enforced integration of the races in the public schools of Virginia.” COUNSEL APPOINTED Simultaneously with submitting its report, the commission, which con sists of 32 members of the state legis lature appointed by the governor, an nounced the appointment of David J. Mays, of Richmond, as counsel. Mr. Mays, 58, one of Virginia’s best known lawyers, and an authority on constitutional law. is the author of a biography of Edmund Pendleton, Virginia statesman and Revolution ary leader, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1953. Mr. Mays also is chair man of the state library board. Gov. Stanley made this brief state ment as he released the commission’s report to the press: “I appreciate the preliminary re port of the commission which I un derstand was unanimously adopted. “It seems to me the commission is endeavoring to make a thorough study to find a solution, and I am confident in its ability to bring in a recommendation that will be accept able to the large majority of the peo ple of Virginia.” The commission’s declaration that it will seek legal ways to prevent en forced integration came as no sur prise to Virginians. Chairman Gar land Gray has been an outspoken op ponent of integration, and the feeling here has been that virtually all the other commission members share that general viewpoint. When he ap pointed the commission last August, Gov. Stanley stated emphatically that he would use “every legal means at my command” to preserve segre gated schools. ALMOND BACKS REPORT Virginia’s Atty.-Gen. J. Lindsay Almond, Jr. told reporters that the Gray commission’s report “is entirely consistent with the position I feel compelled to take before the Supreme Court of the United States.” Mr. Al mond, along with Richmond attorney J. Austin Moore, Sr., counsel for the Prince Edward County School Board, will appear before the court when arguments are presented on the scope and nature of a final decree to carry out the antisegregation ruling of last May. “I feel that the report is construc tive,” Mr. Almond declared, “as I have felt all along that enforced inte gration would destroy the public school system in vast areas of Vir ginia. That we must seek to avoid through any legal means available.’’ The Gray commission (formally titled the State Commission on Pub lic Education) pointed out in its re port that “the great majority” of those who spoke during the Nov. 15 public hearing in Richmond’s Mosque auditorium were opposed to integration. The commission continued: “The hearing was well attended, orderly, and apparently representa tive of the view of the people of the entire state, and it is presently the view of the commission that further public hearings would result only id cumulative testimony, rather than fresh viewpoints. “The testimony at the hearing brought into sharp focus the nature and intensity of the feeling as to the effect that integration would have on the public school system. Not only did the majority of persons speaking at the hearing feel that integration would lead to the abolition or de struction of the public school system, but some groups indicated, through their spokesmen, that they preferred to see the public school system aban doned if the only alternative was id' tegration. “It is noteworthy that 55 counties located in various parts of the state’ through resolutions adopted by th eIf representative governing bodies- have expressed opposition to integra" tion in the public schools and that 0 the 55 counties only 21 have over 50 per cent Negro population. A numb er of school boards have expressed oP" position to integration of the raee- in the schools as have many n° n governmental organizations and asso ciations of our citizens. Included m the latter group are large and repr e Continued on Next Page