Newspaper Page Text
South Carolina
COLUMBIA, S. C.
T HE South Carolina General As
sembly has enacted into law six
legislative measures aimed at pre
serving racial separation within the
state’s public schools. Enactment of
this legislation represents the sec
ond major development within the
pattern of state law since South
Carolina became involved in the
school segregation crisis through the
now-famous “Clarendon County
ease” which successfully challenged
the constitutionality of separate
schools in Clarendon County.
The first major legislative develop
ment came during the 1952-’54 pe
riod, and culminated last year with
the ratification of a constitutional
amendment which eliminated the re
quirement that the General Assem
bly provide a “liberal system of
free public schools.” Repeal of that
section was approved overwhelm
ingly by a 1952 referendum but has
not in itself affected the operation
of South Carolina schools.
There are differences of opinion,
however, as to the possible effect
of one of these latest items of legis
lation upon the school establishment.
Most of the 1955 acts are designed
to strengthen and spell out in more
definite terms the right of local
school authorities to control such ad
ministrative matters as student as
signment and attendance, and the
disposition of school properties. The
focal point of some degree of con
troversy in an act which repeals the
state’s compulsory school attendance
law.
Gov. George Bell Timmerman, Jr.,
who signed the bills into law on
March 9, feels that repeal of the
compulsory attendance law will
have little or no effect on school at
tendance. He is convinced that par
ents, both white and Negro, will
continue to seek formal education
for their children. He agrees with
the special study committee which
recommended passage of the six laws
that the compulsory attendance law
should be eliminated as a pledge
of good faith to the people of South
Carolina that they will not be forced
to send their children to mixed
schools.
OPPOSITION LIGHT
That sentiment was evident ir
substantial measure in both house:
of the legislature, for opposition wa:
ught and ineffective in the Senate
and in the House of Representatives
Two school teacher members of the
House took opposing sides in the
united debate over the attendance
aw repeal. Rep. Richard L. Bree-
and, a high school teacher in the
ca pital city of Columbia, cautionec
against repealing the law, saying
n clearing the decks, let’s be sure
w « don’t sink the ship.”
Rep. John C. Hart, of Unior
ounty, condemned the Supreme
ourts effort “to destroy us” anc
arned against the “mongrelism’
lc h he said would follow racial in
tegration.
g tee House, as earlier in the
th^pe, ^ 1 , ere was n °ne to defenc
e Court’s decision or to espouse
^segregation. The differences o
^ uuon hinged over the impact o:
1 ® luiat ' n g compulsory attendance
, • Most educators in the state
0 V ? re mained silent on that issue
nf _ have given tacit assent to the
essity of repealing the law.
South ret *ring president of the
tion , Carolina Education Associa-
Wav' ^ rS " ^ ester Medlin, of Con-
PenH Sa ^ S “ sch ° o1 attendance de-
rat . s u Pon the individual teachei
hgij^ 1 th an upon state laws ... We
tejj. Ve f the Present (segregated) pat-
C • Public education in Soutl
fiuuizar 3 * S ^est term or-
chil^ atlon ^ or meeting the needs o
en of both races.”
a ^°ther viewpoint
has S ° mewhat similar expressioi
° me from the new executive
Coble of th e S.C.E.A., P. M
( who says:
telle e , tedividual teacher and the
student \ ^ as te spend with eacl
tetidar, ” as m °re to do with at-
ce than any state law.”
te oorf, U ? er tet en dents of city school
eve r h° S ^ e ent ^ s °f the state, how-
eo m ’ ave declared their belief tha
°ry school attendance law
should be preserved. In Greenville,
that expression came from Dr. W. F.
Loggins. In Charleston, George C.
Rogers said he feared more white
children than Negroes would miss
their educational opportunities
through repeal of the compulsory
attendance law.
“The Negroes seem to be more
anxious to receive an education than
the white people,” he said.
Legislators, laymen and teachers
are hopeful that attendance will be
maintained, however, by the activity
of “visiting teachers,” provided for
in one of the six new school laws.
These “visiting teachers” will re
place the old “attendance teachers”
and will be charged with using per
suasion and influence in promoting
school attendance. Another factor
expected to maintain a high level
of school attendance in many com
munities is the existence of juvenile
and domestic relations courts.
Judge J. Wilbur Hicks, of the
Greenville court, has stated flatly
that he has the legal authority to
compel the attendance of a child
at school if the public interest war
rants.
NEGRO TEACHERS SILENT
Negro teachers and administrators,
meanwhile have made no public
statements concerning the attend
ance law repealer or the other new
school laws. At their annual con
vention held here March 24-25, they
concerned themselves with profes
sional topics and heard talks from
such persons as Dr. Mary Bethune,
South Carolina native and president
emeritus of Bethune-Cookman Col
lege.
Dr. Bethune touched on the grad
ual ending of restrictions between
the races, and said:
“It will take a lot of common sense
not hot heads. Good leaders are
needed, both white and black alike,
so we can do this with smoothness
and calmness.”
TIMMERMAN’S ADDRESS
At the annual convention of the
white teachers, held the preceding
week in Columbia, Gov. Timmerman
reiterated his oft-stated conviction
that parents should be afforded a
choice as to the schools their chil
dren attend. In his address, Gov.
Timmerman reviewed the recent de
velopment of the South Carolina
school establishment, stating that
“our schools for Negroes are now
superior to any in the nation” as a
result of a $127,000,000 construction
program in which Negroes have re
ceived approximately 60 per cent of
all funds allocated.
On the subject of racial separa
tion itself, the Governor had this to
say:
EDUCATION
“The course of wisdom is to pro
vide the best education we can af
ford for our children. It is essential
to their future. It is essential to the
future progress of our state.”
“The public education and train
ing of our children is properly and
traditionally a local responsibility.
“With the consent of parents, our
state and its political subdivisions
have assumed that responsibility.”
PARENTAL RIGHTS
“The parent is the natural guar
dian of the child.
“The parental right to determine
what is best for the child is funda
mental. It is a divine right. It is a
basic law of nature that no man, no
group of men, can successfully de
stroy. It finds expression among all
living things.”
PURPOSE OF SCHOOLS
“The public school exists for one
basic purpose. It is to help the par
ent in the education of the child.
“Educational assistance is the only
justification for taking the child
from the home and placing him in
the public school.
“Every hour that the child spends
in the classroom is an hour away
from the protective care and guid
ance of the parent.
“This places a tremendous re
sponsibility upon the teacher and
the school administrator.
“The public school possesses no
monopoly on education. It is only
SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—April 7, 1955—PAGE 13
S.C. COMPULSORY ATTENDANCE LAW REPEALED
GOV. GEORGE BELL TIMMERMAN JR., seated cen
ter, is shown signing the act repealing South Carolina’s
compulsory attendance law. With him are members of the
state’s special study commission which recommended re
peal of the attendance law as a guarantee to South Caro
linians that they would not be compelled to send their
children to mixed schools. Seated, left to right: Sen. R. M.
Jefferies of Colleton County; Gov. Timmerman; Sen. L.
Photo by Munn Teal
Marion Gressctte of Calhoun County, commission chair
man. Standing: Reps. Harold B. King, William L. Rhodes
Jr., Tracy J. Gaines and Paul M. MacMillan Jr.; former
Sen. George Warren; Supt. G. Creighton Frampton of
Charleston County; and Sens. James Hugh McFaddin,
John Henry Williams and William L. Harrelson. Three
members of the commission were absent.
one of several means available for
the education of the child.
“The surest way to undermine the
public school is to deny the right
of the parent to choose the educa
tional environment for the child.
“Without the parental right to
choose, there can be little parental
support for the public school.
“Without parental support, the
public school cannot survive.
“When a public school degener
ates to the level of the experimental
laboratory, the purpose for its exist
ence as a public school comes to
an end.
“There is a great need in public
education for more realistic think
ing in terms of parental rights and
less academic speculation in terms
of sociology.”
SOUTH CAROLINA LAW
“Our law, which has parental ap
proval, requires that separate
schools be provided for the chil
dren of each race and that no child
of either race shall attend the schools
for children of the other race. Our
law applies equally to both races
at the same time. It does not require
that schools for one race be better
than schools for the other race.
“The opinion of the Supreme
Court of the United States in the
school segregation cases holds for
the first time in judicial history that
equality of treatment is discrimina
tion.
“When schools are unequal, the
remedy is not to destroy the schools
or the law. The remedy is to re
quire that the schools be made
equal.”
THE INTEGRATIONIST
“The integrationist, seeking to
abolish parental rights in education,
utilizes men of talent and little char
acter to bombard the public with a
barrage of false propaganda designed
to lynch the character of a fourth of
our Nation.
“Never before has anyone seriously
proposed that the children of two
biologically different races should be
compelled to mix socially.
“The originality for that unique
proposal belongs exclusively to the
integrationist.
“Precedents can be found in the
pages of history for almost every
other plan.
“No precedent, no parallel, can be
found for compulsory integration.
“It is new. It is novel. It is con
trary to the divine order of things.
“Only an evil mind could con
ceive it. Only a foolish mind can
accept it.”
OPPOSING FORCES
“Man today stands on the brink of
destruction. He has attained this un
enviable position through the scien
tific development of weapons that
are powerful enough to wipe life
from the face of earth.
“This power to destroy all life is
held by two opposing groups.
“God-fearing men who accept and
defend the dignity of the individual
are opposed by materialistic men
dedicated to dominating and con
trolling the lives of all other human
beings.
“Those who seek to dominate the
world seek first to weaken our na
tion from within. Their goal is in
ternal social unrest, discord and
dissension. They are not concerned
with the progressive development
of school advantages for childm in
the South or in any other section of
the world.
“If these forces of evil are able
to force on South Carolina the choice
of no public schools with peace and
friendly relations or public schools
with hatred and strife and discord,
it will be the first time a state has
had to make that choice. . .
“A fanciful fallacy has it that the
integrationist is seeking judicial aid
to protect a downtrodden minority
race.
“In the Clarendon County school
district there are in round figures
2,800 Negro pupils and only 250
white pupils.
“The integrationist is not seeking
judicial aid for a minority race. He
is seeking judicial aid to compel a
handful of white children in the
Clarendon County school district to
attend schools that will be pre
dominantly filled with Negro chil
dren. I mention this to keep the
record straight.”
STAND ENDORSED
Gov. Timmerman’s stand on the
school segregation issue has brought
a resolution of endorsement from the
South Carolina Department of the
Veterans of Foreign Wars. At a
spring rally held March 13 at George
town, the V.F.W. members adopted
a resolution reading in part as fol
lows:
“We are aware that it is neces
sary for us to lift ourselves out of
our complacency and declare our
intentions in meeting a grave situa
tion confronting us and our pos
terity, and we believe our decision to
be in the best interest of all our
people. ... Be it resolved, that the
council of the Veterans of Foreign
Wars of the United States, Depart
ment of South Carolina, endorse and
support His Excellency, the Gover
nor of South Carolina, the Honorable
George Bell Timmerman, in his
stand on segregation in our schools.”
COURT PRAISED
On the other hand, praise for the
Supreme Court decision banning
school segregation came from J.
Ernest Wilkins, Negro assistant
secretary of labor who addressed a
Sumter audience at the Emanuel
Methodist Church.
“The Supreme Court did not add
to the powers of government,” he
said. “The fact is that it decreased
the powers of government. It told
state and local communities that they
could not, under our Constitution,
use their state and local governments
to maintain first class citizenship for
some Americans and second class
citizenship for others. The most mov
ing force in the world today is the
struggle against the idea of being
second class human beings.”
Meanwhile, criticism of “inter
racial” propaganda fostered by “left-
wing” newspapers, national maga
zine and television networks was
voiced in Florence at a meeting of
the States Rights League of Florence
County, formerly the Florence
Branch of the National Association
for the Advancement of White Peo
ple. Discussion centered about the
possibility of boycotting such news
media through “legal, Christian . . .
pressure.”
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
Among collateral developments
growing out of the school segrega
tion issue was the South Carolina
reaction to a statement by AF of
L President George Meany, who
went on record in favor of barring
federal school aid to South Carolina
and other states seeking “to evade
the Supreme Court anti-segregation
ruling.”
South Carolina labor officials were
admittedly unhappy over the Meany
statement but would not be quoted in
reply. A pro-labor legislator, how
ever, the same Rep. John C. Hart
who spoke in favor of repealing the
compulsory attendance law, did re
tort to the national labor leader in
a letter stating:
“Through meddling in racial mat
ters which are none of your busi
ness, and are as distinct from labor
matters as is religion, you embarrass
those who try to help the working
people in the South. It is difficult
to believe that labor leaders are so
stupid as to not realize their asinine
actions when they interfere in
Southern racial affairs. At times, I
wonder whether you are seriously
interested in the southern working
people as your foolish babblings fur
nish the weapons with which labor’s
friends in the South are fought. . .
“Organized labor will never make
any substantial progress in the
South until national labor leaders
stop uttering such rot and drivel on
racial matters in the South. Any
southerner who would go along with
you on such things is not worth
his salt and could not be elected dog-
catcher. . . .”
RECREATION PROBLEMS
Another potentially critical prob
lem was posed for South Carolina
during March by a decision of the
Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals,
outlawing racial separation in public
parks. That decision, hinged direct
ly on last year’s anti-segregation
school decision, is causing concern
over the future of South Carolina’s
wide-spread and well-patronized
system of state parks, worth more
than $4,500,000 and visited annually
by more than 3,000,000 persons.
The State Forestry Commission
operates 22 state parks on a strictly
segregated basis. Five of them are
for Negroes, and two of the five have
recently been provided with a
limited number of vacation cabins.
One is a beach park, in Beaufort
County; another is a mountain park,
in Greenville County, and three are
located in the interior of the state.
In years past, particularly in the
Charleston area, Negroes have
threatened to bring lawsuits for ad
mission to the Edisto Beach State
Park (in lower Charleston county)
but the issue has lain dormant since
1953. Now, there are indications that
Negroes might renew their demands
for admission to all parks on a basis
of full acceptance.