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PAGE 14—July 6, 1955—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
South Carolina Officials Stand Firm Against Court Deere*
COLUMBIA, S. C.
IjjOUTH Carolina’s political and ed
ucational officials continued to
present an unbroken front in defense
of separate schools through the June
aftermath of the Supreme Court’s
decision remanding the state’s school
segregation case to the federal dis
trict court where it arose.
The solidarity of official opinion
was the most significant aspect of a
period of diverse reaction and state
ments. The unanimity of sentiment
was reflected by statements from
counties at opposite extremes of the
state, geographically and racially.
Prom Pickens County, where Negroes
make up only 11 per cent of the total
population (lowest ratio in the state)
came a grand jury expression of con
fidence that “education officials of
this county will preserve the separate,
but equal, school system.”
From Clarendon County, which is
involved in the litigation remanded
by the Supreme Court and where
Negroes comprise 70 per cent of the
total population, came flat declara
tions from school officials that the
public schools would be closed be
fore mixed classes would be allowed.
NO CHANGE RECOMMENDED
Of greatest statewide significance,
however, was the recommendation of
the special segregation study com
mittee that South Carolina schools
be operated during the coming school
year on the same segregated basis as
heretofore. Here is what that com
mittee’s chairman, State Sen. L. Ma
rion Gressette, of Calhoun County,
released to the press following a June
14 committee conference with high
political and educational leaders:
“The committee feels that there
may be uncertainty among school au
thorities and the public generally
about the force and effect of the May
31 decree. They should be advised
that the decree, and any subsequent
orders issued by the lower courts in
this case, can effect only the Sum-
merton school district in Clarendon
County, which is before the Court.
The trustees and other authorities in
the other school districts of the state
should prepare to operate their
schools for the 1955-56 session on the
same basis as in the past.”
KLAN MEETS
While this study committee was
grappling with the problem in an al
most complete absence of publicity,
some moderate headlines were gained
by a Ku Klux Klan meeting held in
Sumter County. The June 11 night
meeting was attended by spectators
numbering between 200 and 500, ac
cording to various estimates. One re
porter estimated that approximately
100 persons signed membership ap
plications at the conclusion of a
speech by E. L. Edwards of Atlanta,
billed as the Imperial Wizard of the
United States Klan.
Edwards, garbed in gold and pur
ple regalia, described his “new” or
ganization as a “white, Protestant
body to stop outsiders from interfer
ing with our business.” He called for
organization and unity in order to
get men in state and local govern
ments strong enough to overpower
evil groups.”
Public reaction to the Klan meet
ing, the first since the former South
Carolina Klan head was jailed in
1952, was generally adverse. News
papers condemned the meeting and
said the Klan had no place in South
Carolina’s solution to its segregation
problems. Sheriff John Henry of
Horry County, where the Klan was
most active in the post-World War
II years, issued a vigorous statement
warning Klansmen to stay out of his
county.
In Anderson, where no Klan ac
tivity has been reported in some time,
a cross was burned in front of the
city Recreation Center on the night
of June 18.
The South Carolina General As
sembly, which adjourned on May 27
(just prior to the Supreme Court’s
May 31 decision), will reconvene in
annual session on the second Tues
day of January, but could be called
into special session by the governor
if the situation warrants. At this
time, however, there is no indication
that a special session will be called,
and sentiment throughout the state
seems generally opposed to a special
session under prevailing circum
stances.
Meanwhile, action taken by the
1955 session is providing bases for
study by school officials and others
concerned with adjusting both to the
Supreme Court decision and to the
state law. Local school boards were
vested with increased authority over
pupil placement and other adminis
trative matters by recent acts of the
legislature. The most far-reaching
enactment of the 1955 session was a
provision for the automate stoppage
of public funds to schools required
by court order to accept pupils as
signed through other than school
channels. Any early application of
that new statute is expected to come
in the Summerton district of Claren
don County, which is the only district
actually before the federal courts at
this time.
Another 1955 legislative enactment
prompted by the segregation problem
seems to have had no effect on the
school system one way or another.
The state’s compulsory school attend
ance law was repealed on March 9,
but a sampling of attendance records
from then through the remainder of
the school year discloses no measur
able impact. The fact that the re
pealer came relatively late in the
school year, plus what may have been
a public assumption that the change
would become effective with the next
school year rather than with the cur
rent year, tend to lessen the signifi
cance of attendance figures. More
meaningful data will be available
when the next school year begins in
September.
TAX RELIEF PROPOSED
At least one legislative proposal
will be made next year to grant tax
relief to parents who send their chil
dren to private schools. State Rep.
Burnet R. Maybank Jr. of Greenville
(son of the late U. S. senator from
South Carolina) already has drafted
a bill which would grant a measure
of relief from state income taxes for
persons who have children in pri
vate schools next year. He is plan
ning to make the relief apply up to
30 per cent of the cost of private
schooling, with a provision that 100
per cent of such costs be allowed
when and if integration is actually
ordered in South Carolina. His bill
would apply only to costs such as
tuition, books, instruction and the
like, and would exclude board and
lodging. It would apply only to pri
vate schools operated within South
Carolina.
The Greenville legislator likewise
is studying the possibility of afford
ing similar relief from property taxes
levied for school purposes on the lo
cal level. He feels that parents who
seek to insure the education of their
children in racially separate schools
(privately operated) should not have
to bear a double burden of school
costs.
On the congressional level, both
senators from South Carolina, Olin
D. Johnston and Strom Thurmond,
have renewed their efforts to secure
enactment of federal legislation pre
venting appeals from district courts
on matters affecting schools.
There has been no federal court
action on the Clarendon County case
since the Supreme Court announced
(on May 31) that it was remanding
all of the school segregation cases
back to the district courts where they
originated. In South Carolina, that
means a three-judge court which,
when last constituted, consisted of
Circuit Judges John J. Parker of
Charlotte, Armistead M. Dobie of
Charlottesville, Va., and District
Judge George Bell Timmerman of
Columbia.
The initial three-judge court which
first heard the case was made up of
Judges Parker, Timmerman and J.
Waties Waring, then of Charleston.
Since then, Judge Waring has retired
and moved to New York. His place
was taken by Judge Dobie on the
special court.
In early June, Judge Parker told
The State newspaper of Columbia
that he had no immediate plans for
reconvening the court.
Other district judges in South
Carolina are Ashton H. Williams of
Charleston, in the Eastern District;
and C. C. Wyche of Spartanburg, in
the Western District. Judge Timmer
man who presides in both districts,
is the father of South Carolina’s gov
ernor.
TRANSPORTATION SUIT
Another lawsuit involving segre
gation, this time on city buses rather
than in public schools, went before
the Court of Appeals for the Fourth
Circuit in June. The case, on appeal
from a dismissal by Judge Timmer
man in the district court, was heard
in Asheville on June 21. It was
brought by a Negro woman, Sarah
Mae Flemming, against the South
Carolina Electric and Gas Co., which
operates bus service in Columbia and
other South Carolina cities.
The complainant seeks $15,000
damages for the bus driver’s en
forcement of “unconstitutional and
discriminatory laws requiring . . .
racial segregation in intra-state car
riers operating within the state of
South Carolina.”
In his order of dismissal, Judge
Timmerman noted that the woman
based her suit, at least in part, on the
school segregation decision, and said:
“It (the Supreme Court) has made
no such holding in the field of public
transportation. Besides, the court
rested its opinion in the Brown case
almost exclusively upon sociological
and psychological factors.
“It discussed such intangibles as
opportunities to engage in discussions
and the supposed sociological effect
which segregation might have on a
Negro child’s motivation to learn.
The whole basis of the decision is the
claimed adverse effect which segre
gation has on the educational and
mental development of Negro chil
dren, or as otherwise stated, ‘the
children of the minority group.’
Certainly, no such effect can be
legitimately claimed in the field of
bus transportation. One’s education
and personality is not developed on
a city bus.
“To hold that the Brown decision
extends to the field of public trans
portation would be an unwarranted
enlargement of the doctrine an
nounced in that decision and an un
reasonable restriction on the police
power of the state.
PLESSY CASE APPLIES
“This court is still bound by the
decision in Plessy v. Ferguson . . .
which holds that segregation in the
field of public transportation is a
valid exercise of the state police pow
er.”
Back on the school front, the pres
ident of the NAACP chapter in
Charleston, J. Arthur Brown, has
indicated that group’s intention of
seeking admission to Charleston’s
white schools prior to the opening
of the fall term, but thus far no offi
cial petition or lawsuit has been filed.
South Carolinians during June
heard widely varying views on the
segregation issue from residents and
non-residents alike, ranging in rep
resentation from the National Asso
ciation for the Advancement of Col
ored People to the States’ Rights
Council of Georgia.
The NAACP executive secretary,
Roy Wilkins, told about 700 Negroes
at a state rally in Columbia that the
NAACP has set up a special division
to help protect the rights of Negro
teachers in a desegregated school
system. He said that wholesale firing
of Negroes was not expected, how
ever, in view of the nationwide short
age of teachers. As to prospects for
early integration, he said:
“We feel the white and colored peo
ple of the South, including those of
South Carolina, will get together in
good faith to make a beginning
toward integration. . . . Because the
court’s May 31 action directing dis
trict courts to see that integration is
carried out came as a great shock
to many white people, Negroes should
cooperate in the transition.”
He added that Negroes would “re
main firm on insisting on their con
stitutional rights as defined in the
court’s decision.”
NAACP MOVES CITED
In complete contrast were the re
marks of Hugh C. Grant of Augusta,
Ga., a former official of the foreign
service and now head of the State’s
Rights Council of Georgia. Address
ing the Sumter Kiwanis Club, he
warned that the success of the
NAACP campaign would result in
“amalgamation, mongrelization and
the passing from the American scene
of the Negro race. . . . The assault
is all along the line. It is anticipated
that it will also include an attack
against the laws of many of our
states banning intermarriage between
the races.”
In Charleston, Mrs. Cornelia Dab
ney Tucker, a militant grandmother
who has spearheaded other public
movements (for secret ballots, Amer
ican history instruction, etc.) has
termed the segregation question a
“matter of national security.” She
has enlisted aid elsewhere in the state
in her effort to preserve racially sep
arate schools and is distributing
copies of Sen. James O. Eastland’s
speech calling for an investigation of
the Supreme Court.
The trustees of the school district
most vitally concerned with the seg
regation problem (those of Claren
don County’s Summerton district)
are agreed on a policy of shutting
down all local schools rather than
submit to mixing the races in the
classes. They are supported in that
stand by Clarendon County Supt. of
Education L. B. McCord.
The school board of one of the lar
gest districts in the state (District 1
of the City of Columbia, embracing a
large metropolitan area extending
beyond the city limits) has declared
its intention of continuing separate
schools into the 1955-56 school year.
In Charleston, the retiring city
school superintendent, Dr. George C.
Rogers, expressed his belief that the
state would be able to maintain its
system of separate schools for some
time to come. “I believe,” he said,
“Negroes are well satisfied with their
‘Mixiecrats’
For very different reasons than
those cited in the Northern press,
The News and Courier also prefers
the lack of a (Supreme Court)
deadline. Some of our Southern
friends do not agree. They say they
would have welcomed a joining of
the issue immediately, at the risk
of upheavals and possible violence.
They grow impatient. But this is
not a battle to be fought and won
or lost. It is a long-range cam
paign that will stretch over many
years. No man can now say what
will be victory and where will be
defeat.
When it comes to patience, is the
white man inferior to the Negro?
Once it is shown that Southern
white people are determined nei
ther to yield to the mixiecrat nor
to give up their public schools, ad
justments can and will be made.
Someday, we hope, the Northern
press will grow weary of waving
the bloody shirt at the South and
look to problems closer home.
—Charleston News and Courier.
schools and will continue to attend
them.” At the same time, the veteran
Charleston educator said he hoped a
way could be found to maintain.,
adequate system of public school
He has been fearful of indicating
that the public school system nS!
be abandoned.
NEW WHITE SCHOOL
In mid-state Lee County,
Negroes outnumber whites, ner
month will mark the first ^
toward construction of a major wh^
school unit since the equalization ajr
expansion program went into efiec
four years ago. Up until now, N egr ,
projects have received priority, jy
together, the Educational FinanJ
Commission (which administers th e
school building program) has author,
ized almost $140,000,000 in schoo'
building projects. Almost $79,000.0((i
have gone to Negro schools.
Undergirding that program is th f
state’s three per cent sales tax whiet
supports the school bonds used for
raising the revenue. Those bonds are
believed by Atty. Gen. T. C. Callison |
to be unaffected by either the Su-
preme Court decision of May 17 i 1954^
or that of May 31,1955. The con’stitu.
tionality of the bonds already has
been tested in state courts, and Atty.
Gen. Callison feels that there would
be little likelihood of success for a
suit challenging the bonds’ validity
on grounds that they might be ap-
plied to construction of mixed
schools.
This month Callison called atten
tion to an opinion prepared last year
in which he said of the bond legisla
tion:
“That act was passed by the legisla
ture after the test suits had been
brought to the federal courts and I
with full knowledge that the courts
would either require the state to pro
vide equal and separate facilities or
abolish segregation altogether. . ..
It would appear that the act was
meant to stand whichever way the
court decided.”
The same line of reasoning seems
applicable to lawsuits which could
be brought against school bonds is
sued on the local level.
The Greenville branch of the
NAACP, at an early June meeting,
decided to await word “from higher
headquarters” before taking any ac
tion in the wake of the May 31 Su
preme Court decision. The local sec
retary said the suggestions probably
would come from state headquarters
at Columbia, after that office had re
ceived word from national headquar
ters of the NAACP. The Greenville
branch is reported to have some 500
members.
South Carolina’s school segregation
suit, affecting the Summerton district
of Clarendon County, will go bach
before a federal district court on Jut
15 at Columbia. The hearing will be
the first official development in the
case since the Supreme Court re
manded the lawsuit to the district
court where it originated. The court
will comprise the same three judge 5
who last handled the matter before
it went to the Supreme Court. Cir
cuit Judges John J. Parker of Char
lotte, and Armistead M. Dobie 0
Charlottesville, Va., and Distn c
Judge George Bell Timmerman 0
Columbia.
In anticipation of the hearing
Summerton school officials have been
conferring both with their fell 0 *
townspeople and with the two ador
neys who represented them befo ^
the Supreme Court, Robert MeC.
Jr. of Charleston and S. E. Rogers 0 ^
Summerton. A lengthy closed sessi°^
held with the lawyers on June^ ^
resulted in no public announcem 5 -•
other than that the meeting had bee*
held and that henceforth Figg
serve as spokesman for the group-
The earlier (June 27) “town m e5 ' ,
ing” held at Summerton was d eV °^
to open discussion of whether
public school should be closed no" ^
kept open on a segregated basis VD
integration was actually forced upw^
the schools. The consensus waS ^
open schools as usual in Septem
and continue to operate them so
as they could be kept separai
.ted.