Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 2—NOVEMBER 1955—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
Courts V oid
State Laws
(Continued From Page 1)
activity in Baltimore and Carroll
counties. Montgomery County school
officials reported that 10 Negro
teachers, displaced with the closing
of four sub-standard elementary
schools, had been reassigned—some of
them to formerly all-white schools.
Mississippi
Not a single effort was made by
Negroes to enroll in white schools in
Mississippi, a roundup of school
opening news showed. Meanwhile
steps were being taken to close the
“gap” between the quality of white
and Negro facilities in the dual school
system. Citizens Councils were or
ganized in four additional communi
ties.
Missouri
School children were settling into a
second year of classwork in integrated
schools without incident. “The whole
subject has virtually disappeared
from the newspapers,” wrote SSN
Missouri Correspondent Robert Lasch.
Meantime, a study arising out of
school integration yielded these first
findings: (1) Integration can make
possible a sharp reduction in the av
erage size of elementary classes; (2)
integration in a large city system can
mean mixed classes for only 10 per
cent of the students though the Ne
gro population may be more than 33
per cent; (3) when optional integra
tion takes place in high schools, as
many as one-third of the Negroes
eligible to transfer to a mixed school
may choose to remain at their old
school instead.
North Carolina
Gov. Luther H. Hodges suggested
that North Carolinians someday may
have to operate their schools on a
“local option” basis—meaning, ap
parently, that local districts would be
free to desegregate their schools or
abandon them as they wished. The
plan as yet has not taken any concrete
form. The Advisory Committee on
Education reported to the governor
that it is “pleased with the present
operation of our schools and the
growing acceptance of the thought
that racial pride and racial integrity
make most probable the substantial
success of voluntary racial separa
tion in our schools.”
Oklahoma
Seven more schools reported mixed
classes to bring to a total of 271
the number of Oklahoma schools
which have integrated their pupils.
The Oklahoma Education Association
opened its doors to Negro teachers.
A late count showed that 143 Negro
teachers had lost their jobs; however,
one former principal of a Negro school
had become superintendent of a dis
trict which included a white ele
mentary school.
South Carolina
A Negro minister who was an
originator of the Clarendon County
case left South Carolina after some
gunplay which was the first reported
instance of violence in the state over
the school segregation issue. Meeting
at Columbia, local groups began or
ganizing the Citizens Council move
ment on a statewide basis.
Tennessee
Federal Judge Marion S. Boyd,
ruling in a five-month-old college
entrance case, held Tennessee’s school
segregation laws unconstitutional but
upheld a state plan for gradual de
segregation of the state college sys
tem. The newly formed Tennessee
Society to Maintain Segregation an
nounced plans for a statewide organ
ization and said it would cooperate
with the Citizens Councils in Missis
sippi and other states.
Texas
The Texas Supreme Court declared
invalid provisions of the state consti
tution and state school laws requiring
segregation. This was the celebrated
Big Spring case. A survey showed
between 1 and 2 per cent of Texas’
Negro scholastics are attending mixed
classes in the 65 districts that have
been desegregated.
Virginia
Doubt was cast on the prospect for
a special session of the General As-
A New Book
Finds 3 i Unfinished Tasks’
WHITE AND NEGRO SCHOOLS
IN THE SOUTH, Truman Pierce,
James Kincheloe, R. Edgar Moore,
Galen Drewry and Bennie Carmi
chael, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood
Cliffs, N.J., 338 pages.
F OUR SCHOLARS, educators all,
have taken a sharp look at edu
cation in the South and have, on the
basis of their findings, identified three
major “unfinished tasks” facing the
school systems of the region.
And they have gone further.
White and Negro Schools in the South
not only offers a wealth of statistical
data on educational resources of the
region, but on the basis of these data
it presents the authors’ conclusions on
several aspects of the biracial school
system and points out methods by
which the job of educating the re
gion’s growing numbers can be
tackled.
Subtitled “An Analysis of Biracial
Education,” the closely documented
volume is the result of an exhaustive
study financed by the Kellogg Foun
dation and the Fund for the Ad-
TRUMAN PIERCE
Studies South’s Schools
vancement of Education. The study
was directed by Dr. Truman Pierce
from the George Peabody College at
Nashville, Term. A year’s research by
the four authors, assisted by a broad
array of scholars, educators and
school administrators, went into the
making of this book which has as its
stated purpose “to set forth, analyze
and interpret facts concerning the
dual school systems of the South to
the end that the findings may be use
ful in efforts to deal intelligently with
the segregation issue and other prob
lems in southern education during
the years immediately ahead.”
Like its predecessor in the area of
southern education, the popularly
known Ashmore Report, this most re
cent study defines the South as in
cluding 13 states: Alabama, Arkan
sas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky,
Louisiana, Mississippi, North Caro
lina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Ten
nessee, Texas and Virginia.
1952 DATA USED
Also like the Ashmore Report (The
Negro and the Schools, Harry S. Ash
more, University of North Carolina
(See A NEW BOOK, Page 11)
Teacher Tenure
(Continued from Page 1)
Montgomery County, Maryland, one
supervisor has been displaced. Ten
Negro teachers have been re-assigned
to mixed schools along with their pu
pils, although Negro teachers gen
erally have been excluded, for the
time being, from all-white schools.
In Kentucky, where the 1,386 Ne
gro teachers are, on the average, con
ceded to have higher scholastic and
experience qualifications than the
19,482 white teachers, “a few” Negro
teachers are out of their jobs, ac
cording to press reports. However,
the state department of education has
received no official confirmation. In
Kentucky’s Floyd County, one of the
first in the state to desegregate,
though in the reverse, white students
in the mining area this year are at
tending the formerly all-Negro school
where the only Negro in the state
teaching a mixed class is located.
The threat of loss of jobs also has
been dangled before the eyes of Negro
teachers in several Deep South
states in efforts to keep them from
pressing for school desegregation. The
effort of the Georgia Board of Edu
cation by resolution (later rescinded)
to oust all teachers who supported
the NAACP or desegregation and the
Alabama attempt by legislative ac
tion to accomplish the same end in
the Black Belt counties are the best
known examples.
S. C. CASE
Similar threats reportedly have
been used in Clarendon County,
South Carolina, where one Negro
teacher reported her contract was not
renewed because her father-in-law
had signed the petition instigating the
new famous court action that ulti
mately resulted in the May 17, 1954,
Supreme Court decision.
But the displacements and firings
which have occurred still are far be
low expectations. For example, even
in Oklahoma, Negro education lead-
sembly to deal with the segregation-
desegregation problem as the state
still awaited a report from the Com
mission on Public Education. A sixth
NAACP petition was filed in Virginia
requesting integration, this one in
Charlottesville. (SSN was in error
last month in this space in reporting
that “Norfolk Negroes denied admis
sion to all-white school with school
board later turning over building for
all-Negro occupancy.” The incident
occurred in Newport News, not Nor
folk, and was correctly reported
elsewhere in the October issue.)
West Virginia
Greenbrier County, scene last year
of a disturbance when an unsuccess
ful effort was made to integrate
schools, decided to try again in Jan
uary after a federal district court
ruling. It was the first legal action of
its kind in West Virginia. Meanwhile,
the NAACP implied or threatened
suits elsewhere in the state.
ers have estimated that 450 of the
state’s 1,600 Negro teachers will ul
timately lose their jobs as desegre
gation proceeds, and in West Vir
ginia an estimated 10 per cent of the
Negro teachers may be displaced, of
ficial sources reported.
Outside the region, New Mexico re
ported 20 of its approximately 25 Ne
gro teachers now are instructing
mixed classes, with no displacements
among them. The state has a total of
about 7,200 teachers, with approxi
mate quality reported in the qualifi
cations and salary scales of the white
and Negro groups.
Similarly, Kansas has a small num
ber of Negro teachers, 340 out of a to
tal classroom complement of 16,889
(including public and private
schools). While figures on the inte
gration or displacement of Negro
teachers are not available, some dis
satisfaction with the teacher situa
tion in Topeka, the scene of the Su
preme Court case decided May 17,
1954, has been reported in the daily
press.
Beside the fear of loss of jobs, listed
as the greatest apprehension, there
were other reasons for the uncer
tainties surrounding Negro teachers
in the 13 states responding to the
SSN questionnaires.
The white directors of Negro edu
cation in Florida, Georgia and Ala
bama listed fear of abandonment of
the public schools as the second great
est fear. In Tennessee the fear that
greater professional preparation
would be required ranked second,
while in West Virginia it was the fear
of lack of cooperation from white
teachers, official sources reported. In
Florida, fear of unpleasantness and
unfair treatment stemming from the
attitude of white school administra
tors and in Oklahoma fear that after
being displaced, opportunities in
other occupations would be limited
were the major concerns of Negro
educators.
This listing of causes of uncertainty
among Negro teachers, of course, rep
resents nothing definite. It is nothing
more than the informed opinion of
individual educators or school admin
istrators, white and Negro, in the
various states. Only in South Car
olina has any study of a definite na
ture been made on this topic, and it
in the summer of 1953.
HOWARD STUDY
Conducted by Hurley H. Doddy, as
sistant professor of education, and G.
Franklin Edwards, associate profes
sor of sociology at Howard University,
this study recorded the fears harbored
by 150 teachers and principals in
South Carolina who had returned to
summer school for graduate study.
Published in the 1955 Winter issue of
The Journal of Negro Education, the
results listed the 12 most prevalent
apprehensions in the following order:
(1) Demands for increased profes
sional preparation would be greater.
(2) Fewer couples would be em
ployed at the same schools.
(3) New ways would be intro
duced to evade granting equality in
employment, pay and other benefits.
(4) Great amount of job displace
ment would occur.
(5) Greater hostility toward Negro
teachers by white school officials
would develop.
(6) White students would not show
respect.
(7) Negro teachers would not re
ceive jobs equal to their training and
experience.
(8) Despite the Supreme Court
ruling, schools would remain about as
before.
(9) White teachers would not co
operate.
(10) Negro teachers would be worse
off after desegregation than before.
(11) Negro teachers would not
know how to conduct themselves.
(12) The public schools would be
abandoned.
LAWS ALTERED
However, a review of news stories
on the topic of teacher tenure and
status published in the daily press
since September, 1954, would indi
cate why concern for their jobs may
well be uppermost in the minds of
many Negro teachers. For while states
such as Oklahoma, Mississippi and
Georgia do not have teacher tenure
laws, efforts have been made or con
sidered in the past year to alter tenure
laws in Alabama, Florida, Tennessee,
South Carolina, North Carolina, Ken
tucky and Virginia.
In Tennessee the last session of the
General Assembly adopted an amend
ment to the teacher tenure law
which leaves it up to local boards of
education “to determine the fitness of
such teacher (s) for reemployment in
such vacancy on the basis of the
board’s evaluation of .. . competence,
compatibility and suitability to prop
erly discharge the duties required
. . . considered in the light of the
best interest of the students in the
school where the vacancy exists.”
The Tennessee Department of Edu
cation maintains that this amendment
merely insures local jurisdiction in
the matter of teacher employment.
However, a prominent Nashville at
torney who has spoken publicly on
segregation has recommended similar
tenure law amendments as one meth
od of getting around the touchy prob
lem of employing Negro teachers in
mixed classes in state moving toward
desegregation.
North Carolina abandoned its
teacher training law last year, and
the Virginia Board of Education has
approved the introduction of a 30-
day dismissal clause in its law pro
viding for continuing teacher con
tracts.
PLEDGE PROTECTION
Something of the interest Negroes
have in this aspect of the segre
gation-desegregation question was
demonstrated last month in Char
lottesville, Va., at the state meeting
of the NAACP where top spokesmen
pledged legal support to protect the
tenure of Negro teachers in the state.
While developments relating to the
Kansas Suit
Is Revived
By ANNA MARY MURPHY
Topeka Daily Capital
TOPEKA, Kan.
A three-judge federal district court
panel ruled here Oct. 29, that the To
peka Board of Education is proceed
ing “in good faith toward complete
desegregation.”
An “option” feature of the board’s
desegregation plan was challenged
earlier this fall by the NAACP, rep
resenting Negro parents who brought
one of the original actions, Brown v.
Topeka Board of Education, which led
to the Supreme Court school decision.
“Desegregation,” ruled the court,
“does not mean there must be inter
mingling of the races in all school
districts. It only means they may not
be prevented from intermingling or
going to school together because of
race.”
The Topeka plan has accomplished
the latter, the court said.
By Step No. 3 of the Topeka plan,
effective this fall, the board gave all
pupils the option of attending the
school in the district where they now
live or continuing to attend their I
former school.
Because of the options, the |
NAACP’s latest suit had alleged “the i
purported plan of desegregation... is
not in conformity with the decree of
the U. S. Supreme Court.”
During the hearing, circuit judge I
Walter Huxman told both sides “a
lack of good faith is the only question
we are concerned with now, because
we do not consider this the final plan.”
The NAACP contended the option
feature, combined with the fact most
Negroes live in the districts served I
by the three former Negro schools, i
would keep those schools “from
ever being anything but all-Negro
schools.”
The board’s argument on such
mandatory attendance was that it was
“immediate compulsory integration”
and not “abolition of compulsory
segregation.” Step three achieved the
latter, the board said, and the court
upheld it.
question of teacher tenure and status
have occurred at a slow pace, when
they have occurred at all, the fact
remains that this is an area of in
tense interest to Negroes in the teach
ing profession since it is among the
most lucrative and respected occu
pations open to them in many parts
of the South. In Alabama, for ex
ample, where Negro teachers’ average
salary in 1952 was only $2,359 in com
parison to the $2,541 average paid
the white teachers, the median income
for Negroes as a whole in the state
was only $882 as compared to $2,056
for the whites, according to the 195d
census report.
Perhaps in anticipation of attacks
on the segregated school systems.
Southern states, beginning abou
1949, started on programs of equal
ization which have about equalized
some portions of the biracial educa
tional systems. Among the first
benefit from this rush to protect t e
“separate but equal” theory by iuak"
ing facilities equal in fact were
Negro teachers. While median salad
for Negro teachers still are below ^
white teacher averages, salary se
in practically all of the states ha'
been equalized at the state level, W'
any discrimination in salary , 0 f
occurring in local supplemental® 11
the minimum foundation P r0 ^^
now in effect throughout much o
region.
SALARIES EQUAL ^
In six states—Kentucky,
Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, ^
ginia, and West Virginia—where ^
Negro teachers generally are ^
qualified in terms of degrees e ^
and experience than white teac ^
Negro salaries, on the average
equal or higher.
Just what effect the tensions
by these uncertainties sU1 ' r ° ^-ill
the status of Negro teache jji
have on the quality of educa
the South is not clear. ft>vod
In Tennessee, at least, an irn P
quality of work” has been one
an education official reported-