Newspaper Page Text
Alabama Officials Say State Placement
La>\ W ill Survive Test; One Is Pending
MONTOTVMTTDV a i_
SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—NOVEMBER 1957—PAGE II
MONTGOMERY, Ala.
O fficial reaction in Alabama
to the news that the U.S. Su
preme Court had invalidated Vir
ginia’s school placement law was
that this state s law, though simi
lar, is substantially different in
some respects.
For this reason, one of the au
thors of the Alabama act said, it
was believed the Alabama place
ment law would survive a court
test. (See “Legal Action.”)
Just such a test continued to shape
up in Birmingham as four Negro chil
dren, whose parents had petitioned for
•heir admission to Birmingham white
schools, were given tests as provided
by the placement law. If court action
results, as many expect, it will be the
fest serious challenge to the Alabama
,-tatute which gives broad assignment
powers to local boards of education
See Legal Action.”)
Little Rock continued to dominate the
speeches of politicians and the thoughts
of white Alabamians generally (See
Tolitical Activity” and “What They
Say. )
Alabama legislators and education
leaders expressed hope that the state’s
school placement law would survive a
federal court test whereas Virginia’s
similar law had failed.
State Sen. Albert Boutwell of Birm
ingham, who headed a special screen-
i ing committee which passed on segre-
tation proposals during the 1957 ses-
“ of the legislature, concluded after
a study of the laws of both states that
here are basic differences in the acts.
For instance, Boutwell said, Virginia’s
4ook awa y from local boards of
•duration the power to assign students
® their respective schools and vested
«us authority in a special state place-
ent board. Alabama’s law, passed in
155 and modified this year, leaves as-
, ^ s ent authority entirely to the local
^OTES FUND CUT-OFF
Also, Boutwell said, the Virginia As-
y en acted a statute cutting off
te funds from any integrated school.
toth« A abama feature, due in part
mch VT et ! mg commit tee, avoided any
Je , f St f lct , lon ' The district court rul-
g, which ‘he Supreme Court upheld,
offm mUCb of 1116 appropriations cut-
Y^ure, Boutwell said,
either Alabama’s placement act it-
3 >easnr o any j° f th< ; other P ro - se g r egation
4ture S a< ?° pted b y the Alabama leg-
2o utW eii Spel s racial distinction,
lam
fetiveSJnt. in Pr0vidin ^P™f
^rised gh P Y llCly Alabama officials
AM® 56 ? confidence in the survival of
s placement law if attacked,
argued. Thus, the Birming-
qIa. _ .1.1 . O
senator said, Alabama avoided
cased
'^bama’f
some of them were worried
4out
lts chances. Specifically, they
concerned over the challenge
eerned over th
S up in Birmingham.
h? R p ° i APPLICANTS TESTED
1 ten a 5 y October, four Negro chil-
I *ool K- Se Pnrents are petitioning the
c-ni, i 4or tbeir admission to
^scn^iS’ gi ven tests tQ as _
' ^ria 0 f T fi , toeSS under the broad
t) r a °f the placement law.
OperinY?' E ? anks ’ Birmingham school
»om d , oudent, said results of the tests
' if sajj urmounced following a study.
*hi evem 6 . 4es4s eousisted of standard
-rally p.- 4 psychology tests gen-
Ny S f, n «=hool children. After a
• i* Wifi , 6 results, Dr. Banks said,
''Ur R e „ r e fY?® w the parents of the
'fluent 0 1 cbdd r en > as required by the
bounced 3W ’ before any decision is
•a^four, though not identified by Dr
'V D Y re . amon S 13 Negro children
?°cl ^ m Au gust petitioned the
Dilips 3 j f°r their admission to
-• ps Woodlawn
1 "M
'■a G _ ” °uaiawn high schools
' y,l ’rRER'f m c° Unt elementary school
'd Octni^. . ScaooL News, September
iW, erbTbree °f 4be families sub-
°f th T ew their petiti ° ns > and
4 dropped charges against three white
men accused of attacking a Negro lead
er who had attempted to enroll four
Negro students in an all-white school
in September.
The U. S. Supreme Court Oct. 28
refused to permit 14 organizations to
file amicus curiae brief in behalf of the
NAACP.
The case before the high court, to be
heard later in the fall, is an appeal
from a $100,000 contempt fine imposed
by Montgomery Circuit Court Judge
Walter B. Jones last year.
Judge Jones issued a temporary re
straining order which is still in effect
pending the outcome of the appeal on
the contempt ruling.
fuifo . »ine remaining children
"Ur. Snow up for tests, leaving only
kY Flc re Quests
►T^Use
Wif5 c . 4ke petitioners named the
"Uteri *1, . l4e schools near them they
'invent 6U ' cbddren to attend, the as-
c u ,, reciUe ' st was regarded as a
^ one en S e to the placement law
fhe Je ff imed at ultimate court action.
eis °n County grand jury Oct.
Total enrollment in Alabama public
schools is up almost 10,000 over last
year, according to estimates by the Ala
bama Department of Education.
There are presently an estimated
754,800 students in Alabama elementary
and high schools, the department said.
Of these 475,500 are white, 279,300 Ne
gro. This represents a gain of about
4,000 white students and 6,000 Negro
students.
The state employs about 25,500 public
school teachers. Of these 17,000 are
white, 8,500 Negro—increases of about
200 teachers of each race. Salaries aver
age an estimated $3,289 for white teach
ers, $3,283 for Negroes.
ALL LEVELS SEGREGATED
Segregation continues at all levels of
public schools and in all colleges and
universities, with two small exceptions.
Spring Hill College at Mobile, a
Jesuit school, has 20 Negro students in
its student body of 1,100.
Talladega College, a Negro Congre
gational college, which has accepted
some white students, has no white stu
dents in its current student body of
344 but the doors are still open to whites
and the faculty is integrated—10 white
instructors, 22 Negroes.
A Little Rock attorney and segrega
tion leader told a Selma White Citizens
Council rally Oct. 10 that “Little Rock
is the last battle. If we win in Little
Rock, integration is dead.”
The speaker, Amis Guthridge, said,
“If we lose in Little Rock, the Republic
of the United States is gone forever.”
At the same meeting, State Sen. Wal
ter Givhan said: “There’s no middle
ground now. It’s time for all public
officials to either get on our side or get
on the other side.”
The commander of the American Le
gion in Alabama, John H. Wienand Jr.
of Montgomery, wired President Eisen
hower that troops in Little Rock had
“seriously compromised” the willingness
of southerners to serve in the armed
forces.
•PERVERTED MISSION’
Wienand told the President he had
“arbitrarily perverted the ordinary mis
sion of the armed forces of these United
States by using them against their fel
low citizens . . .” Some 25 local Legion
posts also joined in the protest.
The Birmingham News’ Washington
correspondent, James Free, analyzed
letters sent to Alabama’s congressmen
and reported, “The presence of federal
troops in Little Rock seems to make a
lot of Alabamians so angry they can’t
think.”
Free said the letters contained “more
fire than common sense.” The demands
included, he said: 1) impeach the Pres
ident, (2) curb the power of the Su
preme Court or have all federal judges
chosen by popular vote, (3) pass new
laws to make it impossible for a future
President to call out federal troops to
enforce integration.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Mont
gomery Negro leader, said in a na
tionally televised interview Oct. 27 that
the bus boycott had caused a “tempor
ary breakdown” in communications be
tween the races in Montgomery. King
expressed the conviction that segrega
tion would disappear by the end of the
century.
The King interview was not seen in
Montgomery or South Alabama. Shortly
before air time, a chain was thrown
over power lines leading to WSFA-TV,
the local NBC station, and the station
was off the ail' for 47 minutes while the
shorted lines were located and repaired.
pledging massive resistance to integra
tion in Alabama.
James Faulkner, Bay Minette news
paper publisher, radio station operator
and the runnerup in the 1954 guberna
torial race, invited Eisenhower Demo
crats to return to the Democratic party
and “join hands with old-line Southern
Democrats in resisting federal attempts
to end school segregation.”
Former U. S. Rep. Laurie Battle, also
a prospective candidate for governor,
said his motto is “Billions for defense,
but not one cent for the occupation of
Little Rock.” He urged members of the
House Armed Services and Appropri
ations Committee to kill any future
appropriations which “can be used
against law-abiding citizens.”
Other early candidates for next year’s
governor’s race also criticized Eisen
hower on Little Rock.
14 ORGANIZATIONS FILE
The “friend of the court” petition
was submitted in behalf of 14 organiza
tions: American Jewish Congress,
American Baptist Convention, Ameri
can Civil Liberties Union, American
Friends Service Committee, American
Jewish Committee, American Veterans
Committee, Anti-Defamation League of
B nai B’rith, Congregational and Chris
tian Churches, Council for Christian
Social Action of the United Church of
Christ, Japanese-American Citizens
League, Jewish Labor Committee,
United Synagogue of America and the
Workers Defense League.
The petitioners argued in support of
their request that “it has become per
fectly obvious that Alabama not only is
attempting to maintain its statewide
pattern of racial segregation but is also
working for the destruction of all or
ganized opposition to this policy.”
ENGELHARDT PROTESTS
Earlier, State Sen. Sam Engelhardt,
director of the Alabama Association of
Citizens Councils, had protested the
showing in the Montgomery area, in
sisting that the telecast would do noth
ing to improve race relations. The sta
tion refused to black out the interview,
but offered Engelhardt equal time to
reply.
NBC cfricials have made available a
kinescope recording of the telecast and
WSFA-TV announced it would show it,
repeating its offer of equal time to
Engelhardt. The senator said he wanted
to see the interview first before com
mitting himself.
Alabama political figures and pros
pective candidates for governor contin
ued their attack on the Little Rock
situation, denouncing the President and
GOP CONCEDES DAMAGE
Mrs. Tom Abemethy of Talladega, Re
publican national committeewoman and
wife of the GOP’s 1954 candidate for
governor, conceded that Little Rock had
not helped Republicans in the South,
adding: “I think President Eisenhower
has made a great mistake with tragic
consequences ... We felt that the Re
publicans would delay any action of
this sort . . . But I don’t think it would
have made much difference ... who was
in the White House.”
The Young Republican Club of Jef
ferson County (Birmingham) attacked
Eisenhower and declared themselves
“unalterably opposed to the use of fed
eral troops to enforce integration in Lit
tle Rock.”
Marvin Mostellar of Mobile, GOP na
tional committeeman, said, “I don’t
think the Democrats have any right to
be hard on the Republicans. All you
have to do is look and see what Tru
man, Stevenson and Butler said about
the President’s order.”
Keaton Hardy, Mobile real estate man
who heads the Mobile County Young
Republicans, quit his post and also re
signed from the Mobile County Repub
lican Executive Committee. Keaton said
he had been a Republican all his life
but “I cannot go along with using fed
eral troops in Arkansas.”
Sen. John Sparkman, 1952 Democratic
vice presidential nominee, twice urged
President Eisenhower to withdraw
troops from Arkansas. In the Far East
on a study commission for the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee, Spark
man cabled the President from Singa
pore: “Federal bayonets will destroy,
not preserve, the good will and toler
ance without which there can be no
understanding between the races.”
The Montgomery County Board of
Revenue unanimously adopted a 1,000-
word resolution condemning the Presi
dent’s action “in invading the free and
sovereign state of Arkansas.” The
board’s resolution said the President
had “pierced the armor of his own spot
less character” and called recent inte
gration developments an “iniquitous
horror.”
State Sen. Sam Engelhardt, executive
director of the Alabama Association of
Citizens Councils, said troops in Little
Rock had given the Association’s mem
bership campaign a “flying start.”
Engelhardt said Little Rock had
stirred WCC chapters all over the state
into renewed activity.
Cross burnings continued to be re
ported over the state during October,
notably in central and south Alabama.
In most instances, there appeared to be
no specific motive.
# # #
D.C. Board Head Sees Dangerous Problem
In ‘Disproportionately High’ Negro Ratio
B
WASHINGTON, D. C.
>oard of Education President
Walter N. Tobriner declared
last month that Washington public
schools face the dangerous prob
lem of a “disproportionately high”
ratio of Negro students.
He told a meeting of the Wash
ington Rotary Club that the racial
ratio problem is one that faces the
community as a whole, also. He
added:
“While I do not conceive it to be the
function of the board of education to at
tempt to control or direct the racial flow
within the community, neither do I con
ceive it proper for the board to adopt a
policy that would tend to prevent a bet
ter equation of the races in Washington.
EQUAL PROPORTIONS ‘IDEAL’
“Ideally, it would seem to me that
relatively equal proportions of both
races would be desired, but the trend
has been very much away from this
level. While the citywide population of
Negroes has increased less rapidly, the
following figures indicate the swift ap
preciation of Negro children in our
school system.”
He cited figures showing that white
students represented 56 per cent of the
school enrollment in 1945, 49.3 per cent
in 1950, 32 per cent a year ago and about
30 per cent now.
(The school system’s only racial head-
count is taken on a peak mid-October
enrollment. Officials said this tally will
not be released until after Nov. 1.)
a system which topped the national
norms and which provided the maxi
mum of individual attention by skilled
teachers.”
2) “A redevelopment program in the
blighted sections of the city, planned
economically and esthetically to attract
middle-income white families.”
3) “Continued and intensified inte
gration in the surrounding counties,
particularly in the counties of northern
Virginia.” (There is no public school in
tegration in Virginia.—Editor)
4) “Creation of an attractive tax
structure with an individual and real es
tate rate well below those of the nearby
states: and in this respect the major and
principal help would be an increase of
the federal contribution to a point
where it is fairly commensurate with
federal services received from the fed
eral city.”
Present problems, said Tobriner, call
for “diligence, patience, good will and
tolerance and a devotion to the lifting
of our system of almost missionary in
tensities.”
conscientiously and honestly” whether
professional course requirements could
be lowered to get more professional ap
plicants from out of the city and a wider
pattern of “cultural representation.”
School Supt. Hobart M. Corning told
reporters during a press conference that
it is “too bad for people to come to the
conclusion that this [flight to the sub
urbs of white families] is a new phe
nomenon.”
PRIVATE SCHOOLS EXPLANATION
The citywide proportion of white
population has not dropped with the
same speed. Board of Trade projections
for Jan. 1, 1957, showed that 56 per cent
of the District population is white. En
rollment of white students in private
and parochial schools accounts for the
disparity.
Tobriner told the businessmen he did
not believe “for a moment” that the
proportion of white students would con
tinue to drop at the same rate.
I think there are four factors, among
others, that will tend to reverse trends,”
he said. He said these are:
1) If we are able to give the District
an absolutely first-rate educational sys
tem, many of the white families now
living in the suburbs will return to the
city. The personal prejudices of many
families, I am sure, would yield to the
advantages of exposing their children to
SEGREGATION BLAMED
Tobriner said the schools are coping
with “impairments wrought by over a
century of segregation.” He predicted
that “for years to come” the city will
work to raise attainment levels of those
who have in the past been subjct to a
segregated school system. He said “there
are deficiencies in personnel here to
plague us in years to come.”
At the October school board meeting,
Tobriner said “absurdly excessive re
requirements” are an obstacle to teacher
recruiting for District schools. He ex
pressed amazement at District require
ments which exact elementary teachers
to have 40 semesters hours of profes
sional education courses—more, he said,
than are required by any other large
school system.
“Most teachers who would be inter
ested in coming to Washington are dis
couraged right off the bat because they
can’t even begin to meet the basic pro
fessional course requirements we have
here,” he said.
TREND PRE-DATED 1954
Corning said the proportion of Negro
students in Washington public schools
began to rise long before integration
“and the trend has stepped up only
slightly since.”
He cited school statistics showing that
Negro pupils out-numbered whites in
1950—four years before desegregation.
In 1953-54, the last year before integra
tion, 57 per cent of the Washington
school population was Negro.
The flight to the suburbs is “not
unique to Washington but affects every
larger city,” Corning said.
“We’re beginning to have evidence of
people coming back to the city,” Corn
ing said. “They find that once they move
to the suburbs, their life isn’t as rural
as they expected. The suburbs are
crowded, too,” he said.
ONE-RACE, NOT SEGREGATED
Corning said neighborhood changes in
the District are moving some schools
back toward a one-race basis, “but you
can’t call these segregated schools, be
cause they are still open to everybody.”
Corning told reporters that some
physicians have been too generous in
authorizing psychological “hardship”
transfers of students to schools outside
their residential zone.
He said the school system’s hardship
committee has been “very active” pro
cessing transfer requests this year. A
majority of doctors’ notes stated “psy
chological grounds” for the transfers, he
said.
MEDIAN IS 24 HOURS
“The median state requirement for
education courses is 24 semester hours,”
Tobriner said, “and California, with a
‘most excellent’ school system, requires
24, and Illinois, 16. Only 24 hours are
required of junior and senior high
school teachers in the District.”
Tobriner pointed out that of thou
sands of teachers who took the National
Teacher Examination in 1956-57, only
14 met District requirements and two
eventually took jobs here. He asked the
school administration to determine
100 TRANSFERS FROM ROOSEVELT
The total number of tranfers was not
disclosed, but one high school, Roose
velt, has lost more than 100 white stu
dents through actions of the hardship
committee, school officials said.
“Pressures from homes” are stimulat
ing the requests, Coming said, “but we
require specific indication of why the
transfers should be made. No transfers
are granted on a racial basis.”
Psychological transfers have been re
quested by both Negro and white stu
dents, Corning said. He pointed out that
the deadline for transfers has passed
and no more requests will be honored
except in emergencies, such as health
cases.
# # #