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PAGE 14—JANUARY—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
FLORIDA
Dade County Board Told To Prepare Desegregation Plan
MIAMI, Fla.
TT'lorida’s first try at token in-
tegration in the Dade County
school system may not be enough.
The Fifth Circuit Court of Ap
peals ordered the school board to
present a plan for desegregation
or face an order ending all racial
restrictions in the schools. (See
“Legal Action.”)
A Palm Beach County school
suit neared a showdown in argu
ments over the relative merits of
white and Negro schools. (See
“Legal Action.”)
First steps were taken against a
segregation policy in the state’s
expanding junior college system.
(See “In The Colleges.”)
UPI’s year-end review of the hap
penings in 1959 said Florida’s top news
was developments on the school inte
gration front. (See “Miscellaneous.”)
Dade County school authorities, who
already have integrated two schools,
are studying the possibility that all
schools will be thrown open to Negro
pupils.
This was the prospect raised by a
ruling of the Fifth Circuit Court of Ap
peals in the Gibson case which has been
in the federal courts since the middle of
1955. (Gibson et al v. Dade County
Board of Public Instruction.)
The federal court ruled that the Pupil
Assignment Law may not be used as
an excuse to delay desegregation. It
said that the admission of a few Negroes
under the assignment law as a “token”
of compliance was not sufficient.
TOLD TO SUBMIT PLAN
The Dade school board was ordered
to submit a plan for desegregation or
face an end to all racial bars in the
schools.
The ruling caught the school board by
surprise.
“I am amazed at the decision,” said
Dr. Joe Hall, school superintendent.
Hall directed the planning and made
the recommendations in which the
school board integrated two schools
successfully last September. One, Orch
ard Villa Elementary, has an all-Negro
faculty, 468 Negro and nine white chil
dren. Air Base Elementary, which serves
personnel at the Homestead Air Force
(SAC) Base, has an all-white faculty
and 22 Negro children among the stu
dent body of more than 600.
The school board had considered this
an adequate start toward compliance.
Whether it will be considered so now is
a question for courts.
The Circuit Court of Appeals issued
no order in the case, but remanded it
back to the district court in Miami foi
final action in accord with the ruling.
NO DECISION
The school board has not yet decided
whether to ask for a rehearing, delay
ing final action by at least several
months, or to argue in district court that
the steps taken so far represent sub
stantial and good-faith compliance.
The token integration took place after
the Gibson case was tried. At that time
several Negro parents testified of failure
to have their children accepted in white
schools and contended the pupil assign
ment law was used to deny constitu
tional rights.
School board attorneys denied any
racial segregation existed. They said the
segregated pattern resulted from resi
dential and sociological factors which
are to be considered under the assign
ment law. The district judge ruled that
no proof of racial discrimination was
presented and that the defendants failed
to exhaust all administrative remedies
under the law.
Future steps are uncertain but Ed
ward F. Boardman, school board at
torney, said he was confident the board
could show good faith compliance in
view of the developments last Septem
ber.
“I still feel that our case is sound,” he
said. “The record is barren of any show
ing of discrimination.”
STATEWIDE IMPLICATIONS
The decision has implications that af
fect the entire state. Although suits
are pending only in Hillsborough
(Tampa) and Palm Beach counties, ap
plications by Negroes for admission to
white schools have been made in three
other counties and the base for court
action has been laid.
Newspaper comment added up to a
recognition that further integration is
inevitable. The St. Petersburg Times
had this to say:
“(The ruling) made it clearer than
ever that the assignment law is not
enough and that while pretty obvious
all along, nothing short of a plan for de
segregation is going to satisfy the fed
eral courts . . .
“Fortunately Florida’s situation is not
as complicated as (some others). We
can begin planning against the back
ground of assignment provisions, with
out the tragic prospect of school clos
ures. And, fortunately again, we have
been favored by the Miami case, if a
hint to the wise proves sufficient.”
The Tampa Tribune said the decision
“writes the lesson on the blackboard in
large letters, for school boards all over
Florida to read and heed.”
APPEARS BEFORE BOARD
A case almost as long established as
the Gibson suit (Holland v. Palm Beach
County Board of Public Instruction)
also moved inconclusively toward a de
cision. William Holland, West Palm
Beach Negro attorney, appeared before
the school board to insist that his son
be accepted in a white school.
In this case the Circuit Court of Ap
peals ruled substantially the same as
in the Gibson case. But, although the
decision was made over a year ago, the
Holland boy still attends a Negro school,
and no plan for desegregation has been
submitted.
The elder Holland followed each step
of the administrative path, including the
final appeal to the state Board of Edu
cation at Tallahassee, which turned the
case back to the Palm Beach board.
In his latest action in the three-year-
old-case, Holland appeared before the
county board to contend that white
schools have better facilities and are
more efficiently operated than the Ne
gro schools his son was forced to at
tend.
School administrators on the witness
stand conceded that pupil-teacher ratios
are lower in white than in Negro schools,
but insisted that Negro schools are more
modern.
After several hours of testimony and
argument, the case was postponed until
Jan. 19, when further testimony will be
taken.
State school officials said enrollment
is steadily pushing toward the million
mark and predicted again that final fig
ures will be about 1,030,000 after the
winter tourist influx reaches its peak.
The annual increase of almost 70,000
has put a severe strain on all school fac
ilities and personnel. Thomas D. Bailey,
state school superintendent, said an in
tensive research program is under way
to improve school efficiency. One key
idea is year-round classes.
“In the summer of 1957, more than
45 per cent of all Florida school children
voluntarily returned to school to parti
cipate in the summer enrichment pro
gram,” said Bailey. “It is true that much
of this program is conducted outdoors
but with new legislation enacted this
year it is believed that there will be a
substantial increase in the academic of
ferings in the future.
“There is evidence that an all-weather
environment can be provided in schools
at no additional cost, and even more
surprising, over a ten-year period the
maintenance cost is actually reduced.”
Several Florida counties are conduct
ing extensive research in instruction by
television.
The segregation question was raised
for the first time in the state’s expand
ing junior college program.
The state school board planned a new
junior college for Dade County, includ
ing white and Negro branches. The first
three members of a five-man advisory
board for the Negro branch included
one Negro and two white leaders.
The Negro community protested
against the proposed separate institu
tions. NAACP officials announced they
would oppose the establishment of “yet
another segregated pattern.”
14 COLLEGES
The question is expected to come up
elsewhere as the state moves to extend
the junior college system. The last
Legislature approved operating and
construction funds for six junior col
leges in addition to the four already
holding classes. Four more are now
proposed, making 14 strategic locations
over the state.
The present program is designed to
provide junior college facilities within
commuting distance of every prospec
tive student in Florida.
No official policy on integrated
classes has been established. The insti
tutions are administered as part of the
school system, which has taken the
stand that segregation policies are
made on the local level in accordance
with the pupil assignment law.
In the university system, operated
under the state board of control, segre
gation officially has been ended. Ap
plications are considered on merit
regardless of race.
Under this policy two Negroes are at
tending the University of Florida and
three others attended summer sessions
last year. No Negroes have applied for
admission to Florida State University
and no whites to the Florida A&M Uni
versity, both in Tallhassee.
United Press International, in its
year-end review of Florida news, said
developments in school integration
were the most important events of 1959.
The experiment in integration at Mi
ami easily topped other news, the wire
service said. To this was added the
order to desegregate swimming pools
and other public recreation in Miami,
which was rescinded by City Commis
sion the next day and has now been
taken to court.
In Jacksonville, the City Council is
considering the sale of two golf courses
to circumvent integration. Miami and
Hollywood aready have integrated pub
lic golf courses.
In Lakeland and Tampa, Negroes
push demands for use of facilities at
tax-supported hospitals.
UPI said this racial news “over
shadowed other events most of the
year.”
KASPER RELEASED
John Kasper, the advocate of segre
gation who was sentenced to federal
prison for his part in racial rioting dur
ing the integration of a high school at
Clinton, Term., was released from the
federal reformatory at Tallahassee.
Kasper’s release was accomplished
quietly. He told newsmen at the Talla
hassee bus station that his enthusiasm
for segregation was as high as ever. He
will continue his campaign, Kasper said,
but “in a different manner.” Kasper
said he is writing a book to explain his
views.
In contrast to this occasion, Kasper’s
release from an earlier sentence last
year was the signal for a gathering of
segregationist leaders from all parts of
the South. Prison officials spirited
Kasper out of the city to prevent inci
dents.
Prospective candidates for governor
in the primary next May stepped up
activity and most of them made segre
gation an important issue.
C. Farris Bryant, of Ocala, who ran
third in a four-man field four years ago,
called for “peaceful but determined
resistance” to integration.
“There will never be any effective in
tegration in many sections of Florida,”
he said, adding that the people are “con
firmed in their desire to maintain sep
arate schools.”
While Bryant deplored the injection
of the race issue into the campaign,
Senate President Dewey Johnson of
Quincy, another prospective candidate,
said this would be his principal plat
form, if he entered the race.
All those now considered as possibili
ties have endorsed segregation in prin
ciple. # # #
eciiion
Pupil Assignment Law Doesn’t Meet Requirement, Judges Rule
Following is the abridged text of the decision of
the Fifth Circuit U. S. Court of Appeals in the case
of Gibson v. Board of Public Instruction of Dade
County, Fla.
This action, filed June 12, 1956, sought a judg
ment declaring Article 12, Section 12 of the Con
stitution of the State of Florida and Section 228.09
Florida Statutes Annotated to be violative of the
Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the
United States. That much has been conceded by
the defendants from the beginning. The complaint
further prayed that the Board of Public Instruction
be ordered to desegregate the public schools of
Dade County and be enjoined from requiring the
plaintiffs and other Negroes of school age to at
tend or not to attend particular public schools be
cause of their race. The district court dismissed the
complaint because the plaintiffs had not made ap
plication for admission to a particular school. This
Court reversed and, in effect, held that a primary
and positive duty rested upon the Board of Public
Instruction to comply with the May 17, 1954, ruling
of the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Educa
tion ...
Upon remand . . . the district court rendered
final judgment declaring the Article of the State
Constitution and the Section of the State Statutes
under attack to be violative of the Fourteenth
Amendment, as admittedly they are, but denying
any further relief to the plaintiffs. The present
appeal is from that judgment.
To some extent the facts have been set forth in
the former opinion of this Court and in the opinion
of the district court upon remand. The bases for
the rulings of the district court sufficiently appear
in the following two extracts from its opinion:
“As to the prayer of the complaint that the
Court order the defendants to promptly present
a plan of desegregation of the schools, the
Court finds that the Florida Pupil Assignment
Law enacted by the Legislature of Florida
since the filing of this suit meets the require
ments of such a plan and the demands of the
plaintiffs. . . .
“The plaintiffs now have available to them
adequate remedies under the Pupil Assign
ment Law for any of their grievances pleaded
in the complaint. The record shows that they
have not pursued them and until they do so
and have been denied their rights they are not
entitled to injunctive relief” .. .
The Florida Pupil Assignment Law was enacted
on July 26, 1956, more than a month after the
complaint in this case had been filed. Prior to the
enactment of that law, it is conceded that the
Public Schools in Dade County were racially
segregated. Within a month after the enactment
of the Pupil Assignment Law, the Board of Public
Instruction of Dade County adopted an “Imple
mentation Resolution.” For the next school year
1956-57, then about to commence, that resolution
assigned en masse the children to the same schools
in which they were enrolled, and assigned un
registered pupils “to the school in which he or she
would have been registered had he or she been
present.” As to school terms after 1956-57, how
ever, the resolution provided:
“Section 3. Prior to the close of the 1956-57
school year or such other date as the Board
may specify and each year thereafter this
Board, pursuant to the provisions of the Pupil
Assignment Law, will assign to a school for the
following year each child theretofore attend
ing a school by assignment from this Board.
The record of all assignments shall be open for
inspection . . . and . . . notice of assignment
shall be given . ..
“Section 4. This Board will assign to a school
for the 1956-57 school term and each year
thereafter each qualified child, not heretofore
attending a school by assignment from this
Board, whose parent applied for admission of
such child. Such assignment will be made
pursuant to . . . the Pupil Assignment Law.
Application for admission shall be made on
forms to be approved by the board . . . When
completed, such applications shall be submitted
by the superintendent for action by the board.
Records of assignments hereunder shall be
open for inspection . . . and notice of assign
ment shall promptly be given . . . should the
application for admission to a specific school
be denied.”
A card form of application for admission was
approved by the Board. That form contained no
clear indication that the applicant should indicate
any choice of schools, but contained in its upper
left-hand comer the single word “School: ”
followed by a blank space. No notice . . . was given
to the children and their parents, or to the school
principals and teachers who received their ap
plications for admission, to the effect that Negro
children . . . were now permitted to have con
sidered fairly by the Board any choice to attend
a school other than an all-Negro school. With
very few possible exceptions, they all remained
unaware that the pre-existing policy of the Board
might have been changed. Under such circum
stances, it is obvious that the pupil assignment
cards manifested no conscious preference for con
tinued segregation on a voluntary basis.
... From a careful study and consideration of the
entire record, the conclusion is inescapable that the
plaintiffs and the members of the represented class
have not been afforded a reasonable and conscious
opportunity to have their choice of school con
sidered by the enrolling authorities. For all prac
tical purposes, the requirement of racial segrega
tion in the public schools continued at the time of
trial.
That being true, we cannot agree with the dis
trict court that the Pupil Assignment Law, or even
that the Pupil Assignment Law plus the Imple
menting Resolution, in and of themselves, met the
requirements of a plan of desegregation of the
schools or constituted a “reasonable start toward
full compliance” with the Supreme Court’s May
17, 1954, ruling. That law and resolution do no
more than furnish the legal machinery under
which compliance may be started and effectuated.
Instead, there is nothing in either the Pupil Assign
ment Law or the Implementing Resolution clearly
inconsistent with a continuing policy of compulsory
racial segregation. .. .
On the first appeal in this case, we said that so
long as the requirement of racial segregation con
tinues throughout the public school system it is
premature to consider the effect of the law provid
ing for the assignment of pupils to particular
schools. . . Obviously, unless some legally non-
segregated schools are provided, there can be no
constitutional assignment of a pupil to a particular
school. We do not understand that the Fourth
Circuit has ruled to the contrary. The net effect
of its rulings, as we understand them, is that the
desegregation of the public schools may occur
simultaneously with and be accomplished by the
good faith application of the law providing for the
assignment of pupils to particular schools. If that
understanding is correct, then we readily agree.
In that connection, the Board may, if it chooses,
submit for the consideration of the district court
a plan whereby the plaintiffs and the members of
the class represented by them are hereafter afford
ed a reasonable and conscious opportunity to ap
ply for admission to any schools for which they
are eligible without regard to their race or color,
and to have that choice fairly considered by the
enrolling authorities. In the event of the submis
sion and approval of such a plan, the district
court might properly wait a reasonable time for the
necessary administrative action before finding
whether further proceedings are necessary. In any
event, the district court should proceed in accord
ance with this opinion and with the two opinions
of the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Edu
cation . . . and should retain jurisdiction during
the period of transition. The judgment is reversed
and the cause remanded ... # # #