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SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—JANUARY—PAGE 15
South *.s Lawmakers Propose Little New Segregation Legislation
(Continued From Page 1)
taken up “on or before 12 o’clock noon
Feb. 15.”
But just what will be taken up—and
with what results—is not much clearer
now than it was in the fall. In a major
election year the session is expected to
be short and the political maneuvering
heavy.
The sole measure passed in the civil
rights field last year was a last-minute
extension of the life of the Civil Rights
Commission and a $500,000 appropriation
to permit it to continue its work. Car
ried over were measures ranging from
Sen. Johnson’s suggestion for a federal
conciliation service in racial disputes to
liberals’ plans to give the Justice De
partment injunction powers to enforce
the Supreme Court’s school desegrega
tion decision.
At a press conference just before he
left on his 11-nation tour early last
month, President Eisenhower was asked
about the prospects for civil rights and
desegregation legislation. Specifically,
he was asked to comment on the Civil
Rights Commission’s proposal for the
appointment of federal voting registrars
and on the so-called “Part HI” power
which would authorize the attorney
general to file suit in civil rights cases.
Mr. Eisenhower replied:
“I have not yet had any final confer
ences with the attorney general and the
other people interested, but I do say
that I would like to see all the parts of
the bill that I submitted last year con
sidered, and if possible, enacted this
year.”
A scaled-down version of the admin
istration proposals is embodied in a
House bill which was bottled up in the
Rules Committee when the last session
ended. The measure would:
* Make it a federal crime to obstruct
court school orders (as occurred in
Little Rock).
^ Make it a federal crime to cross state
lines to evade prosecution for malicious
bombings of any structure or vehicle.
® Assure continued schooling for 70,000
children of military personnel at south
ern bases if their schools are closed by
desegregation disputes.
Require states to preserve voting rec
ords for two years and let federal offi
cials examine them to check complaints
of racial discrimination.
House civil rights backers are ex
pected to renew their fight to bring the
measure to the floor and to restore sev
eral provisions which were deleted last
year in the Judiciary Committee.
These include a clause which would
recognize the Supreme Court’s school
desegregation decision as “the supreme
law of the land” and a program provid
ing about $3 million a year for two
years in federal aid for southern com
munities under court order to work
out school desegregation plans.
Florida
Florida’s Legislature isn’t due to meet
again until May 1961, and there has
been no discussion of possible legislative
action on segregation.
Any program would depend on the
outcome of the 1960 elections for gover
nor. All members of the House and
half the Senate are up for re-election
and segregation will be an issue in
many races.
Georgia
On Jan. 11, the Georgia General As
sembly will convene in Atlanta. Ex
pected to be placed before it is a pupil
placement plan, drawn up by the At
lanta Board of Education after a U. S.
district court ordered that a desegrega
tion program be formulated.
A pupil placement plan similar to the
board’s proposal was submitted at the
1959 session by Rep. M. M. Smith of Ful
ton County (Atlanta) but it was bottled
up in committee.
A “parent-choice” amendment to the
present school laws (which require
closing in event of integration) is ex
pected to be offered by Rep. James Mac-
kay of DeKalb County (Atlanta). It
would allow parents of children in af
fected schools, if registered voters, to
decide whether the schools should be
closed or not and would offer a further
choice of permitting such parents, in
event integration takes place, to send
their children to other schools or to ac
cept state grants for educational pur
poses.
Gov. Ernest Vandiver had said the
administration plans no segregation
legislation for the upcoming session, but
a move was reportedly underway to of
fer a measure creating a legislative
group to study existing segregation laws
and proposals.
There are numerous segregation laws
on the Georgia books but the key
statutes are those which would require
closing of any school which is inte
grated. With the Atlanta public school
system under federal court order to de
segregate, tbs significance of these laws
is obvious.
Kentucky
No action on school integration is ex
pected to be taken by the 1960 Ken
tucky Legislature. No legislation on the
subject has been introduced at any
session since 1954.
Newly inaugurated Gov. Bert Combs
has taken a stand for continued com
pliance with the Supreme Court’s de
segregation enunciation, as did his
Reoublican opponent, John M. Robsion.
Not only is the subject not expected
to be raised in the Legislature; it seems
unlikely that reference to racial issues
will be made in the constitutional re
vision convention planned by Gov.
Combs.
Education will be a major topic be
fore the legislators, however. Teachers’
pay, more classrooms, pupil transporta
tion, the textbook deficit, outlays for
higher education and the teachers’ re
tirement system are likely to be con
sidered—along with the accompanying
money-raising problems.
Louisiana
Louisiana’s 140-member Legislature,
sprinkled heavily with new faces fol
lowing recent elections, will meet in
May, but segregation leaders have not
mapped a course of action for new
bills.
State Rep. John S. Garrett of Clai
borne Parish (county), who is likely to
become chairman of the joint legisla
tive committee on segregation as a
successor to state Sen. William M.
Rainach, said “we will have legislation
but because of the campaign the com
mittee has not met to discuss its plan.”
Since 1954 the segregation committee
has steered the segregation bills—18 in
all—through the Senate and House and
almost all of them have been adopted
unanimously. One or two votes against
a segregation bill has been considered
bold.
Louisiana by present legislation has
the authority to close any schools
where desegregation is ordered and
can by a 1958 statute support private
schools. Neither law has been put into
use; neither challenged.
Louisiana has no integrated schools
but the Orleans parish school board,
heading the New Orleans public school
system, is under order to produce a
plan of desegregation in federal court
by May 16. It is predicted by legislators
that this will provoke some new legis
lative move to delay integration in
New Orleans, being used as the test
area for the state.
Maryland
The Maryland General Assembly
meets on the first Wednesday in Feb
ruary for a short (30-day) session that
is intended to be limited to budgetary
affairs and statewide issues which can
not be postponed until the regular 90-
day session which is held in odd-num
bered years.
No desegregation proposals have been
announced, and none is likely to re
ceive serious consideration in a re
stricted session.
If Gov. Millard Tawes has his way,
the coming session will be rigidly held
to a minimum work load. In the 10 years
since Maryland has had annual sessions,
the 30-day meetings gradually have
been opened to increasing amounts of
general legislation. At the last short
session in 1958 the legislators so over
burdened themselves with non-emerg
ency bills that a special session had to
be called to clean up the unfinished
business from the 30-day meeting.
A move then followed to lengthen
the short session by constitutional
amendment, and a majority of the legis
lators appeared to be behind it last year.
But Gov. Tawes killed off the move,
saying that the General Assembly
should give the short session one more
try by exercising the self-restraint nec
essary to hold the work load within
30-day bounds.
This past November, the governor
repeated his views on the need for a
restricted session and called on legisla
tive leaders to screen all bills to be in
troduced.
Under these circumstances, bills for
or against desegregation would have
little chance of passage this year, es
pecially since they have little chance
even under normal conditions.
Maryland legislators have not passed
any measures affecting desegregation in
schools or elsewhere for nearly a de
cade, aside from having voted last year
to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment to
the U.S. Constitution.
Mississippi
Two segregation bills which were de
feated at the 1958 legislative session re
portedly will be introduced in the 1960
regular session of the Mississippi Legis
lature which convenes Jan. 5.
The bills, differing only slightly from
their 1958 counterparts, would:
1) Authorize individual Methodist
churches to secede from their confer
ences and take with them all real estate
and other property they donated to the
conference as prerequisite to affiliation.
2) Authorize counties and munici
palities to contribute public funds to the
Citizens Councils.
The Methodist bill was killed in 1958
after opponents charged it would violate
separation of church and state in that
it would be state interference in church
matters.
The Citizens Council donation bill was
killed in 1958 after opponents charged
the councils are private groups whose
books are not available for public in
spection, that some taxpayers oppose
use of public funds to help support
private groups, and that the bill would
have permitted the council to spend the
money for any purpose without state
control or knowledge.
Missouri
The Missouri General Assembly will
not meet again until 1961 unless Gov.
James T. Blair decides to call a special
session. At present no segregation-de
segregation legislation is pending.
In the last session, there was no activ
ity in the General Assembly on the
school integration issue. Missouri schools
at the state level are regarded as offi
cially integrated.
The recent session brought enactment
of a law making the Missouri Commis
sion on Human Rights a permanent
agency. Also passed was a Fair Em
ployment bill applying to state agencies.
For a number of years, bills to provide
a statewide Fair Employment Law and
to eliminate discrimination in the field
of public accommodations have been
introduced, but have died in committee.
North Carolina
North Carolina’s Legislature won’t
meet again in regular session until
January 1961, and no legislation re
garding school segregation appears to
be in the making.
A pupil placement law and related
tuition laws were adopted in 1955 and
1956. Since then, no change has been
made in any law having to do with the
assignment of pupils.
Oklahoma
The outlook for any type of legisla
tive activity in Oklahoma dealing with
school segregation diming 1960 is prac
tically nil. No official legislative session
is scheduled until January 1961.
And the Legislative Council, which
operates during the interim, has noth
ing before it on the subject at present,
according to its executive director, Jack
A. Rhodes.
It is possible, he reports, an effort will
be made in the next Legislature to wipe
out segregation language still in the
school code. But this would come diming
a routine cleaning-up operation on all
statutes to remove the “deadwood.”
Segregation provisions in the school
code are considered to have been made
inoperative by a 1955 constitutional
amendment eliminating separate financ
ing for Negro schools.
Still uncertain is whether a special
Legislative Council committee studying
the problems of higher education will
take any action to alter the status of
Langston University, the state’s only
Negro college.
The issue crops up in almost any dis
cussion of high per capita costs in state
colleges but no concrete proposal re
garding Langston has been put forward.
Proffered suggestions include (1) con
verting Langston to a junior college and
(2) boosting the student body by
persuading whites to attend. Alumni
and other Negro groups are opposed to
the first suggestion and there seems
little prospect of the second taking
place.
South Carolina
The South Carolina General Assem
bly, which meets annually, is prepar
ing to convene in January without any
indications of special attention to seg
regation matters.
As a matter of general practice, the
Legislature in recent years has relied
heavily on recommendations of a Spe
cial Segregation Committee. The com
mittee, headed by State Sen. L. Marion
Gressette of Calhoun County, has been
meeting periodically, but thus far has
not shown any signs of recommending
additional legislation.
The state enacted a considerable bloc
of anti-integration legislation in 1955
and 1956, and since then has added
several other measures. In recent years,
most of the measures have been in
the nature of relatively minor “after
thoughts” or have laid the groundwork
for combatting the National Assn, for
the Advancement of Colored People.
The Gressette Committee wifi meet
at least once more prior to the Jan. 12
convening of the General Assembly and
may at that time make known its rec
ommendations, if any, for further laws.
Tennessee
This is an off-year for the Tennessee
General Assembly, and there appears to
be no occasion in the offing for Gov.
Buford Ellington to call a special ses
sion. Such meetings have been rare in
the past two decades.
In its past two biennial sessions, the
Tennessee Legislature’s actions bearing
on school segregation-desegregation
have been largely keved to local school
board control. Several laws enacted in
1957 and one in 1959 were enabling
acts for local school systems to invoke
if they chose.
Local school responsibility was em
phasized in the policies of former Gov.
Frank G. Clement, and a similar in
clination has been demonstrated bv his
successor, Ellington, who took office a
year ago. However, Ellington did state
as a candidate that he would “close a
school to prevent violence or blood
shed” as a result of desegregation. He
has not elaborated on that statement,
and no legislation grew out of it.
The 1959 measure, a compromise be
tween the Ellington administration and
a Chattanooga sponsor of a much
stronger bill, makes local school boards
responsible for enforcing the state’s
compulsory attendance law. The other
bill would have allowed parents to
withdraw their children from integrated
schools regardless of the compulsory at
tendance law.
As enacted on Ellington’s recom
mendation, the statute does not mention
segregation-desegregation. It allows
parents to withdraw children from
school for “any good and substantial
reason,” provided that (1) thev first get
the local school board’s permission and
(2) they enroll the children within 30
days either in other public schools de
signated by the board or in private
schools.
None of the permissive legislation en
acted in 1957—most of it under Cle
ment’s auspices—has been invoked by a
school board in anv issue involving ra
cial attendance. However, one of the
acts, a parents’ preference law, was de
clared unconstitutional “on its face” in
the decision on the Nashville case up
held by the U.S. Supreme Court last
"-onth. T' 111 N-sbvifie B^ard of Educa
tion had tested the law by asking the
district court’s permission to invoke it
in lieu of the grade-a-year desegrega
tion plan finally approved.
Texas
Gov. Price Daniel may call a special
session of the Texas Legislature to start
in February for the purpose of increas
ing funds for public schools.
But there seems to be little chance
that any legislation affecting race rela
tions would be considered.
Efforts to speed up desegregation are
stymied pending court interpretation of
two laws which the Legislature passed
in 1957. One provides that districts
which integrate without majority vote
in a referendum shall lose state funds,
and the school officials be subject to
heavy fines.
The other law, never applied, is a
pupil assignment act almost identical
with those of other states.
One legislator introduced a bill at
the Texas Legislature’s session early
in 1959 to repeal the segregation refer
endum law. But his proposal died for
lack of support, and never even was
called for a hearing in committee.
The governor has promised to call a
30-day special session to finance a
teachers’ pay increase, if sufficient en
thusiasm is shown by the public and
legislators. While the response from
teachers and others connected with the
schools has generally been favorable
to the session, legislators appear luke
warm to the idea.
The proposed raises would cost the
state about $30 million a year, and
local districts approximately $6 million.
Base pay of teachers would be raised
$405 annually from the present $3,204
for a beginning teacher with a bachelor
degree.
This program advocated by Texas
State Teachers Assn, is considerably
smaller than that advocated by the
Hale-Aikin Committee, a citizens study
group set up by the Legislature.
Virginia
No major change in Virginia’s school
segregation policy is expected to be
made by the General Assembly during
its 60-day session beginning Jan. 13.
Bills seeking to revive the now-
defunct “massive resistance” program
may be introduced, but political writers
believe such measures will be defeated.
Virginia has had two official school
segregation policies at different periods
since the Supreme Court’s decision of
May 17, 1954,
The General Assembly in 1956 adopted
what came to be known as “massive
resistance.” Under the laws carrying out
that program, no integration in the
schools was permitted. If desegregation
were ordered by the courts, the affected
schools had to close.
After the “massive resistance” laws
were thrown out by both state and fed
eral courts, the first desegregation in
Virginia began in February 1959.
When the General Assembly con
vened in special session two months
later, strong segregationists urged
adoption of a new package of “massive
resistance” laws designed to end the
integration that already had occurred
and to prevent any further racial mix
ing.
But Gov. Lindsay Almond recom
mended a “freedom of choice” program
under which (1) localities could set
their own segregation policies, and (2)
where schools were integrated, parents
who objected could get state tuition
grants to send their children to segre
gated schools.
In the bitter fight that ensued be
tween advocates of the two conflicting
policies, the Almond forces won a razor-
thin victory by the margin of only one
vote in the Senate and by a not much
larger margin in the House.
Since that time, a new Assembly has
been elected, and the election results
have led most observers to conclude
that “massive resistance” is not likely
to be revived.
Numerically, the Almond forces ap
peared to have made only slight gains
in the election. But in the opinion of
many editorialists and other observers,
the significant fact was that the elec
tion results indicated that a candidate’s
support of “massive resistance” is no
longer a prime political asset in Vir
ginia, except in the Southside Black
Belt. These observers believe that with
“massive resistance” removed as a po
tent political factor, no strong move
ment will be made by the legislators to
change the state’s present policy.
There is also a feeling that the lack
of violence, or apparent widespread un
rest, in localities where integration has
occurred has served to strengthen sup
port of the existing policy.
All indications now are that the big
fight in the 1960 Assembly will be over
Almond’s recommendation for adoption
of a sales tax. Schools will be affected
only to the extent that if such a tax is
enacted, there will be additional money
available for all governmental purposes,
including education.
West Virginia
West Virginia’s Legislature has a
30-day budget session slated for Janu
ary. School desegregation isn’t likely to
come up.
There has been little legislation in
West Virginia on the subject of school
desegregation since the U.S. Supreme
Court’s 1954 ruling.
The 1957 Legislature adopted legisla
tion recognizing desegregation as an ac
complished fact. # # #