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PAGE 6—FEBRUARY—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
TENNESSEE
Fight Indicated Against Knoxville Desegregation Suit
NASHVILLE, Tenn.
T he Knoxville Board of Edu
cation hired attorney S. Frank
Fowler to defend it in its latest
desegregation suit, indicating it
will probably fight the suit instead
of submitting a desegregation plan
of its own, as suggested by the
city law director. (See “Legal
Action.”)
A Negro attorney in Memphis
told the Memphis Board of Educa
tion a suit will be filed to desegre
gate the city schools unless the
board comes up with a plan of its
own. (See “Legal Action.”)
Tennessee teachers, meeting in Nash
ville, served notice they will ask the
Legislature for big pay raises next year
(See “School Boards and Schoolmen.”)
Knoxville attorney S. Frank Fowler
Was retained at the request of the city
Board of Education to defend the board
in the new desegregation suit filed in
December. (Josephine Goss et al. vs.
Board of Education of the City of Knox
ville et al.)
This gave rise to speculation that the
board intends to fight the suit instead
of following the advice of T. Mack
Blackburn, city law director, to submit
a plan of its own for desegregating city
schools.
Dr. John H. Burkhart, the board
chairman, told Southern School News
the board will not submit a plan unless
Fowler thinks it should, but declined
to comment further on the case.
“I’m not going to say what we’re go
ing to do when we come into court,” he
said. “When you defend yourself in a
law suit, you keep certain things to
yourself. We’re being sued and we re
quested that Mr. Fowler be hired to
defend us and to defend the way we’ve
been doing things which we think ought
to be continued.”
Fowler, who defended the board suc
cessfully in its first suit, said he had
not yet had time to study this case. The
board must file an answer before Feb. 8.
FILES BRIEF
Meanwhile, Carl A. Cowan, attorney
for the Negro plaintiffs, filed a brief
with Federal Judge Robert L. Taylor in
support of their demand that 17 Negro
children “and all others similarly situ
ated” be admitted to any Knoxville
school without regard to race.
Blackburn appeared before the Board
of Education Jan. 4 and urged it to sub
mit a plan for desegregation “in order
to retain some control over the process.”
The board appeared to agree, and C. K.
McClain, city trial attorney, was desig
nated to handle the case.
Three weeks later, however, the board
requested that Fowler be retained.
“I don’t know what their idea is,”
Blackburn said. “The city legal depart
ment has no objection to hiring Mr.
Fowler. It takes the problem out of our
hands. But my opinion is that the smart
thing to do is file a plan, either one
like the Nashville plan or some other
plan.”
GIVES WARNING
In Memphis, an attorney for the Na
tional Assn, for the Advancement of
Colored People, warned the city school
board it will face a federal lawsuit un
less it comes up with a desegregation
plan.
A. W. Willis Jr., the attorney, said
the suit is being prepared now. But, he
added, before it is filed, Negroes will
make one more attempt to meet with
the board “to see if some sort of de
segregation plan cannot be worked
out.”
“If the board offers us any kind of
plan, we probably won’t feel so strong
ly about filing the suit,” he said.
WILL RULE SOON
Circuit Court Judge Chester C. Chat-
tin said he will hand down his decision
in the Highlander Folk School case by
about Feb. 15.
Chattin presided last November at a
hearing in which Dist. Atty. Gen. A. F.
Sloan demanded revocation of the tax-
exempt charter of the interracial school
near Monteagle.
The state is seeking to have the char
ter revoked on the grounds that the
adult education center has been used
for the personal gain of Myles Horton,
the school’s founder. It also charges that
Highlander has engaged in commercial
activities in violation of its non-profit
charter, and that its interracial classes
are forbidden by Tennessee law.
Cecil Branstetter, Nashville lawyer
representing Highlander, contends the
law prohibiting integrated classes has
been declared unconstitutional.
KASPER BEGINS TERM
John Kasper, New Jersey-born racist,
began a six-month term in Davidson
County workhouse last month for in
citing to riot, after the U.S. Supreme
Court refused to review his conviction.
The tall, slender segregationist had
asked to be allowed to serve his time in
the county jail instead of the work-
house, on the grounds that he might be
harmed by Negro prisoners.
Criminal Court Judge Homer B. Wei
mar ruled against Kasper, however,
after W. H. Turner, workhouse superin
tendent, said he saw no reason why
Kasper should be harmed.
The inside facilities of the workhouse
are segregated, although outside work
gangs are not.
Meanwhile Porter Freeman, Antioch,
Tenn., feed merchant, said he is circu
lating a petition requesting Gov. Buford
Ellington to pardon Kasper.
Tennessee teachers served notice last
month that they will ask the 1961 Legis
lature for substantial raises in pay, but
the exact amount they will demand was
open to interpretation.
The representative assembly of the
Tennessee Education Assn, noted that
the 1959 Legislature had established a
teacher salary goal calling for beginning
pay of $3,600 for degree teachers, and
$5,400 for those with 12 years’ experi
ence. It then added:
“It is therefore recommended that the
1961 Legislature recognize this declara
tion of intent on the part of the 1959
Legislature and take necessary steps to
reach the goal established.”
Some delegates felt this meant that
TEA was asking for the whole amount
next year. That would mean raises
ranging from $950 a year to $2,000 a
year. Others, however, including the or
ganization’s executive secretary, Frank
Bass, said the figures still represent
only a long-term goal of the teachers.
1,000 ATTEND
More than 1,000 teachers from all
parts of the state were delegates to the
Nashville meeting. In other actions,
they:
• Urged Congress to provide federal
aid to education without federal con
trols for school construction and gen
eral operating expense.
• Asked the Legislature to maintain
public schools at their present level
WEST VIRGINIA
Senators Urging Anti-Bombing Legislation in Congress
CHARLESTON, W.Va.
T he two U.S. senators from
West Virginia have declined
to commit themselves on their
final stand on new civil rights leg
islation now before Congress.
(See Political Activity.”)
A Negro leader has warned that
Charleston hotels might be sued if
they refuse to accept Negro regis
trants. (See “Community Ac
tion.”)
Gov. Cecil Underwood proposed
a 21 million dollar economic im
provement plan but made no rec
ommendations on education. The
administration plans to submit a
comprehensive school program to
the 1961 Legislature. (See “Legis
lative Action.”)
West Virginia’s two U.S. senators,
Jennings Randolph and Robert C. Byrd,
have declined so far to commit them
selves on their final stand on new civil
rights legislation now before Congress.
Randolph said he has always favored
moderate legislation in the civil rights
field and pointed out that he is co
sponsor of the Senate version of the
anti-bombing bill, which would make
it a federal offense to transport explos
ives across state lines for the purpose of
bombing schools or churches.
Byrd called this bill, of which he also
is a co-sponsor, his “main interest” in
the field of civil rights.
The enthusiasm of West Virginia’s
senators for anti-bombing legislation
was intensified by the early morning
dynamiting of an integrated school at
Osage (Monongalia County) in late
1958. Damage ran to $200,000 and no con
victions have come from the case.
In the House, a petition to discharge
the Rules Committee from further con
sideration has been circulated. Among
those signing it is Rep. Arch Moore of
the First West Virginia District.
Reps. John Slack, Ken Hechler and
Elizabeth Kee, also from West Virginia,
have said they will sign it. Rep. Cleve
land Bailey on the other hand, says he
has no intentions of signing it.
The other member of the West Vir
ginia delegation in Congress, Rep. Har
ley M. Staggers, has not made his plans
known.
The president of the Charleston
branch of the National Assn, for the
Advancement of Colored People, Wil
lard Brown, has warned that city hotels
might be sued if they refuse to accept
Negro registrants. Brown said “We
have proceedings prepared to bring a
$100,000” suit in behalf of any Negro
who has a confirmed reservation and
who is refused service.
His warning came during a meeting
of the Mayor’s Committee on Human
Relations, of which he is a member.
But Brown emphasized that he was
speaking as an individual.
He said a hotel refused a room to for
mer national tennis champion Althea
Gibson when she appeared in Charles
ton in December to perform at half
time of a Harlem Globetrotters basket
ball game.
Brown said the same hotel that re
fused rooms to Miss Brown and her
manager earlier accepted a Negro at
torney from Beckley who had reserva
tions. Miss Gibson had no reservation.
He said the NAACP believes that a
suit might be advantageous to integrat
ing hotels because “we’re going to make
it costly for them to continue to exclude
Negroes.”
After Brown told of the possible suit,
L. Leo Kohlbecker, later elected com
mission chairman, said he wasn’t sure
he agreed with the NAACP position.
Kohlbecker said he thought the prob
lem of hotel segregation had a better
chance of settlement if it were discussed
amicably between hotel men and inter
ested groups such as the commission.
Gov. Cecil Underwood blueprinted an
economic improvement plan to the 54th
Legislature Jan. 13 to cost 21 million
dollars, advising that “we have now
reached the point where talk will not
do the job.”
West Virginia has more than 50,000
unemployed, many of them Negroes in
the coalfield areas.
In his message Underwood made no
recommendations on education. State
School Supt. R. Virgil Rohrbough had
said earlier no program would be pre
sented. A comprehensive one will be
submitted to the 1961 Legislature, he
added.
A program of vocational education
was included in Underwood’s recom
mendations. It would retrain displaced
workers at a cost of approximately one
million dollars.
Later, the presidents of the university
and 10 state colleges met with Under
wood and the legislative leadership to
request a 14 to 15 million dollar capital
improvement program at the institu
tions. It would be financed from tuitions,
which now go into the state general
fund.
A more modest program along the
same lines was enacted by the 1959 Leg
islature. It nets almost a million dollars
a year in capital improvement funds.
All state colleges and the university
are fully desegregated, and improve
ments are set up on a priority basis, with
one new building being sanctioned a
year.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. of Mont
gomery, Ala., said here Jan. 24 that he
believed “we will have moved a long
way toward a desegregated society in
the next 10 to 15 years.”
He continued:
“I feel that we’re in the last stages of
resistance in the South. I don’t mean
it’s going to end next year, but I do feel
that we’re in the last stages of the pow
erful, determined resistance, and it is
my feeling that within a few years even
the hard core states will realize that re
sistance is futile and closed schools is
an absurd way to deal with the problem.
“Now that doesn’t mean there will be
an all-out integration in the next five
years, but I do feel that resistance will
lessen a great deal because of many de
velopments that are taking place at the
present time.”
School closings have given the moder
ates a rallying point, he remarked.
“Two powerful interests have collided
in the South: the institution of segrega
tion and the Institution of the public
schools. The people up to now have
made it clear that when the final choice
comes, they will close the schools.
“This happened in Little Rock. It
happened in Virginia. And it’s happen
ing in Atlanta right now.”
Although the removal of legal bar
riers against desegregation is an impor
tant need in the South, Dr. King said,
“ultimately we seek integration, which
is true inter-group, inter-personal liv
ing where you sit on a bus—you sit to
gether not because the law says it but
because it’s natural because it’s right.”
ANOTHER SOUTHERNER
Another southerner spoke in Charles
ton in December. Ralph McGill, Atlanta
Constitution editor, said he believed the
people of his city would prefer deseg
regated schools to no schools at all.
Apparently, they won’t be given an
alternative, he continued, because the
Georgia Legislature has voted to stop
state aid to any public school that ac
cepts Negroes.
“The Atlanta system has been ordered
to integrate by a federal court,” he said,
“so you can see that they’re in an al
most impossible dilemma.”
“The Legislature, of course, hopes
that in another year that maybe public
opinion will allow them, the politicians,
to save face and open the schools,”
he said.
The students of Marshall College, the
state’s largest state-owned college, have
endorsed the proposal of their president,
Stewart Smith, that Marshall should
become a university. The proposal has
been submitted to the State Board of
education but no action has been taken.
Marshall is at Huntington and is de
segregated.
PASTOR BECOMES EDITOR
Dr. Kyle Haselden, pastor of Charles
ton’s Baptist Temple and an outspoken
desegregationist, said he will resign
soon to become editor of two independ
ent, inter-denominational magazines.
He said he will go to Chicago to be
come managing editor of The Christian
Century, a journal of Protestant
thought, and The Pulpit, a monthly for
ministers.
The 47-year-old clergyman was of
fered the editorships following the pub
lication of his book, The Racial Prob
lem in Christian Perspective.
# # #
during the two years beginning July 1,
1961. This would add $15 million to the
state’s school building program for the
two years.
Shannon Faulkner, Tipton County
school superintendent, was elected pres
ident of the organization to succeed J.
A. Barksdale, former state commission
er of education and now dean at Ten
nessee Polytechnic Institute.
URGES CONSOLIDATION
In Memphis, Walter P. Armstrong Jr.,
president of the city Board of Educa
tion, urged consolidation of the Mem
phis and Shelby County school systems
as the “only ultimate solution” of
school problems.
Armstrong told the Memphis Ex
change Club the city board is already
anticipating consolidation in the design
of its new administration building to be
erected in Tobey Park.
He predicted the first step toward
merger will be taken next year with the
introduction of enabling legislation in
the 1961 Legislature.
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COMMUNITY ACTION
The Rev. James D. Glasse of Vander
bilt University divinity school was
elected president of the Tennessee
Council on Human Relations at the or
ganization’s two-day annual meeting in
Nashville. He succeeds Walter Sharp,
professor of fine arts at Vanderbilt.
Other new officers are Mrs. Bernard
Fensterwald of Nashville, the Rev. John
Charles Mickle of Memphis, and James
Stokeley, Newport, vice presidents;
Mrs. John C. Hull, Nashville, secretary;
and John Cheek Jr., Nashville, treas
urer.
At a dinner meeting, Marion A.
Wright, vice president of the Southern
Regional Council, told the delegates
token compliance with the Supreme
Court’s desegregation decision is inde
fensible in either law or morals.
“Consider for a moment the applica
tion of this idea of token compliance to
other laws,” he said. “When driving, I
will stop at only every 10th red light.
I will pay only one 10th of my income
tax. As a draftee, I will serve only one
10th of my induction period. I will ob
serve only those parts of a business
contract which are favorable to me.
Such is token compliance. What is the
result? Raw, naked anarchy.
“And what about its application in
the realm of morals? I will bear false
witness against my neighbor for only
nine out of 10 days—on the 10th day I
will tell the truth. I will observe only
one of the Ten Commandments. Only
every 10th day will I love my neighbor
as myself. Such is token morality. What
is the result? Universal moral license
and iniquity.”
DISAGREE
City officials of Millington, Tenn., near
Memphis, and the Millington Chamber
of Commerce were in opposite camps
last month over the location of 500
housing units for Navy families sta
tioned there.
The Chamber of Commerce wants the
housing located in the city in order to
boost business there, but Mayor Charles
Pruitt and other city officials are op
posed to having integrated facilities. If
the project is not built in Millington,
it will be erected on the base itself.
Millington already has one integrated
housing project for Navy families, Fair
way Homes. Eight Negro families live
in the predominantly white project.
Their children attend Negro schools.
WILL TRY AGAIN
Nashville Negro ministers said last
month they are waging a campaign to
get eating facilities at downtown de
partment stores desegregated.
The Rev. Kelly Miller Smith and the
Rev. J. M. Lawson Jr. said new attempts
will be made by the Nashville Chris
tian Leadership Council to have Ne
groes served in the store restaurants.
At present there are no eating fa
cilities for Negroes in the heart of the
Nashville business district. One depart
ment store, Harvey’s, formerly had a
Negro restaurant but abandoned it be
cause of lack of patronage.
The council tried in December to get
Harvey’s and another store, Cain-Sloan,
to serve Negroes in all restaurants, but
was unsuccessful.
Memphis Negroes threatened a boy
cott of the city’s automobile dealers last
month after they were barred from the
Memphis Automobile Show at Ellis
Auditorium.
About 300 persons attended a protest
meeting sponsored by the Volunteer
(SEE TENNESSEE, PAGE 16)