Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 14—MARCH I960—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
FLORIDA
School Desegregation Suit Filed in Escambia County
MIAMI, Fla.
new suit filed in federal
court challenged school seg
regation on principle and asked
complete integration of Escambia
County schools. (See “Legal Ac
tion.”)
Both the nature and the loca
tion of the suit, in Florida’s north
west panhandle where segrega
tion is strong, gave this unusual
significance.
Florida’s first Negro student in a
white university was dropped because
of academic deficiencies. (See “In the
Colleges.”)
A white student at Florida State
University applied for admission to
Florida A&M University for Negroes.
(See “In the Colleges.”)
School officials forecast a 30 per cent
increase in school enrollment in the
next five years, and an even greater
increase in costs. (See “Under Survey.”)
LEGAL ACTION
Florida’s most sweeping court chal
lenge to school segregation was filed
in Pensacola in the tip of the state’s
northwest panhandle, where segrega
tion sentiment is strongest.
This suit (Tolbert et al vs. Escambia
County Board of Public Education)
was begun in federal district court in
behalf of 12 Negro children of various
ages. It does not ask court orders for
any of the children to enter any spe
cific school, but demands an injunction
against racial discrimination and com
plete and total end to racial segregation
at all levels and phases of the school
system, including students, teachers
and administrative personnel.
The suit was filed by Charles Wil
son, Pensacola Negro lawyer who has
been handling the applications of two
Negro pupils seeking admission to spe
cific schools. Co-counsel of record are
Thurgood Marshall, chief legal counsel
of the National Assn, for the Advance
ment of Colored People, and Constance
Baker Motley of New York, assistant
general counsel.
School Board Chairman A. S. Ed
wards said the suit would “just have to
take its normal course.”
THREE LAW FIRMS
At the next school board meeting,
the board retained three Pensacola law
firms and ordered an “all-out defense.”
Speculation in Pensacola was that the
course of litigation could run for four
years or more.
Copies of the resolution effectuating
this decision were sent to the attorney
general of Florida, the state and county
school superintendents.
At the same meeting the school board
made 307 assignments of children en
tering county schools for the first time,
and 176 applications for reassignments
to other schools. None of these, how
ever, involved Negroes wishing to en
ter white schools.
The school board said it was operat
ing the system under the pupil assign
ment law, as it was duty bound to do.
APPLICATIONS CITED
The suit charges that the school
board has consistently ignored the Su
preme Court’s segregation rulings by
barring Negroes from white schools on
racial grounds. It cites the decisions re
fusing the applications of two Negro
girls last fall as part of the evidence.
The court was asked, in event it
failed to order immediate and complete
desegregation, to require an orderly
plan of compliance.
The suit, attorneys for the 12 plain
tiffs said, does not attack the pupil as
signment law but rather demands en
forcement by the elimination of racial
grounds for assignment. The law makes
no mention of race.
MAJOR CHALLENGE
Attorneys for both sides, as well as
school officials generally, saw the new
suit as a major challenge to the state’s
segregated schools. All three of the
other pending suits are based on pleas
of specific children to enter specific
schools. The Escambia County case is
a class suit attacking the principle of
segregation.
In reporting the new development,
the Pensacola Journal recalled that va
rious state officials, including Atty.
Gen. Richard W. Ervin and Pensacola’s
State Sen. Philip D. Beall, have de
clared some integration is inevitable in
Florida schools.
Beall, addressing the Escambia
County Citizens Council a short time
ago, said that the only alternative to a
limited amount of integration was to
abolish the public school system.
Upon the filing of the latest suit,
Beall commented: “Nothing has hap
pened to change my mind.”
FIGHT CONTINUES
In three other counties the court
fight continues.
The oldest of the cases is scheduled
for hearing in Miami Feb. 29. Involving
several Dade County children, the case
has been remanded to the federal dis
trict court with instructions to decide
the issues in accordance with recent
rulings of the appellate court, and to
approve a plan for integration.
A similar order was issued in the
Palm Beach County case but the
plaintiff, William Holland Jr., still is
attending a Negro school.
The suit at Tampa was dismissed by
District Judge George Whitehurst on
grounds that the pupil assignment law
was followed in Hillsborough County
in placing children. He upheld the
legality of this law.
The decision was appealed.
A student at Florida State University
in Tallahassee, attended only by white
sudents, has applied for admission to
tlie Florida Agricultural and Mechani
cal University, with a faculty and stu
dent body composed exclusively of
Negroes.
Alan Breitler, 21, of Miami Beach,
ST. LOUIS, Mo.
he St. Louis Board of Educa
tion voted to submit two bond
issues totaling almost 30 million
dollars to voters in a special elec
tion March 22. The action was
taken Feb. 9 to meet increasing
school population, a declining tax
base and the necessity for elim
inating fire hazards.
The two bond issue proposals in
clude one for $24,297,000 for new
schools and for modernization and
additions to present schools; and
one for $5,238,000 to bring exist
ing schools into compliance with a
new city fire safety code. Voters
will be asked to approve a 26-cent
increase in the present tax rate of
$1.51 of each $100 of assessed
valuation. The new rate would be
$1.77.
A great deal of strain on the St. Louis
school system in recent years has been
due to the necessity for taking care of
children of Negroes newly emigrated
from the rural South. Another factor has
been the shifting of Negro population
in the city caused by slum clearance
projects. The proportion of Negroes in
the St. Louis public school population
has reached 50 per cent in the elemen
tary system.
Among the major improvements the
Board of Education wishes to make, and
the amounts to be allotted to them, are:
1) Fourteen new elementary schools
at an estimated cost of $15,376,420.
2) Eleven additions to elementary
schools, $1,899,300.
3) Ten elementary school playground
expansions, $844,160.
William A. Kottmeyer, assistant su
perintendent of instruction in charge of
elementary schools, said one seriously
overcrowded area, in the west central
section, needed three large elementary
schools, each with 24 classrooms and a
kindergarten, and one primary school
with seven classrooms and a kinder
garten.
FRINGE’ NEIGHBORHOOD
The section referred to by Kottmeyer
was described in Southern School News
for January 1960. It is a segment from
Union Boulevard west to the city boun
dary, and from Lindell Boulevard north
to Natural Bridge Avenue. Much of it is
a fringe neighborhood in process of
transition from white to Negro oc
cupancy.
There are many fine old residences in
this part of St. Louis. An organization
of white and Negro citizens known as
the West End Community Conference
said his action was “a protest against
parcelling out education on a basis of
racial discrimination.”
In a statement to the Florida Flam
beau, FSU’s student newspaper, Breit
ler declared:
“It is my belief that a student has
the right to seek knowledge wherever
he desires.
“I want people to know why I did
this. I don’t want them to think I am
a crackpot.
“Racial discrimination is in opposi
tion to the entire body of spiritual and
moral values which govern society; and
that parcelling out of knowledge on a
discriminatory basis is an insult to the
world of academics and its members.”
ASKED ABOUT COURSES
Edwin M. Thorpe, registrar at
Florida A&M, said the FSU student in
quired some days previously about en
rolling for pharmacy courses. Thorpe
advised Breitler to fill out the neces
sary forms, which would then be pro
cessed in the normal manner.
Final approval of Breitler’s applica
tion would be up to the State Board of
Control, which administers the state’s
university system. Board Chairman
Jack Daniel of Jacksonville said the
case would be handled “purely and
simply on its merits.” Board member
Frank Buchanan of Miami said he
would be guided by the wording of
the law creating Florida A&M.
Dr. J. P. Broward Culpepper, exec
utive director of the board, said a de
cision on Breitler’s application prob
ably would be made at the March
meeting. There would be no consider -
was organized several years ago to try
to keep the area from deteriorating, but
it has been only partly successful. The
natural westward expansion of the Ne
gro community into the section has been
aggravated by the need for housing Ne
groes evacuated by the massive Mill
Creek Valley redevelopment project.
Kottmeyer said all nine schools serv
ing the area were overcrowded. Some
of the schools, he said, have enrollments
twice as large as they were built to ac
commodate. He said many children had
to be transported out of the district by
bus because of the shortage of class
rooms.
Kottmeyer said the ratio of pupils to
teachers in the nine overcrowded
schools ranged from 39 to one to 44 to
one. Parents of both races have com
plained that the quality of instruction
has gone downhill because of unsettled
conditions and overcrowding.
In a massive Summary of Elementary
School Building Needs, the plight of
certain schools was set forth in detail.
Five of the nine schools serving the west
central section are so crowded that some
of their pupils have to be taken care of
in out-school facilities—some in other
schools, some in churches.
CHURCH FACILITIES RENTED
The report also called for new school
buildings in other areas tenanted prin
cipally by Negroes. It revealed that in a
number of instances schools are so
crowded that children have to be trans
ported to other areas by bus, and ancil
lary facilities, such as church Sunday
school quarters, are rented.
Although much of the new construc
tion probably would have been neces
sary regardless of any change in the
white-Negro proportions of the St.
Louis population, nevertheless the mov
ing in of less-favored economic groups
and the exodus of white residents to
the suburbs has caused concern about
the city’s tax base.
The Governmental Research Institute
reported early in February that the
assessed valuation per pupil declined
last year in St. Louis, from $19,772 in
1958 to $19,411 in 1959. In St. Louis
County, there was a decline in 11 school
districts and an increase in 18.
While the valuation per pupil declined
in St. Louis, operating costs per pupil
increased. Operating costs were $374 in
the 1957-58 school year and $378 in
1958-59. For all the county districts, op
erating costs per pupil increased from
$382 in 1957-58 to $413 in 1958-59.
Actually the average city school at
tendance last year was less than the
average in the county—86,280 compared
with 92,420—and the city’s figure was a
3.7 per cent increase over the previous
year compared with 7.7 per cent increase
ation of the racial angle, he said. He
pointed out, however, that Breitler,
who will graduate from FSU next
June, would be attending Florida
A&M as an undergraduate student, a
situation that would require a policy
decision.
Several days after Breitler an
nounced his decision a five-foot wood
en cross was burned beneath the win
dow of the dormitory he shares with
250 other students.
Deputy Sheriff Joe Cooke, who re
sponded to a midnight telephone call,
said he found the cross blazing on the
lawn. The sheriff’s office and William
Tanner, FSU’s security officer, made a
detailed investigation without discov
ering those responsible. The officers
said they were inclined to view the
matter as a prank.
ACADEMIC TROUBLE
The first Negro student to attend the
University of Florida was dropped in
February for academic deficiencies.
George H. Starke Jr. was accepted as
a law student at the beginning of the
1959-60 term as the first integrated
student ever to attend a public educa
tional institution in the state.
After his dismissal it was disclosed
he had been on academic probation
since the first of the year.
Starke said he was certain no preju
dice was involved in his failure to
make the grade.
“The law school and its professors
were eminently fair,” he said. “I was
treated like any other student.”
One of Starke’s professors said there
“had never been as much as two min-
for the county. The county has rela
tively few Negroes.
Having voted to submit the tax in
crease and the two bond issues at the
special March election, the Board of
Education, together with school of
ficials, began a campaign to obtain fa
vorable action.
Supt. of Instruction Philip J. Hickey
conducted reporters, photographers
and civic leaders on a tour of
the Dozier, Hempstead and Arlington
schools. All three are in the west cen
tral area that has been the scene of re
cent population shifts.
In a statement made later, Hickey
said St. Louis school teachers are
underpaid by national standards and
have to teach 40 or even 45 children in
classrooms designed for 35. The mini
mum pay for a teacher with a bachelor
degree in St. Louis is $4,000 a year.
The St. Louis public school system
has lost 190 teachers by resignation since
last September, Hickey said.
COMMUNITY ACTION
With the objective of helping press
for passage of the tax increase and bond
issues in St. Louis, a new organization
called the Citizens Assn, for the Public
Schools was incorporated in February.
The temporary chairman is Andy J.
Brown, who was an organizer of the
West End Community Conference.
Brown said the immediate purpose of
the new group was to “prove that the
conflicts and the confusion in the city
about the public schools and the school
board cannot be allowed to crucify the
education of the children, and that the
school tax and bond issues must be
passed.”
UNDER SURVEY
The Missouri advisory committee to
the Civil Rights Commission heard a
report at a St. Louis meeting in mid-
February that racial discrimination was
involved in transporting Negro pupils
from overcrowded St. Louis public
school districts.
Lorenzo J. Greene, professor of his
tory at Lincoln University in Jefferson
City, said Negro pupils who had to be
transported by bus to less crowded
schools were not taken to the nearest
school, if the nearest school had an all-
white enrollment.
Greene, a Negro, is chairman of the
advisory committee’s subcommittee on
education. He said Negro pupils who
were transported because of overcrowd-
utes trouble in any of my classes be
cause of him.” A university official
said Starke’s behavior and attitude had
been “exemplary.”
The Florida Alligator, student publi
cation, interviewed Starke and his
fellow students and reported:
“Reaction to his year and a half on
the UF campus has varied from ac
ceptance (in some cases with clenched
teeth) to complete (but usually silent)
rejection.”
The publication closed its summary
of this first try at integration with this
conclusion:
“If Starke proved one thing by his
three-semester stay here he proved
that the faith and confidence placed in
the maturity of the UF student body
were well deserved.”
Starke’s departure left Ester M.
Langston of Orlando as the only Ne
gro student at UF. Miss Langston, a
Phi Beta Kappa at Fisk University, is
a first-year student at the school of
medicine.
Three other Negroes attended summer
sessions last year.
With Florida’s school population
edging toward the one million mark
for the first time, the Legislative
Council’s education committee heard
testimony that the cost of public edu
cation will reach one-half billion dol
lars in the next five years.
Dr. Arthur Cunkle, associate direc-
(See FLORIDA, Page 15)
ing were taken only to schools already
racially integrated or Negro.
It has been explained by St. Louis
school officials that they feel it is not
proper to transport Negroes to a school
in a white neighborhood. They said it
was not the school system’s respon
sibility to change the character of a
neighborhood.
At present, some 1,000 children are
being transported out of the west cen
tral district, between Lindell Boulevard
and Natural Bridge west of Union. Most
of them are taken to Beaumont and
Vashon high schools.
The Missouri committee decided to
make continuing studies in the areas
of education, housing, employment and
public accommodations. Greene said
that in Jefferson City, the state capital,
there is only one place of public ac
commodation where a Negro can be
served a meal.
At a public meeting in St. Louis Jan.
31, the Rev. John Hicks, a member of
the St. Louis Board of Education, said
problems among Negro students were
“far out of proportion to the total school
population.”
The Rev. Mr. Hicks, a Negro, pastor
of Union Memorial Methodist Church,
addressed a gathering sponsored by the
St. Louis Citizens for Public Education.
Citing police statistics indicating a
heavy crime rate in Negro districts and
a disproportionate rate of school dif
ficulties related to behavior among Ne
gro school children, he urged that Negro
parents and citizens give these problems
their earnest attention.
NO EXCUSE
The Rev. Mr. Hicks said sub-standard
socio-economic conditions and discrim
ination were contributing factors but
these should not serve as an excuse for
citizens to absolve themselves of respon
sibility.
He suggested a number of ways in
which Negroes might make a better
record. Toward the end of his talk, he
said:
“I am not saying that the Negro is all
bad, or that our boys and girls are
worse than those of any other group.
The Negro is no new element in the
citizenship of our city, and needs no
special prescription to suit his needs.
“His case is one common to a people
whose surroundings and environment
have placed, or caused them to be
placed, in a dependent attitude. And his
only hope for rising above the common
level of a second-class citizen is to so
use his resources of mind and body as to
change these environments and become
the master, rather than the helpless
creature, of circumstance.” # # #
MISSOURI
Two School Bond Issues Are Proposed in St. Louis