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SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—MAY I960—PAGE 7 ARKANSAS Plaintiffs Ask Further Desegregation in Little Rock LITTLE ROCK, Ark. N egro plaintiffs in the Little Rock case filed a 66-page brief arguing against the use of the pupil assignment law and for expansion of the desegregation plan. The Negro plaintiffs objected in a written filing and an oral hear ing to the statement of affirmative policies filed by the Dollarway School Board. (See “Legal Ac tion”) Little Rock’s three high schools regained their accreditation with the North Central Assn, of Sec ondary Schools and Colleges. (See “School Boards and School men.”) Hendrix College at Conway, a Methodist institution, decided to continue its policy of admitting white students only. (See “School Boards and Schoolmen.”) Four men were in the race against Gov. Orval E. Faubus, who is trying for an unprecedented fourth term, when the ticket closed April 27. It ap pears school desegregation again will be the main issue. (See “Political Ac tivity.”) In both the Little Rock and Dollar way desegregation lawsuits in U.S. Dis trict Court at Little Rock, there were legal filings and other developments during April. In the Little Rock case (Aaron v. Tucker), the Negro plaintiffs filed a 66-page brief with Judge John E. Mil ler of Ft. Smith. They contended that the Little Rock desegregation plan, now operating on a token basis in two high schools, should be expanded. In the Dollarway case (Dove v. Par ham) there was another hearing on the effort of three Negro plaintiffs to gain admission to the white high school. More filings included one in which one of the three plaintiffs, a senior about to graduate, gave up her attempt to get into the white school. NEW BRIEF The new brief in Aaron v. Tucker was written by Wiley A. Branton of Pine Bluff and by Thurgood Marshall and James N. Nabrit III of New York City, lawyers for the National Assn, for the Advancement of Colored Peo ple. They argued that the Little Rock School Board, by using the 1959 Pupil Placement Act for the 1959-60 school year, materially altered the desegrega tion plan submitted by the board in 1955 and approved by district court in 1956. They attacked the policies applied to the approved desegregation plan by the board under the pupil assignment law. The brief included the following statements and arguments: 1) That the school board illegally considered the race of all pupils in making the 1959-60 assignment. 2) That the board, contrary to the Supreme Court rulings, had shifted the burden of the initiative for ending seg regation to the Negro pupils and their parents. 3) That the board’s claim that it had assigned some Negro pupils to the Ne gro high school instead of a white high school was impotent. “The theory that each child must establish to the board’s satisfaction that his admission to a non- segregated school will benefit him would establish a unique proposition under constitutional law.” 4) That the assignment of pupils to schools according to the attendance area in which the pupils live was the core of the original, approved plan and that by applying the pupil assignment law the school board had “unilaterally modified” the approved plan. 5) That the application of special tests and qualifications to the Negro pupils requesting admission to white schools violates the approved desegre gation plan; and so does the assignment to white schools of those white pupils living in the Horace Mann (Negro) High School attendance area. 6) That because the board has shift ed responsibility for taking initiative to end segregation to the pupils and their parents, the Negro schools will remain all-Negro units and unless individual white children apply for admission to them, and that because of this, Negro children who do apply for admission to white schools “become conspicuous ex ceptions to the segregated pattern and the focus of the resentment and repris als of elements opposing desegrega tion.” 7) That, also, because of this pro cedure, “agents of the state deal with Negro students who seek admission to non-segregated schools as if they were ‘presumptive disease-carriers’ who re quire ‘screening’ before release from the quarantine of ‘jim-crow’ schools.” 8) That the pupil assignment law did not relieve the school board of the duty to go forward under the approved plan to reorganize the school district on a non-segregated basis. Judge Miller held a hearing in March on the plaintiffs’ complaints about the board’s use of the pupil as signment law and then called for the filing of briefs. This was the brief for the Negro plaintiffs. After reading it, attorneys for the school board will write and file their brief. DOLLARWAY CASE In the Dollarway case (Dove v. Par ham), the situation was that Judge J. Smith Henley had ordered the board to file a statement of “affirmative policies” designed to bring about an end to seg regation in the district. The board filed the statement on March 21, saying that it would from now on assign first grade pupils, when possible, according to the preference of their parents. The board said that it opposed the transfer from school to school of pupils in grades above that. The board carefully refrained from calling this a plan and said that de segregation “may or may not” result from it. Early in April the Negro plain tiffs filed a response to the statement of policies. They said all that the statement of fered was “an opportunity for Negro children in the Dollarway School Dis trict to apply for desegregated educa tion and be rejected under the pupil assignment law.” They said that the statement “does not comply with the order of this court directing the defendants to submit an affirmative statement of their plans and policies designed to bring about an end to compulsory racial segregation in the public schools of the district, in that the report does not contain an affirma tive plan or policy designed to end compulsory racial segregation in the Dollarway School District. The report is void of any affirmative steps to be taken by the defendants towards initi ating desegregation in the Dollarway School District. The report does not contemplate a definite starting date, nor a period of time for the elimination of racial discrimination. At best the de fendants’ report is an equivocal scheme designed to perpetuate segregation ...” ORAL ARGUMENTS A few days later, Judge Henley heard oral arguments on the statement from the attorneys, Herschel H. Friday Jr. of Little Rock for the Dollarway board, and George Howard Jr. of Pine Bluff for the Negro plaintiffs. At the hearing, Friday said the Dollarway board would buttonhole the parents of every incom ing first-grader in the 1960-61 year. They will be asked which school they want their children to attend and an extensive investigation will be conduct ed on each one. He said this would be done in May before the end of the current school year so that parents not satisfied with the assignment of their children would have plenty of time to apply for reas signment. Judge Henley asked if pu pils in the second and higher grades would have a chance to apply for re assignment. Friday said yes, though the board discourages that and doesn’t plan to make a survey on it. Judge Henley said he thought die board should make a survey, just to see, for one thing, whether it was going to get five or 500 such requests. NOT SATISFIED Howard was not satisfied with this explanation. When Judge Henley asked him what he thought of the board’s in tention to comply when possible with the school preferences of first graders, he said: “I think the board should come out and state specifically whether or not it plans to start at the first grade. The as signment law is just an aid in solving this problem. The board should have some plan to work with and use the assignment law as an aid. We say this report is not a plan and therefore the board is not entitled to avail itself of the assignment law.” Howard said the board should have a plan, such as starting in the first grade, advancing a grade a year and completing desegregation in 12 years. The judge disagreed. “The court doesn’t see that it needs to be 12 or any number of years,” he said. The judge spoke of an “open-end transition period” and said there might be desegregation in the third grade, with none in the second grade, in the second year, depending on the ability of the Negro pupils to adjust. Howard took the position that the schools were there to teach the pupils to adjust. LATERAL TRANSFERS In another comment Judge Henley saw nothing wrong in the Dollarway board’s policy against lateral transfers (from the Negro school to the white school at grades two or higher), but said it would have to be justified. He took note that the policy would tend to preserve segregation since a child once enrolled in a school would have to stay there through the 12 grades. “Our opinion,” said Howard, “is that the school board is using the lateral transfer argument merely to circum vent the Brown decision.” So far the board has made all its assignments on the basis of race, he said. “What you’re saying,” Judge Henley said, “is that on the basis of what they have done in past they’re going to do it to you again.” TRANSITION PERIODS Howard argued against the idea of a transition period, but Henley said the Supreme Court had authorized transi tion periods in the same case in which it ruled that compulsory racial segre gation was illegal. “If you’re going to have a transition period you’re going to have a tolerance of some degree of illegality,” the judge added. “It boils down in the local sit uation to how much illegality will be accepted.” Judge Henley took the statement of policy under advisement and planned to announce a ruling by the end of April. Later the Negro plaintiffs filed a new appeal with the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals at St. Louis, asking again that the appeals court overrule the district court and order the Negro plaintiffs ad mitted immediately to the white Dol larway school. The appeal made this request for only two of the three plaintiffs. It explained that the third, Ernestine Dove, whose name is part of the title of the case, is in the 12th grade and will be graduated in May and no rul ing by the court could come in time to be of any merit to her. The other two plaintiffs are Corliss Smith, a ninth grader, and James E. Warfield, in the 10th grade. FILE APPEAL Three of the four men convicted of the 1959 Labor Day dynamitings at Little Rock have appealed to the State Supreme Court. They are Jesse Ray mond Perry, sentenced to three years; E. A. Lauderdale Sr., three years and a $500 fine; and John Taylor Coggins, three years and $500. The fourth man, J. D. Sims, pleaded guilty and a fifth has not been tried. The targets were the school board office, the mayor’s office and the fire chief’s city-owned car. DAMAGE SUITS The nine civil damage suits totaling $500,000 and pending against Little Rock Police Chief Eugene G. Smith when he shot himself to death in March, will be prosecuted, Amis Guthridge, attorney for the plaintiffs said. He said he would file to make either Smith’s estate or his successor as police chief the substitute defend ant. Two persons filed the suits alleging violation of their civil rights by the manner in which Smith and policemen and firemen broke up a segregationist march on Central High on Aug. 12, 1959, or by the way they were arrested after the Labor Day dynamitings. The North Central Assn, of Secon dary Schools and Colleges re-accredited the three Little Rock high schools— Central, Hall and Horace Mann. They had lost their accreditation dur ing the 1958-59 school year when closed by Gov. Faubus to prevent a second year of desegregation at Central. TO CONTINUE POLICY After a one-year study by its ex ecutive committee, the board of trus tees of Hendrix College at Conway voted to continue its policy of admit ting white students only. Hendrix is owned and operated by the two Meth odist conferences in Arkansas. The board said it was certain that a majority of the Methodists in the state did not want the policy changed. The board announced its decision only a month after an Arkansas Methodist Student Movement resolution called for desegregation at Hendrix. JOB APPLICANTS The Little Rock School District is receiving job applications from teach ers at a rate of about five a day, Supt. Terrell E. Powell said. About 300 quali fied applications are on hand. The district has 808 teachers with a normal turnover of about 80 a year, but it lost 280 during the year the high schools were closed. The American Assn, of University Professors presented its Alexander Meiklejohn Award for Academic Free dom to Guerdon D. Nichols, dean of the college of arts and sciences at the University of Arkansas, in recognition of his opposition to Act 10 of 1958. Act 10 requires all employes of pub lic schools and colleges to file affidavits listing the organizations they have been members of or contributed to in the previous five years. It was aimed at exposing members of the NAACP in the public schools. ATTACKS PROPOSAL Another official of the Arkansas Edu cation Assn, attacked the constitutional amendment proposed by Gov. Faubus under which school districts could abandon their school systems to avoid court-ordered desegregation. Eugene R. Warren of Little Rock, counsel to the AEA, in a speech at a district AEA meeting, called the amendment “most destructive, most vi cious and dastardly.” It’s a “wolf in wolf’s clothing,” he said. The amendment will be voted on at the general election in November. From all indications the overriding issue in the gubernatorial campaign this summer will be, for the third straight election, school desegregation. That’s the issue on which Gov. Fau bus rode to a third term in 1958 and on which he apparently is relying chiefly in his appeal for an unprecedented fourth term. His opponents, all segre gationists, want to make the fourth term itself the main issue. Three more candidates got into the field with Faubus and Atty. Gen. (See ARKNSAS, Page 8) School Group By WILLIAM T. SHELTON LITTLE ROCK, Ark. he Little Rock Private School Corp. is still in existence after all and will continue so, accord ing to its president, Dr. T. J. Raney. When the corporation abruptly closed its school— T. J. Raney Private High School—last August, Raney said the corporation would be dissolved, but six months later he disclosed that some of the board members wanted it kept active. It is now in the process of disposing of its assets. It has sold its equipment, consisting of 1,175 student desks, 500 lockers, some office furniture and drinking fountains, to the Pulaski County (rural) School District, for $10,000, and donated its library of about 4,000 books to the same district. It has listed for sale at $72,500 the 20-acre tract on the west edge of Little Rock, which it bought for that price with the intention of building a new school building there. The corporation paid $12,500 down on that site and still owes $60,000. It has joined with Vance Thompson of McCrory in listing for sale the city block of land and the buildings on it which were used by T. J. Raney High School during its singla year of operation in 1958-59. Thompson bought the property for $50,900 in September 1958 and leased it to the corpora tion for $400 a month. Before the 1958-59 school year was over, the corporation began the construction of extra class rooms on the block but the building was never finished. HOPES TO GET $50,000 Raney said the corporation had spent about $98,000 on the property and hoped to get back about $50,000 from the sale. He said Thompson wanted only to get his purchase price back. That would make the sale price of the block about $100,900. If both pieces of property are sold at the listed prices, the corporation will realize $62,500. With the $10,000 from’ the sale of equipment to the county school district, Raney said, all this will be added to the corporation’s escrow account, which had $6,511 when an audit was made last October. This money, which could total $79,011, will be held for possible donation to any other segregated school “in a like position,” Raney said. The corporation was formed Sept. 17, 1958, with the bless ing of Gov. Orval Faubus, anticipating that the governor’s Will Continue order closing the Little Rock high schools under Act 4 of 1958 would be approved by the voters of the school district in a special referendum on Sept. 27. The voters did approve and the Private School Corp. proceeded on election night to negotiate with the public school board for the lease of the public high school buildings. The federal courts immediately nullified that lease, which led to the posting of signs, reading “This School Closed by the Federal Government,” on the school grounds by a man who said he had been hired by the Private School Corp. After a short delay, Vance Thompson bought the block containing a former orphanage and leased it to the corpora tion for use as a school building. OPENED IN OCTOBER 1958 Raney is a member of one of Little Rock’s wealthiest families. All six members of the board were prominent Little Rock residents, including one member of the state Legislature, Mrs. Gordon P. Oates. They got their school open in October 1958, for whites only and with no tuition. They and Gov. Faubus appealed to the public for financial support. Through the school year the corporation received a total of $300,000 in gifts from all over the country. Its other main source of money was the state government, which under Act 5 of 1958 was withholding from the Little Rock School District state aid equalling $172 per high school student, and was paying it in monthly installments of $24.50 per student to whatever accredited school the former Little Rock stu dents were attending. About 800 students attended Raney High and before Acts 4 and 5 were nullified by the federal courts, the school had received $71,907.50 from the state. The Private School Corp. was formed with the intention of becoming a permanent institution, but the situation in August 1959 differed from that of September 1958. The flow of cash donations had dwindled and the state aid was cut off. Then the Little Rock Public School Board announced that it would reopen the public high schools. On the same day the Private School Corp. announced that it would not operate any longer because it was broke. There had been no warning that this development was coming. Up to then Raney High had registered 1,226 students for the 1959-60 year and its faculty and staff were going through the routine of getting ready to start classes. But Raney said the corporation couldn’t foresee a way to finanre another year of school. m. jl jl