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Southern Schodl News
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9002-b- 13
APRIL, 1961
2 Mississippi
P
State Education
leader Opposes
Closing Schools
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JACKSON, Miss.
rjiATK Education Supt. J. M.
^ Xubb said March 16 that aboli
tion of public schools as a last
^sort to prevent desegregation
Tfould be to close the door of
hope for many ambitious youth
•n this state.”
It was his first comment on that
;SUe since legislative passage of bills
authorizing the governor or local school
ioards to take that action as a “last
resort.”
Supt. Tubb’s position was expressed
lufore the 75th annual convention of
ie 12,000-member Mississippi Educa-
j on Association of white educators
meeting in Jackson.
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Superintendent’s Statement
Tubb said:
“No problems have ever faced the
uembers of any convention in the long
fetory of the MEA greater than those
that face us during this year, 1961.
Hie fate of the great public school
system founded 91 years ago perhaps
hangs in the balance in the months
ahead.
“In Mississippi, a dual, segregated
program of education has been oper
ated for all the children. It is the belief
a! an overwhelming majority of our
people that this type program, con
sidering the background and traditions
of our people, is the best for us.
“If, however, this system of operation
is challenged, the solution must be
found through the efforts of dedicated
leaders who put the welfare of the
children and the future of our state
and nation above everything else.
“In the day of last resort, our people
must know that to abolish the public
schools would be to close the door of
hope for many ambitious youth in this
state. It would bring to a halt the
wheels of industry on the borders of
•nr state, and destroy the dreams we
have had for a great state whose
•conomy would be based upon agri-
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Segregation Is Issue
In Federal Aid Debate
After SERS Directors Meeting
From left, John Scanlon, program associate in education for the Ford Foundation;
Frank R. Ahlgren, re-elected chairman of the SERS board; Dr. Luther H. Foster,
president of Tuskegee Institute; Thomas R. Waring, vice chairman; Reed Sarratt,
executive director.
SERS Officers, Members
Of Board Are Re-elected
NASHVILLE, Tenn.
fficers and board members
whose terms expire this year
were re-elected at the annual
meeting of the Board of Directors
of Southern Education Reporting
Service here on March 26.
Returned to office for another year
were Frank Ahlgren, editor of the
Memphis (Tenn.) Commercial Appeal,
chairman; Thomas R. Waring, editor of
the Charleston (S.C.) News and
Courier, vice-chairman; and Reed Sar
ratt of Nashville, executive director.
Directors re-elected for three-year
terms were Dr. Harvie Branscomb,
chancellor of Vanderbilt University;
Dr. Luther H. Foster, president of Tus
kegee Institute; Bert Struby, general
manager of the Macon, Ga., Telegraph
and News; Don Shoemaker, editor of
the editorial page of the Miami (Fla.)
Herald; and Ahlgren. Sarratt was
elected to the board for a three-year
term.
Fisk Made Repository
meeting in October, had instructed
Chairman Ahlgren to request. The
grant was made to George Peabody
College for Teachers, which serves as
fiscal agent for SERS.
In the event that this proves to be
a terminal grant, the SERS directors
at their meeting March 26 asked their
executive committee to make a study
of the feasibility of continuing the li
brary beyond June 30, 1963, and to
submit their recommendations at the
next annual meeting.
Format and Content
The directors approved the report of
a committee appointed last October to
study the format and content of
Southern School News. The commit
tee recommended that efforts be con-
(See SERS BOARD, Page 15)
WASHINGTON, D. C.
HE MUSHROOMING DEBATE Over
aid to private and parochial
schools overshadowed the usual
“Powell Amendment” discussions,
but the question of government
funds for segregated schools was
raised in House and Senate hear
ings and appeared likely to come
up again before there is a final
vote on President Kennedy’s $2.3
billion school aid program.
Administration spokesmen and con
gressional managers for the president’s
bill warned that any attempt to with
hold aid from segregated schools would
endanger passage of the school assist
ance program. But Clarence Mitchell,
director of the Washington Bureau of
the National Association for the Ad
vancement of Colored People, urged
inclusion of a “Powell Amendment”
and said there was no evidence it
would hurt the bill’s chances.
‘Forget Court Opinion’
Mitchell told the Senate Education
Subcommittee March 10 that the argu
ment that an anti-segregation amend
ment would kill the school bill “is
an attempt to persuade the colored
citizens of our country to forget that
the United States Supreme Court has
declared that racial segregation in
public schools is unconstitutional.”
He said those who would be en
trusted with the expenditure of fed
eral funds in Southern states “do not
have the slightest intention of using
such money to promote the education
of all children,” and added:
“Governors are busy issuing flaming
statements of defiance, state legisla
tures are cluttering the statute books
and courts with unconstitutional laws
and mobs are chasing white parents
out of town in New Orleans just be
cause two public schools have been
opened to a handful of colored chil
dren.
‘Segregation Extended’
“All of this represents action that
the states promote or at least tolerate.
In addition, the federal government is
busily extending racial segregation in
schools through the Department of
Health, Education and Welfare under
the defense impacted area program.”
Mitchell said segregation of children
of military personnel at the Redstone
Arsenal in Alabama amounts to “a par
ticularly flagrant example” of federal
involvement with racial bias.
Sen. Wayne Morse (D-Ore.), chair
man of the Education Subcommittee,
asked the Defense Department to fur
nish a report on the situation at Red
stone Arsenal and other federal in
stallations, but made it clear that he
would not favor an anti-segregation
rider to the school bill. He said the
matter should be taken up separately
later as an amendment to the Civil
Rights Act.
Administration Position
Presenting the Administration’s case
for the school bill to Congress, Secre
tary of Health, Education and Welfare
Abraham Ribicoff warned that any at
tempt to withhold federal funds from
schools practicing racial segregation
“would definitely weaken prospects for
the legislation.”
Ribicoff called the Supreme Court’s
1954 desegregation decision “legally
and morally correct.” but added:
“I can imagine no greater tragedy
than to place every problem facing
America on the back of education. We
can do no greater disservice to the fu
ture of education than to try to solve
all our problems through this bill and
in the process not solve any of them.”
THE REGION
Federal Pressures Increase
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•ulture and a great industry.”
Relative to private schools, Tubb said:
A private school system on a state-
’ide level simnlv would not work,
fl’ink of all the experience which
t0 "ld be lost if our public schools are
<W”
noted that “other states have
ne d, and failed, with school-closing
“Tempts.”
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Negro Leader Agrees
Echoing those sentiments was L. S.
JTcxander, executive secretary of the
■ssissippi Teachers Association com-
'"'jh of 7,000 Negro educators.
_° close the schools would penalize
, e innocent,” Alexander said. “Closing
it ^ools would be to punish children
,' h ° had no part whatsoever in the
’°hlem.”
■ 5 f e asser ted that “there’s no logical
; f( f° n why both races working to-
5 jf r cannot solve every educational
lem.” He said “all such problems
(See MISSISSIPPI, Page 15)
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For Desegregation of Schools
A major action by the board was the
designation of Fisk University as re
pository for the SERS library upon ex
piration of the project. This action was
recommended by Chancellor Brans
comb. In 1955 the board had named the
Joint University Library (Vanderbilt,
Peabody and Scarritt) as repository.
The change was made with the con
currence of JUL and Fisk, the princi
pal reason for it being lack of space
at JUL to house the SERS collection,
which already contains more than 800,-
000 separate items. The SERS library
is microfilmed annually, and a part of
the new agreement is that the micro
film negative and a set of positive
prints will go to JUL. Fisk will receive
the original materials.
The directors were informed of
ficially that the Ford Foundation has
made a grant of $390,000 to SERS for
the biennium 1961-63. The Foundation
last December approved the grant,
which the SERS directors, at a called
What Is
By DR. BENJAMIN E. MAYS
N ow that the Supreme Court
has made compulsorily segre
gated education unconstitutional,
the question is constantly asked:
What will happen to the predomi
nantly Negro college? Does it
have a future? Will it be needed?
Before I attempt to give answers to
these questions, I would like to make
an observation which has seldom been
made but an observation which is
mighty important.
Although the white colleges in the
South have always been far more segre
gated than the Negro colleges, no one
has ever asked the question: What
will happen to the predominantly white
colleges? It is assumed that the white
colleges, regardless of quality, will sur-
Dr. Mays is president of More
house College in Atlanta and of the
United Negro College Fund.
F ederal pressures for increased
school desegregation came
from the courts and the executive
department during March. In
Congress, at the same time, the
aid to education proposal became
embroiled in a controversy over
whether federal funds should be
available to segregated schools.
The U. S. Justice Department re
versed its policy in entering four
Louisiana school desegregation cases as
a friend of the court. The department
previously had intervened only after
trouble developed in enforcing court
orders.
U. S. District Attorney M. Hepburn
Many obtained permission to enter the
vive and grow in strength and in
fluence. No such assumption is ever
made where the Negro colleges are
involved — not even the best Negro
colleges.
Oddly enough, this question is raised
not only by well-meaning white people
but by well-meaning Negroes as well.
It is an unfortunate question because
it may reflect an attitude that could
mean the death of a college now
predominantly Negro, however excel
lent it may be.
Different Sources
The question may arise from different
sources in the Negro and white minds
but the implication is the same. The
question reflects the belief that colleges
for Negroes, even the best of them,
are uniformly inferior to any white
college and that white colleges, even
poor ones, are uniformly better than
any Negro college. It implies further
that nothing that Negro educators have
built is good enough to survive in a
suits in which St. Helena and East
Baton Rouge parishes and six state-
supported trade schools have been or
dered to desegregate “with all de
liberate speed!” Attorney;General Rob
ert F. Kennedy explained the move
would “assist the* court.'in preventing
potentially dangerous and critical situ
ations from coming to a head.”
Many had entered file New Orleans
desegregation suit as amicus curiae
last year after opposition developed
over that court order. In March the
U. S. Supreme Court upheld three de
cisions in which three-judge courts
had thrown out a series of segregation
laws trying to halt the Orleans Parish
desegregation.
Another policy of the new attorney
(See THE REGION, Page 5)
desegregated society.
In the Negro mind, it may be an
expression of the inferiority complex
and in the white person it may be a
sign of the superiority complex. It is
important, therefore, that we write
about the future of the Negro college.
In preparation for this article, we
sent a questionnaire to the presidents
of the 33 colleges that make up the
United Negro College Fund and 10
of the largest predominantly tax-sup
ported colleges for Negroes. An analy
sis of the answers reveals what most
people do not know: Negro colleges
have been “segregated” institutions but
they have never been “segregating”
institutions. The Negro colleges have
had to restrict their enrollment to
Negroes by custom and law and not
by any desire or design to exclude
white students. Most of the Negro
colleges had to confine their student
bodies to Negroes in order to be
chartered by the states.
No one can predict with mathematical
★ ★ ★
Justice Department Follows
New Policy in Louisiana
In a sharp reversal of policy, the
Justice Department stepped into four
Louisiana school desegregation cases
March 17. Previous practice has been
for the Department to intervene only
after trouble developed in enforcing
court orders.
The Louisiana move, Attorney Gen
eral Robert F. Kennedy said, was de
signed to “assist the court in prevent
ing potentially dangerous and critical
situations from coming to a head.”
Kennedy pointed out that in author
izing the department to intervene,
Judge J. Skelly Wright gave it a more
active role than is normally allowed to
groups which enter cases as “friends of
the court.” This is necessary, Kennedy
(See D. C., Page 5)
certainty the future of the predomi
nantly Negro college. Three assumptions
have been made which this writer
believes are false. It has been said:
• That when integration comes in
full force, the colleges now serving
Negroes will not be needed; that they
will go out of existence.
• That when white colleges in the
South open their doors to Negroes, they
will make a straight line to the white
institutions, thus leaving the Negro
colleges empty.
• That white students will not matri
culate in colleges that are now serving
mainly Negroes.
I would like to comment on all three
assumptions.
To Serve All People
Will the Negro colleges go out of
existence? The colleges now designated
as “Negro colleges” will go out of
existence. They will become colleges
(See DR. MAYS, Page 12)
The Future of Negro Colleges?