Newspaper Page Text
SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—APRIL 1961—PAGE 5
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(Continued from Page 1)
j to “enable the United States to
^promptly to head off critical situa-
pg before they occur and to protect
y, integrity of the judicial process.”
four cases in which the Depart-
intervened are aimed at ending
legation in East Baton Rouge and
j.' Helena Parishes and in six trade
^,ools run by the Louisiana Depart-
of Education. No dates have been
^ for desegregation, and Kennedy
Ljjssed that setting dates would be
* to the court and not the Depart
ment of Justice.
★ ★ ★
; u preme Court Agrees
j fo Review Sit-in Cases
fhe Supreme Court agreed March 20
preview a group of Louisiana sit-in
.ges stemming from efforts of students
Southern University in Baton Rouge
to desegregate lunch counters.
Supreme Court hearings, to be held
next fall, will be the first in which the
Court has considered whether states
oan use their police powers to enforce
j store owner’s desire to segregate his
ujstomers at lunch counters.
Fifteen Southern University students
tere arrested and convicted of dis
turbing the peace under a law which
makes it a crime to act in “such a
manner as to unreasonably disturb and
jlarra the public.”
The convictions are being chal
lenged on the grounds that there was
no evidence that anyone was alarmed
b? the demonstrators, that the state
law is too vague and that it is uncon
stitutional for a state to enforce dis
criminatory practices in businesses
open for general public use. The last
of these points—never ruled on by the
Court—could have a broad effect on
other sit-in cases.
★ ★ ★
In another March 20 action, the Su
preme Court summarily affirmed ac
tions of a lower federal court in de
claring many acts of the Louisiana
Legislature unconstitutional and in en
joining many state officials from in
terfering with desegregation in New
Orleans schools.
The orders upheld also allow the
Justice Department to take a broader-
than-normal role in the cases and
tailed interposition an unconstitutional
doctrine.
★ ★ ★
The Supreme Court agreed to re-
hew a Virginia barratry law next fall.
“ e statute, one of a series of 1956
treasures aimed at the NAACP, was
a Pheld by the Virginia Supreme Court
s a legitimate measure to strengthen
Nations on the solicitation of busi-
® ss by attorneys.
Vsj 6 ^ aw * s designed to keep the
■•ACP from encouraging the filing of
«ool desegregation cases. The
^CP said it is not soliciting busi-
Owrict Schools
D. C. Highlights
Administration spokesmen and
Congressional leaders voiced oppo
sition to any anti-segregation rider
in the President’s school aid pro
gram, but the issue came up in
committee hearings and appeared
likely to come up again.
The Justice Department took the
unusual step of intervening in four
Louisiana school desegregation
cases. The Supreme Court upheld
lower court rulings in the New Or
leans dispute and agreed to hear a
group of Louisiana sit-in cases.
Legislation versus executive ac
tion to promote civil rights was the
topic of a discussion at a civil
rights conference. Administration
aides favored the latter course.
The District School Board had
high praise for Superintendent Carl
F. Hansen as it appointed him to
his second three-year term.
ness for its attorneys and argues that
the law will put it out of business in
Virginia.
★ ★ ★
On March 6, the Supreme Court re
fused to hear the first of the sit-in
cases carried to it. It involved eight
Negro and four white students con
victed of disorderly conduct when they
refused to leave the lunch counter of
a dime store in Tallahassee, Fla., which
had refused to serve them.
The Supreme Court gave no reason
for refusing to hear the case. However,
the city of Tallahassee had contended
that the 12 students did not exhaust
all judicial remedies available to them
in the state before carrying the case
to the highest tribunal.
★ ★ ★
Executive Power Cited
To Civil Rights Group
Civil rights proponents were told
March 23 that they should not discount
the executive powers of the President
as a help in their fight to wipe out
racial discrimination.
The advice came from Harris Wof
ford, a special assistant to President
Kennedy, after other speakers at the
annual meeting of the National Civil
Liberties Clearing House had sounded
a call for new civil rights legislation.
“We still will not make first base
without legislation,” declared Thurgood
Marshall, legal counsel for the NAACP.
He called for a “determined and af
firmative drive” for civil rights legis
lation and said the time for “bargain
ing” in Congress is over.
But Wofford and another White
House assistant, Frank D. Reeves, sug
gested that political realities must be
taken into account. Reeves said civil
rights leaders cannot afford to exist
“in the ivory tower of professional
professionalism.”
Ill
Hansen Reappointed; Given
High Praise by School Board
! District Board of Educa-
> heaped praise on School
^•Perintendent Carl F. Hansen
. voted him his first reappoint-
March 15.
Jansen was lauded for his direction
. successful, vital and significant
1 ^ our Vocational system” over
l^«st three years. His new three-
krm was approved unanimously,
was named to succeed Ho-
ISjj Coming as superintendent in
bile serving as an assistant su-
u rodent, he played a key role in
§ and executing the desegrega-
5 »>i
" v d
Vi
the school system, which fol-
uhnost immediately upon the
Court’s 1954 desegregation
. ★ ★ ★
“kig ® B. Yochelson, 54, a lawyer
&iT‘ ve , in District civic affairs, was
®d to the Board of Education
kiet q by judges of the Federal Dis-
V ? Urt - He was named for the un-
\ term of Walter N. Tobriner,
' sw °m in on the same day as
4[ , lc t Commissioner.
® board’s March 15 meeting, it
C. Smuck as its vice pres-
\ replaced Wesley S. Williams,
+ ame the Board’s first Negro
when he succeeded Tobriner.
A
★ ★ ★
^nw,° rge Washington University
- Council voted the first week
' • c h to discontinue the student
annual “Colonial Cruise” to
Hall Amusement Park be-
&
Vif
cause the park will not admit Negroes.
The “Colonial Cruise” on a Wilson
Line excursion boat to the amusement
park at Marshall Hall, Md., across the
Potomac from Mount Vernon, has been
a spring event for students of the
University since the early 1950s. About
500 were expected to make the trip in
April.
Ernest F. Henry, counsel for Mar
shall Hall, said the park is a private
venture which has followed a policy of
barring Negroes since it opened in
1888.
★ ★ ★
Appointment of a Negro to the Dis
trict Board of Commissioners was
hinted at by associate White House
press secretary Andrew T. Hatcher in
a March 19 address to the Washington
branch of the National Association for
the Advancement of Colored People.
“It’s inconceivable that a city 54 per
cent Negro does not have a Negro
Commissioner, and I will say that
President Kennedy is most aware of
this,” Hatcher said.
Hatcher, one of the President’s ma
jor Negro appointees, predicted that
the Kennedy Administration would
achieve so much for Negroes in the
field of civil rights that 10 years from
now “the NAACP as an organization
for civil rights may be out of business.”
He urged the organization to begin
now to shift some of its emphasis to
ward such new goals as increasing the
economic status of Negroes, combating
juvenile delinquency and working to
ward self-improvement of Negroes.
Negro Population Shifts
To North and to Cities
The Net Result?
Richmond Times-Dispatch
The Region
(Continued from Page 1)
general has been to make telephone
calls and hold personal conversations
with Southern governors on civil rights
matters. Gov. Ernest F. Hollings of
South Carolina said of his talks with
Kennedy:
“At no time has the attorney gen
eral threatened or warned us, and no
time will he (concerning civil rights
matters) .... I think we’ve got a very
helpful attorney general, who is trying
to forestall civil rights suits and dis
cord .... We are not meddling in
each other’s affairs.”
Prodded Board
The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals
in St. Louis prodded Little Rock’s
school board to speed up desegrega
tion. The appellate court, reversing
every point of the district judge who
had commended the school board’s
conduct, said the board was using the
Arkansas pupil assignment laws il
legally. The decision came just a few
days after the Arkansas capital an
nounced it had landed its first major
new industry since the school crisis
began in 1957.
Expansion of another school desegre
gation order came from a district court
in Georgia. U. S. Judge William A.
Bootle, in a sweeping order, opened
all “facilities and opportunities,” in
cluding the swimming pool and cafe
teria, to the two Negroes admitted un
der his order to the University of
Georgia earlier this year.
Escambia County, where segregation
sentiment is strong, became Florida’s
first school district to receive a fed
eral court order requiring a desegrega
tion plan. U. S. District Judge Harrold
Carswell gave the school officials 90
days to file a timetable. Dade County,
the state’s only desegregated district,
voluntarily began to desegregate its
schools in 1959.
Joins Other Issues
The question of federal influence on
segregation joined the other issues in
the president’s federal school aid pro
gram. Administration spokesmen and
congressional leaders voiced their op
position to any rider that would with
hold funds from segregated schools.
Opponents of such a rider said it
would endanger passage of the aid bill.
In committee hearings on the bill, wit
nesses urged inclusion of an anti-seg
regation provision, and the issue ap
peared likely to come up again before
a final vote.
In Alabama, where the completely
segregated school system has been hav
ing financial troubles, Gov. John Pat
terson declared he would refuse fed
eral education aid under the Kennedy
program “if there are any strings at
tached.” The governor added that fed
eral assistance would be of great help
as the state can hardly afford the
school system it needs.
Mississippi Reaction
Mississippi’s state superintendent of
education, J. M. Tubb, and the Mis
sissippi Education Association also gave
their conditional “no strings” endorse
ment to the aid proposal. Two Mis
sissippi congressmen, John Bell Wil
liams and W. M. Colmer, said they op
posed the bill because “there can be
no federal aid without federal control.”
The state convention of the 12,000-
member Mississippi Education Associ
ation also heard Superintendent Tubb’s
first comment on the issue of abolish
ing public schools to prevent desegre
gation. The legislature has authorized
the governor or local school boards to
close the schools as a last resort. Tubb
told the white educators:
“. . . our people must know that to
abolish the public schools would be to
close the door of hope for many am
bitious youth in this state. It would
bring to a halt the wheels of industry
on the borders of our state, and de
stroy the dreams we have had for a
WASHINGTON, D.C.
wo Southern states—Missis
sippi and Arkansas—lost Ne
gro population in the years be
tween the 1950 and 1960 censuses
and in other states the Negro pop
ulation increased at a smaller rate
than in the nation as a whole.
Racial population figures released
by the Census Bureau March 7 re
flected a continuing Negro population
shift from Southern to Northern states.
An increase of almost half a million
Negroes was reported for New York
State, bringing the total to 1,417,511
and giving the state the largest Negro
population. In 1950, New York trailed
Georgia, North Carolina, Mississippi,
Alabama and Texas in Negro popula
tion. (See table.)
10.5 Per Cent
The Negro population for the 50
states and the District of Columbia was
reported as 18,871,831 as of last April.
Negroes accounted for 10.5 per cent of
the total population of 179,323,175.
The 1950 census counted 15,042,286
Negroes in the then 48 states, or 10.0
per cent of the population of 150.7
million.
The Census Bureau’s tabulation
showed that the Negro population in
creased 25.5 per cent, while the total
population increased about 18.5 per
cent.
Additional census data released
March 25 confirmed that the bulk of
big-city Negro population continues
to be confined to central cities, while
suburban areas remain predominantly
white. Statistics for the 25 largest
metropolitan areas showed substan
tially higher percentages of Negro
population for the cities themselves
than for the areas.
*Not a state in 1950.
great state whose economy would be
based upon agriculture and a great in
dustry.”
The South Carolina Education As
sociation also approved a resolution
favoring the federal funds. But Gov.
Hollings opposed the program in his
address to the white teachers and
warned against falling into a trap of
federal aid.
Groups of citizens in Mississippi and
South Carolina prepared to set up pri
vate schools in case the public schools,
now segregated, should be closed in a
Louisville Courier-Journal
The statistics for the nation’s
twenty-five largest cities, includ
ing Negro populations and ratios,
were as follow:
Total
%
City.
Population
Negroes Negro
New York ..
.. 7,781,984
1,087,931
14.0
Chicago ....
.. 3,550,404
812,637
22.9
Los Angeles
.. 2,479,015
334,916
13.5
Philadelphia
.. 2,002,512
529,240
26.4
Detroit
.. 1,670,114
482,223
28.9
Baltimore ..
.. 939,024
326,589
34.8
Houston ....
.. 938,219
215,037
22.9
Cleveland .
... 876,050
250,818
28.6
Washington
.. 763,956
411,737
53.9
St. Louis ...
.. 750,026
214,377
28.6
Milwaukee .
.. 741,324
62,458
8.4
San Fran. ..
.. 740,316
74,383
10.0
Boston
.. 697,197
63,165
9.1
Dallas
.. 679,684
129,242
19.0
New Orleans
. 627,525
233,514
37.2
Pittsburgh ..
.. 604,332
100,692
16.7
San Antonio
.. 587,718
41,605
7.1
San Diego ..
.. 573,224
34,435
6.0
Seattle
.. 557,087
26,901
4.8
Buffalo
.. 532,759
70,904
13.3
Cincinnati .
.. 502,550
108,754
21.6
Memphis ...
.. 497,524
184,320
37.0
Denver ....
.. 493,887
31,066
6.3
Atlanta ....
.. 487,455
186,464
38.3
Minneapolis
.. 482,872
11,785
2.4
desegregation dispute. Union employes
of a plant at Hattiesburg, Miss., re
tained a former county school super
intendent to conduct a study for the
proposed school. A union official said
they intend to plan for segregated fa
cilities for white and Negro children
“if a crisis arises.”
In South Carolina, a group repre
senting Citizens’ Councils in the
southern part of the state obtained a
private school charter modeled on the
Prince Edward County, Va., plan.
# # *
The Census Bureau released in Washington last month a state-by-state
breakdown comparing Negro population in 1960 with that of 1950 The
figures follow, with minus signs indicating decreases:
State
1960
1950
Change
Alabama
980,271
979,617
654
Alaska
6,771
*
*
Arizona
43,403
25,974
17,429
Arkansas
388,787
426,639
—37,852
California
883,861
462,172
421,689
Colorado
39,992
20,177
19,815
Connecticut
107,449
53,472
53,977
Delaware
60,688
43,598
17,090
District of Columbia
411,737
280,803
130,934
Florida
880,186
603,101
277,085
Georgia
1,122,596
1,062,762
59,934
Hawaii
4,943
*
*
Idaho
1,502
1,050
452
Illinois
1,037,470
645,980
391,490
Indiana
269,275
174,168
95,107
Iowa
25,354
19,692
5,662
Kansas
91,445
73,158
18,287
Kentucky
215,949
201,921
14,028
Louisiana
1,039,207
882,428
156,799
Maine
3,318
1,221
2,097
Maryland
518,410
385,972
132,433
Massachusetts
111,842
73,171
38,671
Michigan
717,581
442,296
275,285
Minnesota
22,263
14,022
8,241
Mississippi
915,743
986,494
—70,751
Missouri
390,853
297,088
93,765
Montana
1,467
1,232
235
Nebraska
29,262
19,234
20,028
Nevada
13,484
4,302
9,182
New Hampshire
1,903
731
1,172
New Jersey
514,875
318,565
196,310
New Mexico
17,063
8,408
8,655
New York
1,417,511
918,191
499,320
North Carolina
1,116,021
1,047,353
68,668
North Dakota
777
257
520
Ohio
786,097
513,072
273,025
Oklahoma
153,084
145,503
7,581
Oregon
18,133
11,529
6,604
Pennsylvania
852,750
638,485
214,265
Rhode Island
18,332
13,903
4,429
South Carolina
829,291
822,077
7,214
South Dakota
1,114
727
387
Tennessee
586,876
530,603
56,273
Texas
1,187,125
977,458
209,667
Utah
4,148
2,729
1,419
Vermont
519
443
76
Virginia
816,258
734,211
82,047
Washington
48,738
30,691
18,047
West Virginia
89,378
114,867
—25,489
Wisconsin
74,546
28,182
46,364
Wyoming
2,183
2,557
— 374
Totals
18,871,381
15,042,286
3,829,095