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VOL. 7, NO. 11
20 Areas Plan
Desegregation
Moves In Fall
i bout 20 Southern communi-
\ ties are preparing for initial or
expanded desegregation next fall.
Developments in Virginia during
April indicated that the state next fall
may have nearly double the 200 Ne
groes now attending biracial schools.
Much of the increase is expected in
Northern Virginia, where Arlington and
Fairfax counties and the city of Falls
Church voted to handle their own pupil
assignments, replacing the State Pupil
placement Board.
Falls Church paved the way for its
first desegregation by approving three
N’egro requests for assignment to pre
viously all-white schools. Fairfax ap
proved 76 applications and Arlington
104. Pulaski County this fall will admit
six Negroes to a formerly all-white
high school.
Meetings With Students
In preparation for the first public
school desegregation in Georgia, At
lanta School Supt. John Letson ap
peared before separate meetings of
white and Negro students to explain
the plans for next September. The city
las agreed to comply with a federal
court order to desegregate the 12th and
Uth grades as a start on a descending
grade-a-year plan.
HOPE, Inc., a statewide organization
farmed to support open schools, an
nounced it would continue operation
to support peaceful desegregation. At
lanta Mayor William B. Hartsfield
warned that city police would not
tolerate any violence when the Ne
groes enter the schools with whites.
In Texas, a court order for desegrega
tion in Dallas this September became
final when the district school board
waived its right of appeal to the U. S.
Supreme Court. Negroes will be admit-
(See 20 AREAS PLAN, Page 11)
On The Inside
-•ate Reports
Alabama 3
Arkansas 10
Delaware 10
District of Columbia 13
Florida g
kwsia
Kentucky 3
Maryland 7
Mississippi .....15
Missouri
North Carolina 9
Oklahoma 12
;?“uth Carolina 16
Fexas 4
West Virginia 11
Texts
Charlottesville, Va 5
Atlanta School Board 14
?^' a l Articles
rjite Child in Negro School 2
fTince Edward History 6
“harlotte Colleges 9
-^® < i Springs, Okla 12
NOISI A IQ SNOI1ISI no DV
S 3 II 1
VIOtiOJO JO AifSb3AlNn
2 eoo2-a-!9 3*nr
tXMK
MAY, 1961
tGINIA
St. Helena Parish Votes on Schools
Voters line up at booth in Ward Five, Hilsdale.
LOUISIANA
St. Helena V o tes To Close
Schools; Court Case Set
NEW ORLEANS, La.
S t. Helena Parish residents
voted 1,147 to 56 in favor of
closing their public schools to pre
vent desegregation. Even before
the election was conducted it was
under attack in federal court.
With only 1,572 persons—1,461 whites
and 111 Negroes—eligible to vote, St.
Helena conducted the election under
Act 2 of the second special session of
the Louisiana legislature. The act
authorized school boards to conduct
elections to determine whether voters
would rather close schools than comply
with desegregation. The outcome of the
voting is not binding on the school
officials.
A three-judge court sitting at New
Orleans on April 16 permitted the
parish to conduct the election April
22, providing that the school board
took no action on the issue, pending a
ruling on the suit contesting constitu
tionality of the election.
The school board, headed by Carl
Stone, agreed to the court’s stipulation.
Both sides have until May 5 to file
briefs with the court composed of U. S.
Fifth Circuit Court Judge John Minor
Wisdom and U. S. District Judges
Herbert W. Christenberry and J. Skelly
Wright.
St. Helena’s school board is under
Judge Wright’s order to desegregate
“with all deliberate speed” but has
been given no date for compliance.
The voting was conducted as the first
step in an attempt to convert St.
Helena’s schools—which now house
1,821 Negroes and 1,021 whites in
separate facilities—to private institu-
Tennessee
tions, which would be segregated and
supported by the state’s grant-in-aid
program, not yet operative.
St. Helena has 9,000 residents, and
56 per cent of them are Negroes. Be
fore a new registration of voters be
gan Jan. 1, the parish had 2,478 white
voters and 1,243 Negroes.
Voting was quiet. Reportedly only
four of the 111 Negroes registered
went to the polls.
Of the outcome, Supt. J. L. Meadows
said:
“1 think if the court forces integra
tion there will be a complete boycott,
such as that at McDonogh No. 19 in
New Orleans, and there would be de
struction of public education for the
white people.”
But whether the courts will permit
St. Helena to become the pilot parish
for a full test of the state’s grant-in-aid
program and sale of public schools to
private interests is still to be de
termined.
In arguments before the three-judge
court April 16, attorney Thurgood Mar
shall said Negroes were not as con
cerned about the election itself as the
fact that the school board would follow
the voter mandate and close public
schools. Marshall, representing the Na
tional Association for the Advancement
of Colored People, said:
“• • • If the schools are closed, it
would cause irreparable injury to
plaintiffs.”
The importance of the decision in
the St. Helena case was underlined by
Judge Wisdom who, at the end of the
hearing, announced the delay in the
(See COURT SAYS, Page 8)
Placement Upheld In Memphis
q NASHVILLE, Tenn.
(J ■ s. District Judge Marion S.
p] “°yd on April 14 rejected a
oj^Tor immediate desegregation
•hat ern T ) hi s city schools, declaring
sj TTie 1957 Tennessee Pupil As-
Shhient Law already provides
Wh ^ aw alr
v Dlra cial classes.
55 itf° attorneys said they would file
C Cj? lediate a P peal to the U - S - Sixth
b„ Court of Appeals, Cincinnati.
’j j. - -
S - Justi
Groh, attorney for the
itvjjj -“Eke Department’s Civil Rights
Mil g° n > said the federal government
e a motion with the appeals court
^t the Negroes’ appeal be ex-
Hoj.jj ’ Ckoh was present when Judge
Itj ^todered his decision,
caul -minute opinion read before a
° 0rri audience of about 100 per-
m °st of them Negroes, Judge
fciPraised the Memphis Board of
0°n
which he said “openly an-
many months ago its desire to
e Memphis schools through
jj? ce with the Pupil Placement
he hoard’s position, Judge Boyd
■§rate
continued, is “crystal clear.”
The suit (Northcross et al v. Board of
Education of the City of Memphis et al,
Southern School News, May, 1960)
was filed March 31, 1960, in behalf of
18 Negro students and sought immedi
ate desegregation on all levels of the
school system.
Judge Boyd last Dec. 7 rejected a
request by Negro attorneys for a pre
liminary injunction against continued
segregation of the
schools and urged
“careful consider
ation” of the 1957
law which pro
vides for the as
signment of chil
dren to schools on
the basis of where
they live.
In his ruling,
the judge said:
“The Memphis
BOYD Board, the court
feels, has fully realized it is under a
clear duty to . . . bring about an elimi
nation of racial segregation . . . (it) has
already done that as a matter of fact
when ... (it) set up operations un
der the Tennessee Pupil Placement
Plan.”
The 1957 act establishes 22 factors for
ass gning pupils to schools. Race is not
one of the factors.
Among the factors specified in the
law are available space and teaching
capacity, geographical location of resi
dence, transportation facilities, suit
ability of established curricula, the
effect on the “welfare and best inter
ests of students, scholastic aptitude,
psychological qualifications, sex, morals,
conduct, health and personal standards
of the pupil. Also included are the
poss-b lity of “threat of friction or d s-
order” among pupils or others and the
poss.b.lity of “breaches of the peace or
ill will or economic retaliation within
the community.”
The law, passed at the request of
former Gov. Frank G. Clement, estab-
Tshed the factors for local boards of
education to consider in assigning stu
dents.
(See COURT REJECTS, Page 2)
U.S. Asks Legal Ban
On State School Aid
RICHMOND, Va.
T he united states government on April 26 asked federal district
court at Richmond to bar state support of any public schools in
Virginia until Prince Edward County schools are reopened on a racial
ly desegregated basis.
Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy filed a motion asking U. S.
District Judge Oren R. Lewis to grant the Justice Department per
mission to intervene in the Prince Edward case as a co-plaintiff. This
is the first attempt by the government to take the role of a complain
ing party in a desegregation suit. It previously has acted as a “friend
of the court” in Arkansas and Louisiana cases.
In its motion the Justice Department
asks for injunctions to:
• Stop payment of all state school
funds until the Prince Edward County
schools are reopened.
• Halt county and state tuition grants
to students attending private schools
in Prince Edward.
• Prevent tax credits for contribu
tions to the Prince Edward School
Foundation, which operates the private
schools.
• Force Prince Edward County to
reopen its public classrooms on a de
segregated basis.
The motion declared that the federal
government’s intervention “is neces
sary in order to prevent the circum
vention and nullification of the prior
orders of this court and to safeguard
the due administration of justice and
the integrity of the judicial processes
of the United States.”
The government took the stand that:
“The closing of public schools to avoid
compliance with a desegregation de
cree while schools elsewhere in the
state remain open is an unlawful ob
struction to the carrying out of such
decree, and the diversion of state funds
from the closed schools to privately
operated segregated schools is an un
lawful circumvention of such decree.”
Justice Department officials had ex
hausted behind-the-scenes negotiations
in Prince Edward before filing the mo
tion, a press release indicated.
Attorney General Kennedy was quot
ed in the release as saying, “We have
tried to work this out to permit Negro
children to go to school. They are un
able to. Court orders are being cir
cumvented and nullified. Therefore, we
have brought this action to protect the
judicial process of the United States.”
Arguments on the government’s mo
tion may be part of proceedings before
the federal court at Richmond May 8,
when Negro plaintiffs are scheduled to
challenge the use of public funds to
support the private schools in the
county.
Governor J. Lindsay Almond, who as
attorney general argued the state’s los
ing battle for segregation, declined to
comment.
W. Lester Banks of Richmond, secre-
(See NUMBER, Page 5)
Chronology Of Major
Desegregation Events
On May 17, seven years will have passed since the United States
Supreme Court decision of 1954 in the public school segregation cases.
Southern School News has prepared a chronology of major develop
ments leading to the decision and arising from it.
Included are the most significant legal developments, the first de
segregation in each state in tax-supported colleges and in the public
schools, and some of the other more important events that accompanied
this major social change.
1936
Donald Murray, a Negro, enrolled at the University of Maryland Law
School under a court order. The Maryland Court of Appeals held that the
state must afford equal educational opportunities in its own institutions.
1938
The University of West Virginia graduate and professional schools ad
mitted Negroes.
In Gaines v. Canada, the U. S. Supreme Court decreed that the state was
bound to furnish equal facilities within its borders. It ordered Leroy Gaines
admitted to the University of Missouri Law School since no Negro law
school existed. Gaines never enrolled.
1948
The U. S. Supreme Court ordered Mrs. Ada Lois Sipuel admitted to the
University of Oklahoma Law School, which accepted her in 1949. The court
said one race must receive equal facilities as soon as another race. The
university admitted its first Negro, G. W. McLaurin, in 1948 under court
order.
The University of Delaware announced it would admit Negroes to any
courses not offered at De'aware State College for Negroes. (The university
desegregated under court order in 1959.)
The University of Arkansas voluntarily admitted Negroes to its pro
fessional schools.
1949
The University of Kentucky opened its graduate schools to Negroes
under court order.
1959
The U. S. Supreme Court, in Sweatt v. Painter, ordered Heman Sweatt
admitted to the University of Texas Law School after ruling the law school
at Texas State University for Negroes was inferior in such intangible
criteria as standing in the community, tradition and prestige.
In McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, the Supreme Court held that
G. W. McLaurin, a Negro admitted to the University of Oklahoma Graduate
School in 1948, was handicapped in being taught in segregated conditions.
The court ordered that he receive the same treatment as other races.
A U. S. District Court order opened Louisiana State University Law
School to a Negro, Roy S. Wilson.
The University of Virginia Law School admitted its first Negro under
court order.
A state court opened the University of Missouri to Negroes.
1952
The University of Tennessee, under court order, admitted Negroes to its
graduate, professional and special schools.
1953
Friona in West Texas desegregated voluntarily.
Arden and Claymont districts in Delaware desegregated voluntarily.
(See CHRONOLOGY, Page 16)