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f 3 Factual Southern School News Objective VOL. 9, NO. 3 NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE* SEPTEMBER, 1962 >n Ji uest a 1 aroii “is t thet by t : Nej s be g eve 46 Districts OpenfJjKi^h New Policies Most Schools Start Quietly FLORIDA IS CO irogre orhoe Carlin i beg and 1 1-Neg lenta is ra its 4 Neg beg may egistr >e tra aorho tly a iferri ture as se integ? ufficii race ve be camp years ;s boa: ate tl ; to i ils wl he pr :hildr Corn ola, v ;ar. T will be f >ol a Df the oyed gned inch f iditioi -y. Ot assij ;arya Scho ious i od E ok, A 31em* digh. 11 ini are t coin uguF Judge Simpson Orders Teacher Desegregation MIAMI F ederal District Judge Bryan Simpson last month ordered two Florida counties to cease making racial distinctions in teaching, supervisory and admin istrative personnel of their school systems. In one of the most sweeping decisions yet handed down in Florida school de segregation cases, the court ordered three of the state’s largest counties to end their dual school systems and to stop using criteria of the state assign ment law to determine which schools the children attend. Judge Simpson ruled simultaneously in long-pending cases from Duval (Jacksonville), Volusia (Daytona Beach) and Hillsborough (Tampa) counties. His injunction forbidding ra cial considerations as to school person nel applied to Duval and Volusia but not at Hillsborough, where the issue had not been raised. The Duval and Volusia boards were enjoined from “approving policies, cur ricula or programs designed to perpet uate, maintain or support a school sys tem operated on a racially segregated basis.” Neither may the boards approve budgets or enter into contracts in con nection with racially segregated schools. Without Precedent The Florida attorney general’s office, which is studying the decisions, said they are without precedent in this state and probably go beyond any lower court decision yet. One of the three defendant counties, Duval, has already announced an ap peal would be carried to the U.S. Su preme Court, if necessary. Other desegregation suits in the South also have included petitions for ending discriminatory practice in re gard to school personnel, budgets, cur ricula and administrative procedure. But the Duval and Volusia County cases were the first in which a judge ruled for the plaintiffs. In other de- the Petitions have been denied, field in abeyance, or returned for hear ing on the merits. The evidence shows,” Judge Simp- sa *d in the almost identical orders, that the Florida Pupil Assignment Law a s been used to perpetuate segregation an not to accomplish good faith de segregation. The Florida Pupil Assignment Law her S ” n0 * i >rov ‘ < ^ e an adequate remedy Judge Simpson gave the three county school boards until Oct. 30 to submit e ailed plans to carry out his order. (See THREE. Page 8) in 1 each' par icatitf ut th> md b chinl lly c teach' lea £ md* -ofes* social J.S. ® d et* 1 sysH n aH ( jsolih 1 y scb ickly # * In This Issue Slate Reports Alabama Arkansas Delaware District of Columbia Florida Georgia Kentucky Louisiana Maryland Mississippi Missouri N °rth Carolina Gklahoma South Carolina lennessee Texas V ‘rginia .. West Virginia . S Peeial Articles The Region °utside the South . .15 .16 .14 . 9 . 1 . 5 .19 . 1 .13 . 2 .14 .17 .12 . 9 .10 . 4 . 3 . 7 Nun Leads Class Into School Adults gathered at St. Francis de Sales and other Catholic schools which were desegregated in New Orleans. Nine Negro children entered this one. LOUISIANA Orleans Desegregation Extended to 46 Schools . i .18 NEW ORLEANS N ew Orleans public and Cath olic schools admitted 258 Negroes to 46 previously all-white schools Sept. 4, 5 and 6. There were no major incidents. The public schools, in their third year of expanding desegregation, accepted 104 Negroes—most of them first-graders entering 16 schools affected for the first time by federal court desegregation orders. Four other schools previously were desegregated. Catholic schools desegregated at the elementary and high school level under the March directive of Archbishop Jo seph Francis Rummel. The schools re ceived 136 Negroes into 22 elementary schools and 18 of them into four high schools. Outside of New Orleans, there was no other public school desegregation in Louisiana. However, Catholic schools throughout the 11 parishes of the Archdiocese of New Orleans were affected by the arch bishop’s directive and nine previously all-white elementaries outside the city enrolled a total of 37 Negroes. Fluctuations Expected All figures for public and Catholic schools were from official or semi-of ficial sources who emphasized that the total would fluctuate some after late en rollments and adjustments within each school. There was some white boycotting of both the public and Catholic schools. Private schools said their registrations were on the rise. The Orleans public schools—expecting some 95,000 students this year—made a compilation of enrollments within three hours of the beginning of the first day of classes Sept. 6. It showed enrollment down in 17 of the desegregated schools and up in three. These were the figures giving a pic ture of public schools in the city: Schools Oct. 19, ’61 Sept. 6, ’62 Enrollment Enrollment White Negro White Negro Allen 377 0 305 4 Audubon 143 0 103 7 Bradley 609 0 395 2 Davis 726 0 477 3 Frantz 59 1 144 3 Jackson 689 0 433 9 Lafayette 570 0 361 8 Laurel-McDonough No. 1 765 0 613 1 Lee 377 0 235 3 Lusher 256 2 256 7 McDonough No. 10...235 0 131 10 McDonough No. 11...298 1 266 4 McDonough No. 16...216 0 164 2 McDonough No. 39... 953 0 781 1 McDonough No. 45... 467 0 470 4 Palmer 655 0 358 7 Semmes 342 0 88 8 Shaw 577 0 256 10 Washington 741 0 480 1 Wilson 394 1 366 10 The Catholic school figures were sup plied by an unofficial but reliable source after the second day of desegregation. These are the schools and the number of Negroes in attendance throughout the Archdiocese of New Orleans: Orleans Parish Little Flower 8 St. Frances de Sales 9 St. Gabriel 5 Mater Dolorosa 4 Our Lady of the Sacred Heart 30 St. Ann G St. Augustine 13 St. Frances Cabrini 8 St. Louis Cathedral 2 St. Michael 2 St. Rose de Lima 1 St. Stephen 3 Our Lady of Lourdes 5 St. Joseph 1 St. Leo the Great 22 Holy Name of Mary 2 St. Raphael 1 Incarnate Word 6 St. Joseph’s (Algiers) 1 St. Mary of the Angels 4 St. Rita 2 St. Vincent de Paul 1 Jesuit High 8 St. Joseph’s Academy (High) 6 St. Mary’s Dominican (High) 1 Ursuline Academy (High) 3 Jefferson Parish St. Anthony 20 St. Joseph the Worker 3 Our Lady of Perpetual Help 6 St. Rosalie 1 St. Matthew the Apostle 1 Our Lady of Prompt Succor 2 St. Tammany Parish St. Scholastica, Covington 2 St. Charles Parish Sacred Heart, Norco 1 St. Mary Parish Sacred Heart, Morgan City 1 The public schools admitted the Ne groes under a transitional school de- (See NEW ORLEANS, Page 6) But Louisiana Has Violence orty-six public school districts in the Southern and border region opened the 1962-63 school year with new desegregation policies. Although the school openings in the region generally were quiet, violence returned to the school desegregation scene in Louisiana. Threats of violence, bomb hoaxes, gun shots and jeering crowds ac companied the court-ordered expansion of desegregation in New Or leans public schools and the voluntary opening of the first biracial schools by the Orleans Catholic Archdiocese. Negroes are eligible to attend the schools with whites in 960 public school districts in the region. The 17 Southern and border states, plus the District of Columbia, have a total 6,368 school districts, and 3,047 of these have both Negro and white students, whether segregated or desegregated. Three states—Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina—continue to have complete segregation at all grade levels in the ninth school year after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1954 that compulsory school segregation was unconstitutional. Only four of the 46 districts desegregating for the first time acted by court order. The other 42 districts voluntarily admitted Negroes with whites, although in some cases legal action was threatened or under way. At the beginning of the 1961-62 school year, 29 districts desegre gated, eight by court order and 21 voluntarily. Districts Under Court Order Still Segregated Three school districts under court orders to desegregate this fall re opened their schools on a segregated basis. Duval County (Jacksonville), Fla., was ordered by a U.S. district judge to submit a complete desegregation plan by Oct. 30, but in the meantime to end discriminatory assignment and transfer policies. The school board announced it would appeal the decision. Fort Worth, Texas, also had been ordered to desegregate at the open ing of school this September, but school officials are awaiting a ruling on their appeal to the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. In Prince Edward County, Va., one of the five defendants in the original school segregation cases before the Supreme Court, public schools apparently will be closed another year. The county closed its schools in 1959 rather than comply with a desegregation order, but a federal judge has ruled that other schools in the state cannot remain open while Prince Edward’s are closed. Negro Admission Efforts Fail Efforts by Negroes to gain admission voluntarily to white schools failed in Gadsden and Huntsville, Ala.; Albany and DeKalb County, Ga.; Baton Rouge, La.; Carrollton, Georgetown, Hampshire and Waco, Tex.,, and Powhatan, Va. These attempts were considered in most cases as preparatory steps for legal action. Three colleges have decided to admit their first Negro students this fall. Johns Hopkins Medical School in Maryland has accepted a Negro from Kenya. Manatee Junior College, a county school at Bradenton, Fla., ad mitted three Negro men students. The board of directors for Arlington State College in Texas has adopted a policy that permits Negroes to enter the school. Texas has 12 new desegregated school districts, all of them voluntary. Nine Virginia disticts desegregated for the first time, one acting on court orders and the others resulting from assign ments by the State Pupil Placement Board. The number of new desegregated districts in other states were: Tennes see, eight; Florida, Kentucky and North Carolina, five each; and Arkansas, two. Major Opposition Major opposition to school desegrega tion this month centered in South Louisiana, although minor incidents oc curred in other spots in the South. In New Orleans, crowds gathered outside desegregated public and Catholic paro chial schools to jeer Negro students and cheer white parents withdrawing their children. Shots were fired through a Perez Makes a Point Plaquemines Parish political leader Leander Perez Sr., his fist doubled, is applauded as he addresses pickets near desegregated Catholic school at Buras. door at a Catholic school and the win dow of a Negro parent’s car was smash ed at a church school. Several bomb threats caused the removal of parochial and public school students while searches were made. South of New Orleans, at Buras, a boycott by white and threats of violence caused five Negroes to withdraw from a parochial school, and the school later closed. The U.S. Department of Justice began an investigation of the threats. Other Incidents Other incidents connected with school desegregation in the South included false bomb threats at Pensacola, Fla., and Chattanooga, Tenn., and the arrest of three boys for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest at an Atlanta, Ga., school. Southern schools had opened for the past two years without violence over desegregation, although the 1961-62 school year was the first to be peaceful throughout the entire term. Schools operated quietly for the first two months of the 1960-61 year, and then violence broke out in New Orleans when the first desegregation occurred there. Prior to the disturbances in South Louisiana this year, the last violent protests against school desegregation in the re gion occurred at the University of Georgia in January, 1961, when two Negroes entered the school under court order. State -bv- State j Here is a state-by-state summary of school desegregation in the region, with asterisks (*) marking new desegregated districts: Alabama All public schools opened still segre gated. Two public school desegregation cases are pending, but the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to (See STATE-BY-STATE, Page 20)