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PAGE 10—NOVEMBER, 1962—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
ALABAAAA
Hearings Completed in Combined
Birmingham Desegregation Suits
(Continued From Page 1)
academic ability above the national
average while Negro students in the
same grades were below average.
Tests Not Identical
He said that tests given Negro and
white students, although furnished by
the same agency, were not identical.
When identical tests were given both
races, “A great many Negroes made
zero and we could arrive at no mental
age for them.” As a result, he said,
a simpler test for Negro children was
installed in 1960.
Dr. Theo R. Wright, superintendent
of city schools, said that mass school
desegregation in Birmingham would
bring “educational chaos.” Negro at
torneys objected, calling this a predic
tion and commenting that Dr. Wright
had had no opportunity to experiment
with desegregation.
Wright further testified that public
schools in Birmingham are segregated
by custom but that assignment of pu
pils is based on the Alabama Pupil
Placement Act which has been upheld
as constitutional on its face by the
U.S. Supreme Court.
In response to the question as to
whether a Negro who showed up at
a white school would be registered,
Wright answered, “No.” Asked why
not, he said, “As a matter of custom,
because he was not attending a white
school.”
Denies Racial Basis
Wright said that Birmingham oper
ates only one school system, but that
schools are designated Negro or white
depending on their location—“They
get the name from the area they’re in.”
However, he denied that assignments
were made on the basis of race. “Gen
erally,” he said, “Negroes go to the
4egro schools in their area and white
students do the same.”
Dr. Wesley Critz George, former
head of the University of North Caro
lina Anatomy Department, testified
that the state-financed study he made
(See Under Survey) showed that the
Negro race is 200,000 years behind
the white race in the evolution process.
Dr. George said that a high percent
age of Negroes have lower intelligence
than white students. George said fur
ther:
“Individuals are not bom equal in
the biological sense nor do they have
equal endowments. . . . The white man
has demonstrated his superiority to the
Negro in capacity to create and main-
, tain civilization of the types found in
the modem world. ..
A deposition by Dr. Henry W. Gar
rett, educational psychology professor
at the University of Virginia, was in
troduced containing the conclusions
from “general findings” that the aver
age Southern Negro is 10 to 15 points
below the Southern white child on
intelligence quotient exams. Even in
non-segregated sections of a Northern
state, he said referring to one study,
Negroes remain 10 to 15 points below
whites on IQ exams.
Negro attorney Orzell Billingsley Jr.
said during the hearings that segrega
tion leads to the scholastic retarda
tion of Negro children, creating a “psy
chological situation” that, as a result,
“retards the progress of the Negro stu
dent.”
Congressman George Huddleston Jr.
testified for the defense about school
conditions in Washington where, he
said, disciplinary problems had “sub
stantially increased” after desegrega
tion, Desegregation has prompted a
“substantial migration” of white fami
lies from the city, the Birmingham
congressman said.
★ ★ ★
U.S. District Judge H. Hobart Grooms
of Birmingham dismissed the City of
Gadsden as a defendant in an omnibus
desegregation suit, but withheld ruling
on motions to dismiss several Gadsden
city employes.
The suit, filed last May by three
Gadsden Negroes, sought immediate
desegregation of every public facility
in Gadsden, including schools and
swimming pools. The Negroes ask $13,-
000 in punitive damages, naming as de
fendants not only city officials, but also
heads of almost every department
under city supervision.
Under attack is segregation at the
city auditorium, city hall, library, rec
reation center, swimming pool, Gads
den High School, tennis courts and
the Gadsden branch of the Alabama
Employment Service.
Alabama Highlights
Hearings were completed in the
U.S. District Court in Birmingham
in October in a suit—actually two
combined suits—which many observ
ers believe could lead to the first
public school desegregation order in
Alabama.
A Negro applied by mail Oct. 24
for admission to the University of
Alabama and Negro leaders said
other applicants were expected. The
university is under a permanent in
junction to admit qualified Negro
students.
Two prospective high office holders,
who will assume their duties in Jan
uary, have taken strong stands
against mob violence in racial inci
dents. Attorney - General - nominate
Richmond Flowers and Lt. Gov.-
nominate James B. Allen said they
believed in segregation and states
rights, but both pledged support for
law and order.
A retired University of North Caro
lina professor, Dr. Wesley Critz
George, released a state-sponsored
study, which concluded that Negroes
are intellectually inferior to whites.
^ ' -V ' - '-i » .XvXv ^4 , WJ J
Judge Grooms said that there seemed
to be some confusion as to who
should be retained as defendants since
almost every person employed in some
official capacity with the city had been
brought under the suit. The city itself
could not be a defendant, Grooms said,
giving attorneys for both sides 30 days
to file briefs supporting their conten
tion that the remaining defendants
should be retained or dismissed.
What They Say
Two State Nominees
Decry Violence
Over Desegregation
Lt. Gov.-nominate James B. Allen
warned Oct. 17 that Alabama would
soon be faced with a school desegrega
tion crisis, “but what happened in Mis
sissippi must not happen in Alabama.”
Speaking of violence in Oxford, Allen
asked: “What has been accomplished?
The person (Meredith) is in school,
and it will take the university a decade
to recover from what happened. Two
people lost their lives because the law
In the Colleges
A Negro applied by mail Oct. 24 for
admission to the University of Ala
bama, still under a desegregation in
junction dating from the Autherine
Lucy case of 1956.
Dean of Admissions Hubert Mate
declined to identify the student “in
keeping with the university policy that
the name of an applicant is a matter
of confidence and not for public re
lease.”
On Oct. 19, Dr. Martin Luther King
Jr. announced in Montgomery, where
he was attending a meeting of Negro
leaders organizing a Southern Chris
tian Leadership chapter, that five Ne
gro students would apply for admission
and had applied for S.C.L.C. “aid and
support.”
Later it was announced that at least
two of the students had decided to
wait to apply for a later term.
King said the students would apply
“as a result of their own desire and
own choice—we did not pick them.”
He did not identify the prospects ex
cept to say that they are presently
enrolled in colleges. The Negro leader
said S.C.L.C. had assured the pros
pective students of support.
University officials said that while
was taken into the hands of an unruly
mob.”
Allen was critical of the use of
troops, which he described as unconsti
tutional:
“It would seem that they (the ad
ministration) are more interested in
the Negro bloc vote of the big cities
than in all the white people of the
South. We will maintain our way of
life, but by honorable and peaceful
means. Mob rule and mob violence is
not the way to handle any situation.”
Speaking in Selma, Allen added his
opposition to closing schools:
“We must maintain our public school
system. It would be a great tragedy
to close down our schools.” The crowd
at the annual meeting of the Dallas
County Farm Bureau Association re
sponded with polite applause to Allen’s
remarks.
Flowers Statement
Attorney General - nominate Rich
mond Flowers said Oct. 2 that no racial
violence will be tolerated in Alabama
during his term, which like Allen’s,
begins in January.
“I hereby serve notice on race agi
tators, both white and Negro, and on
all demonstrators and on all curiosity-
ALLEN FLOWERS
seeking mob-makers, that no violence
will be tolerated as long as I am the
chief law enforcement officer of . . .
Alabama.”
In a prepared statement, Flowers
said that in Mississippi someone “failed
to keep order” and that both sides
blame the other” with neither side ac
cepting “the grave responsibility.” He
said that during his term he would
accept responsibility for law and order”
to the limit of the full powers of the
office of attorney general,” adding:
“Law and order and the rights so
secured under the constitution of . . .
Alabama and the constitution of the
United States . . . will not be turned
over to the passions of mob hysteria so
long as I am attorney general of Ala
bama. I am for states rights; by my
oaths of office I will swear to defend
the rights of the people of . . . Ala
bama.
“This will be not only a matter of
(See ALABAMA, Page 11)
the applications would be processed
“in due time,” no students could be
registered before the next semester
starts in February.
Assurances Received
University of Alabama President
Frank Rose said Oct. 30 he has been
assured by Gov. Patterson and Gov.-
nominate Wallace that the state will
use “every force at its command” to
prevent mob violence and bloodshed at
the university.
Similar assurances have come, Dr.
Rose said, “from every comer of the
state, from every walk of life.”
In an academic progress report to
faculty members, Dr. Rose touched on
the possibility of the admission of one
or more Negroes in February.
“Times are too serious,” Dr. Rose
said, “and education too expensive” for
the university to “dissipate her re
sources on lesser goals than academic
and intellectual accomplishments.”
Each semester since 1953, Dr. Rose
said, several Negroes and hundreds of
other students had begun applications
for admission to the university, but no
application from a Negro had been
completed since 1956 (when Miss Lucy
was admitted). In the last several years,
he added, more than 3,000 students have
been turned away under higher admis
sion standards.
The Rev. Ralph Abernathy, S.CL.C.
Negro Student Applies by Mail
To Enter University of Alabama
Maryland
(Continued From Page 7)
the contractor for $30,000 damages and
asked the court to order that suitable
property be made available to him.
Chief District Judge Roszel C. Thomsen
signed an order prohibiting the sale of
one property until the case could be
heard on Nov. 15.
Meet With Candidates
In Charles County, which also has a
suburban overflow from Washington,
the county chapter of the NAACP met
with Republican candidates for polit
ical offices in the Nov. 6 election and
aired racial concerns. Among the Ne
gro grievances was the fact that lack of
housing in the county available to Ne
groes forced 80 per cent of the Negro
teachers in the county to seek living
quarters in Washington.
Yet in Baltimore County, which is
heavily white suburban, housing for
Negro teachers apparently is not an
issue. Leonard J. DeLayo, executive
secretary of the Teachers Association
of Baltimore County, told Southern
School News in October that the ques
tion of available housing for Negro
teachers had not arisen in the three
years he has been in office.
A Negro teacher explained that in
his opinion 95 per cent of Baltimore
County’s Negro teachers prefer to live
in Baltimore city. He said he had never
heard of a Negro teacher complain
ing that he could not obtain county
housing and also did not know of any
Negro teacher who had tried to get a
house in the area of Towson, the
county seat.
Schoolmen
Anne Arundel Board
on a statewide basis by the Maryland
Commission on Interracial Problems
and Relations (a state agency) and
the Maryland NAACP.
The issue first attained prominence
during the summer (SSN, July) when
delegates from several counties charged
discriminatory teacher hiring at a
statewide interracial conference called
by the state agency.
Baltimore Cited
The Maryland Advisory Committee
to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights
was told at its October meeting that
there is discrimination against Negro
teachers in Baltimore despite extensive
school desegregation. The speaker was
David L. Glenn, executive secretary of
Baltimore’s Equal Opportunity Com
mission, an FEPC-type municipal
agency.
Speaking of the desegregation of
teaching staffs in Baltimore, Glenn,
according to an Associated Press dis
patch from Annapolis, said, “Over all
it looks good. But 90 per cent of the
Negro teachers coming out of the col
leges are put in Negro schools and 98
per cent of whites go to white schools.”
Glenn, who is married to a Balti
more school teacher, was reported in
the advisory committee minutes as
having said, “Negro teachers also have
a problem in obtaining employment in
white schools. In schools located in
changing neighborhoods, white teachers
are allowed to transfer out to wholly
white schools elsewhere and in almost
every case a Negro teacher is sent
in as a replacement. By this practice
the schools are party to a system of
re-establishing segregation among the
teachers. Negro teachers do not have
the same freedom to transfer into a
white school.”
Asked To Probe
Teacher Hiring
The Anne Arundel Board of Educa
tion was asked in October to investi
gate racial policies in teacher hiring.
The request was formally presented
by the Anne Arundel County Federa
tion of PTA’s, a Negro organization,
which seeks to learn to what extent
uncertified white teachers are hired in
the county when qualified Negro teach
ers are available.
Replying that “all teacher applica
tions are processed in a like manner
without regard to race,” the school
board chairman, Richard D. Weigle,
said that the board “plans to study this
during December.”
Elmer Thompson, president of the
PTA federation, was reported by the
Baltimore Sun to have said that “quali
fied Negro teachers are not being em
ployed” in Anne Arundel. He cited as
examples two graduates of Bowie State
Teachers College who unsuccessfully
applied to teach in Anne Arundel be
fore being hired by Prince George’s
County.
College Degrees
The issue of whether unqualified
white teachers are hired ahead of cer
tified Negro teachers was given impetus
by a recent report that about two-
thirds of the county’s elementary
teachers and half of the secondary
teachers lacked college degrees. Anne
Arundel employs some Negro teachers
in predominantly white schools as well
as in all-Negro schools.
The same issue also is under study
treasurer, conceded that “it is very
possible the university would have a
legitimate excuse for turning down the
applicants because of overcrowding. A
number of students were turned down
this fall for that reason. . . . However,
this would set the stage for a show
down next September. ... I just don’t
believe they (the Negroes) would have
time to get their ducks in line for the
main show in February.”
In his Oct. 19 statement in Mont
gomery, Dr. King said the Negro lead
ers were very enthusiastic and “pledged
themselves to begin immediately a
strong statewide action program to
break down the barriers of segregation
in Alabama.”
The permanent injunction, which
still binds the university, dates from
the 1956 appearance on the university
campus of Autherine Lucy. Her admis
sion was ordered by U.S. District Judge
H. Hobart Grooms of Birmingham. But
Grooms upheld the Board of Trustees
action expelling her, after only three
days of classes, for her charge that
university officials had conspired in the
mob action which drove her from the
campus. (SSN, March, 1956.)
White Attitudes
The unwillingness of white teachers
to accept assignment to predominantly
or all-Negro schools has had some
previous discussion, notably by Dr.
Houston R. Jackson, an assistant su
perintendent of Baltimore schools, in a
Southern School News interview
(SSN, August, 1961).
An article in The Sun this past Au
gust reported Dr. George B. Brain,
Baltimore school superintendent, as
saying that three white teachers had
agreed to join the staff of a white
principal in a predominantly Negro
school.
★ ★ ★
The Maryland civil-rights commit
tee was given an injection of new
members earlier this year and is now
holding investigatory meetings.
★ ★ ★
School Closing to Move
About 60 Negro Pupils
The closing of a small, antiquated
Negro school in Annapolis will move
about 60 Negro children to a predomi-
nantly white elementary school around
the first of the year, Dr. David S.
Jenkins, superintendent of Anne Arun
del County schools, said in October.
Lying south of Baltimore, the count!
already has more than 1,400 Negroes
in formerly all-white schools under 8
stairstep plan that began in 1956.
The school to be abandoned is the
one-story, frame Eastport Elemental
School, which has had more than ^
pupils in three rooms, with two classes
and a single teacher in each room.
Conditions in the school have bee®
criticized over the past several yep 11
by county grand juries and fire J®*
spectors and, more recently, by P®*”
ents of affected children. A
spokesman for school parents appeal"
before the Anne Arundel Board of
ucation last April and again in M 8 ?
and at one time was reported to
considering a boycott, although tn®
was later denied.
School Addition
This September, Dr. Jenkins
about 30 children in one of the thr*^
classrooms were moved to a nea •
predominantly white school. “That
all we had room for at the time,
Jenkins explained, adding:
“By Christmas we hope to have c°^
struction completed on a four-ro°
addition to the other school, so tha
the first of the year we can move
remaining children and then aban
the Negro school.” , ^
Some white parents were report®
have sought to transfer their chil
out of the school after the first
class was moved in, but the trans*
were denied. .
Anne Arundel has a gradual
decidedly firm policy on desegrega
that has maintained a steady tr
tional pace with minor incidents.
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