About Southern school news. (Nashville, Tenn.) 1954-1965 | View Entire Issue (July 1, 1963)
PAGE 10—JULY. 1963—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS KENTUCKY Governor Bans Bias By Licensees of State LOUISVILLE ov. Bert T. Combs on June 26 issued a precedent-shattering executive order forbidding racial discrimination by state-licensed firms and professions, and said the order might be used to withhold accreditation and funds from school districts practicing racial segregation. The o-der was called the first of its kind in the Southern or border states and the first in the nation not backed up by antibias legislation. It took effect immediately, but Combs gave the departments of state government with licensing powers up to 60 days to prepare reports telling how each proposes to put the order into action. If upheld by the courts and effec tively enforced, the order presumably would compel restaurants, taverns, mo tels, barber and beauty shops, funeral homes, nursing homes, merchandising firms and others holding state licenses to adopt an open-door service policy without regard to race or face the re vocation or suspension of their licenses. School Districts As for school districts, the governor said, “If they failed to integrate, they’d be in danger of losing state as well as federal funds.” Combs made it clear that the legal implications of his order were not fully known. But he said he thought that, in the official antidiscrimination climate created by the order, the State Department of Education could hardly afford not to apply whatever pressure is needed to end school segregation. The State Department of Education, which has responsibility for issuing teaching certificates and accrediting schools, has considered taking punitive action against segregated school dis tricts, but the department and the State Board of Education have adhered, up to now, to a policy of persuading holdout districts to desegregate. The department’s latest count indicates that only five districts still lack any degree of desegregation or any plan or policy for future of desegregation. (See Schoolmen.) Combs based his order on the pre mise that discrimination in places of public accommodation is “unfair, un just and inconsistent with” the Con stitution of Kentucky and the Consti tution of the United States, and that holders of state permits and licenses are under as much compulsion to com ply with federal law as they are to ob serve state law. Legislature in Session His order was issued at Frankfort at a time when the General Assembly was in special session to consider hos pital problems in East Kentucky. The order was generally praised by civil rights leaders who had been urg ing that the special legislative session be broadened to consider a statewide antibias law. The desegregation leaders, however, reaffirmed their desire to have an antibias bill submitted to a future General Assembly. They said the order was not a substitute. Kentucky Highlights School districts practicing racial segregation may be subject to the loss of state financial aid under a precedent-breaking antidiscrimina tion executive order issued by Gov. Bert T. Combs. Student-transfer provisions in three separate desegregation plans were struck down in federal court and the districts involved were ordered to sub mit new plans providing also for faculty hiring without regard to race. The State Department of Education reported that the number of school districts which have not complied with a request to adopt desegregation plans has been reduced to five. Five other districts adopted plans during June, it was reported, and the state’s biggest-enrollment district, Jefferson County, moved to increase pupil de segregation and to initiate faculty de segregation. The number of Negro teachers working on biracial faculties should increase substantially next term, said the director of the State Commission on Human Rights. Some Republican leaders in the Gen eral Assembly called for an immediate vote on an antidiscrimination bill so such a law could be passed. They charged that Combs’ order was a po litical move to persuade voters to sup port the Democratic ticket in Novem ber, that the order is of doubtful legality, and that it will be in effect only until Combs, a Democrat, leaves office Dec. 10. The Democratic candidate for gover nor, Edward T. (Ned) Breathitt, said he would keep the order in effect if he is elected. The Republican candi date, Louie B. Nunn, said he approved the order’s objectives but felt the question should have been presented to the legislature since it was in ses sion. Legal Action Court Tells Boards To Strike Transfer Option from Plans Three school districts were ordered in federal court to discard optional transfer provisions in their desegrega tion proposals and to submit new plans within 30 days, all to be effective at the start of the fall term. U. S. District Judge H. Church Ford based his rulings on the Supreme Court decision of June 3 which held that transfer op tions in Knoxville and Davidson County, Tenn., violated the equal - protection clause of the 14th Amendment. The three Ken tucky cases, stemming from separate lawsuits, involved the boards of educa tion of Jessamine County, where ini tial desegregation was sought, and of Frankfort and Richmond, where ex tended desegregation was the goal. Attendance Zones Judge Ford adhered to the view that each school board should establish “ra tional and reasonable” attendance zones for each school and that stu dents should attend the school in their zone regardless of race. He said, as did the Supreme Court, that transfer options based on race would tend to perpetuate pupil segre gation. He also has ordered faculty Schoolmen The State Board of Education re ceived on June 26 a report that only five Kentucky public-school districts lack plans for desegregation. The re port said five districts had announced plans for desegregation since a June 10 report. Listed as not having immediate plans for desegregation were the county dis tricts of Fulton, Graves, Muhlenberg, Hickman and Todd. Listed as planning desegregation this fall were the county districts of War ren, Casey and Metcalfe. Listed as changing to “a voluntary plan pending complete integration in 1964 when school buildings now under construction are ready for occupancy” were Montgomery County and the Mount Sterling city system. The desegregation progress report was made by Sam B. Taylor, assistant director of instructional services, who has been working with school district officials to encourage desegregation. Taylor also reported on the number of all-Negro high schools. He said there were 60 in the state in 1954-5. Up to this year, 23 had been discontinued “as of today,” he said. Of the remaining 21, he said, several are classified as desegregated but have all-Negro stu dent bodies because they draw from an attendance district in which no white students live. Gov. Bert Combs An executive order. desegregation in the three Kentucky cases, summaries of which follow: FRANKFORT—A second elemen tary-school desegregation plan was re jected by Judge Ford at Lexington on June 17 and the Frankfort Board of Education, given 30 days to draft a third plan, came up with it on June 24. The judge disapproved the bulk of the second plan including a provision that students could choose between previously all-white and all-Negro schools, and a provision that students could transfer from schools in which they were in a racial minority. ‘Free Choice’ Ben Fowler, school board attorney, agreed that the transfer provision was now unacceptable but had argued for the option privilege on the ground that it was not discriminatory even if it led to continued segregation. “If a student is given a free choice, it is his choice, your honor . . . and if it results in vol untary segregation, it does not violate the 14th Amendment to the Constitu tion,” he argued. But the judge held out for a new plan. The school board said its latest plan, the one offered June 24, would admit pupils to elementary schools without regard to race. The all-Negro Mayo- Underwood School would be closed. Any resulting decrease in the teaching staff would be based on seniority and teachers would be assigned or reas signed without regard to race. A hearing on the plan was set for July 3, according to attorney J. Earl Dearing of Louisville, who filed the complaint Sept. 21, 1962. The case is styled Mack v. Frankfort Board of Ed ucation. (SSN, May and previous). JESSAMINE COUNTY—In addition to disapproving the attendance option, Judge Ford told the school board to amend a provision for retaining teach ers now holding jobs in the system “so as to provide that employment of teachers for the respective schools shall be without regard to race or color.” The hearing was held at Lexington (See KENTUCKY, Page 17) Jefferson Board Moves To Complete Program The Jefferson County Board of Edu cation, which operates the largest school district in Kentucky in subur ban Louisville, took two steps June 24 toward completing a desegregation program started in 1956. The board abolished the last school still segregated by policy, and it initi ated faculty and central-office desegre gation. Both actions were voluntary but the board had been under pres sure from desegregation leaders. (SSN, December, 1962, and previous.) Under the plan, the Alexander-In- gram Elementary School, which en rolled 87 Negro pupils in the 1982-3 year, will become part of the all-white Jeffersontown Elementary School. The old school building, however, will serve as an annex housing four or five de segregated first-grade classes in the immediate future. The three Negro teachers at Alexander-Ingram will be assigned to the Jeffersontown School. Two other Negro teachers will be assigned to the new Jane Hite Ele mentary School under construction at Middletown. They had taught at the all-Negro Forest Elementary School which the board had ordered closed previously (SSN, December, 1962.) A Negro counselor at the Newburg School was given pupil-personnel work at the system’s control office. The only all-Negro school remaining in the district is the Newburg school, also the district’s only nine-grade school. But Supt. Richard Van Hoose Report Says Five Districts THE REGION Eight School Districts End Race-Based Transfers (Continued From Page 1) systems, reversing the U.S. Sixth Cir cuit Court of Appeals at Cincinnati which had approved the transfer pro visions. Since that time, the Nashville and Davidson County Transitional School Board (which is now operating both schools systems under metropolitan government) has deleted the contro versial section from desegregation plans of the two districts. A spokesman for the Knoxville district indicated similar action may be taken prior to the open ing of the 1963-64 school year. At Memphis, the board of education obtained U.S. district court approval of a substitute provision broadening the procedure so that Negroes attending desegregated schools could request re assignment to other biracial schools. U.S. District Judge H. Church Ford, who said he based his decision on the Supreme Court ruling, ordered three Kentucky school districts — Jessamine County, Frankfort and Richmond—to discard the transfer provisions and to submit new plans within 30 days. Ne gro plaintiffs are seeking initial deseg regation in Jessamine County and extended desegregation in the other two districts. In Virginia, U.S. District Judge John D. Butzner rejected the West Point School Board’s zoning plan because it would allow a student to transfer from a school in which his race is in the minority. His decision came one week after the Supreme Court opinion. Roanoke’s five-year school desegre gation plan was approved in general by another district court, which with held a decision on a similar transfer procedure. Following the decision in the Tennessee cases, the Roanoke school board voluntarily removed the clause. In rejecting Lynchburg’s grade-a- year plan as too slow on July 1, the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals also threw out a racially based transfer provision. Six Florida counties—Escambia, Du val, Hillsborough, Orange, Volusia, and Leon—were studying the effect of the Supreme Court ruling on a similar fea ture of their court-approved plans, under which they have registered pupils for the 1963-64 school term. The U.S. Supreme Court, in another decision on June 17, refused to review an appeals court rejection of a pupil placement plan, which included a race- transfer provision, proposed in Char lottesville, Va. Oklahoma City board of education’s Lack Plans said Newburg is not considered segre gated because it serves a regular at tendance district, even though no white pupils live in that district. ★ ★ ★ Warren County Board Votes to Desegregate The Warren County Board of Edu cation voted June 10 to desegregate all its schools at the opening of the fall term. The 4-1 vote followed corre spondence with Negro attorney James Crumlin of Louisville, who had said he hoped to avoid litigation (SSN, May). The school board also agreed, on the recommendation of Supt. E. R. Ward, that the system’s seven Negro teachers would be retained and reassigned, pos sibly one to a school. The system has about 5,500 students, including some 344 Negroes. The high school-age Negro students—about 75— have been attending the High Street High School of the Bowling Green sys tem. But the Bowling Green system, previously segregated, was ordered by a federal district court on April 8 to desegregate in the fall. Attorney Crumlin had filed the suit in that case. Officials of Warren County schools and Bowling Green schools were re ported to have agreed in general terms on a transfer of territory that would shift about 1,000 students from the county to the city. This would relieve overcrowding in the county, a problem previously cited as delaying desegrega tion. pupil-transfer policy, similar to the rejected procedure, was taken before a federal court with Negroes charging that it was being administered in a way discriminatory to members of their race. In St. Louis, a citizens’ advisory com mittee asked the school board to adopt policies which, among other things, would include the right of pupils to transfer as a means of further desegre gation. During June, two school districts en rolled their first Negroes in biracial classes. They included Bibb County, Ga., which admitted a Negro student to the Dudley Hughes Vocational School at Macon, and Hopewell, Va., which enrolled two Negro students to a high school summer session. In North Carolina, the Goevmor’s School for the Gifted opened at Win ston-Salem with 30 Negroes included in a student body of 400 for the sum mer session. Plans Formulated As a result of voluntary school board action and federal court rulings, dis tricts in Texas, Georgia, Kentucky, Virginia and North Carolina formulated plans for desegregation this fall. The Texas districts included Arling ton, Birdville, Denton, Waco, Boeme, Irving, Grand Prairie, Sherman, Mar- tindale, Hale Center and Kemper City. In Virginia, initial desegregation is scheduled to occur in 17 districts—the county systems of Albemarle, Charles City, Culpeper, Dinwirdie, Fauquier, Frederick, Greene, Hanover, Henrico, King and Queen, Middlesex, Powhatan, Spotsylvania and Surry, and the city systems of Danville, Martinsville and Staunton. The Durham County, N.C., board of education approved the transfer of three Negro high school pupils to biracial classes while two other North Carolina districts took steps toward de segregation. Burlington announced a four-year plan with tne assignment of 13 Negroes in the first three grades in previously all-white schools and the Rocky Mount board of education as signed 15 Negroes to two previously all-white schools. Other districts scheduled to begin desegregation this fall include Warren, Casey and Metcalf counties in Ken tucky. Court Gets Plan In Georgia, a plan to desegregate the Chatham County and Savannah schoo districts beginning with the 12th g r aae this fall was presented to the U.S. Dis trict Court at Brunswick. The East Baton Rouge Parish School Board in Louisiana adopted a grade-a year plan to begin with the 12th gn® ® in 1964 and submitted it for distnc court approval. Shelby County, Tenn., school are expected to submit a plan to eral court in response to a suit by the Association for the Advanceme of Colored People. In South Carolina, the Most R^ Francis F. Reh, bishop of the Dio of South Carolina, announced tha 37 Roman Catholic parochial schools the state will be desegregated by . tember, 1964. Elementary anc T e schools in the Savannah, Ga., dio will be desegregated this fall- . The Oklahoma Legislature orde the desegregation of three state s for the mentally retarded. All Schools Biracial In Florida, the Dade County s< -|) ^ board declared that the ent |’' e ^' g, school system now is officially fl f regated and that future assignme ^ pupils, teachers and other pe 0 f will be made without considera Y0 t \ff& lefferson County, Ky., al so ''V-ion :ulty and central office desegreg file Warren County, Ky., sc teaC h- 1s indicated that seven (jc- ; would be retained in the tion of the entire system. \mong the colleges and ^ ive enr0 ll' ention was directed to the ^ a . ;nt of Negro students Vlv j an T rever ie and James A. Hood at the y of Alabama as President n. leralized National Guard GoV- fich had been called out «rge C. Wallace. Another (See THE REGION, Page 11 >
