Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 2—DECEMBER, 1963—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
TENNESSEE
18 Whites
NASHVILLE
"C 1 ighteen white students are
enrolled in classes with 1,245
Negroes at two Chattanooga
schools, marking the first time in
Tennessee that white students
have been required to attend
school’s where their race is in the
minority.
Dr. Bennie Carmichael, superinten
dent of the district, released figures
during November which showed that
seven white pupils were among 400
students at Davenport School and that
11 whites were attending classes with
852 Negroes at East Fifth Street School.
Both schools include only elementary
grades, Dr. Carmichael said, explain
ing that the white students have been
attending the formerly all-Negro
schools since shortly after the 1963-64
term began in September.
Chattanooga, desegregated under
federal-court order in 1962, extended
biracial classes to include students in
the first four grades this fall.
Based on Residence
Dr. Carmichael said the white stu
dents attending the East Fifth Street
School, assigned there because of their
residence, had not requested to be
transferred to other schools.
Those enrolled at Davenport, how
ever, asked to be transferred to an
other school but were turned down
by school officials because they were
not eligible, Dr. Carmichael said.
“They (the white students) live in
those zones and are not eligible for
transfers,” the superintendent said.
A provision proposed last year to al
low transfer of students from schools
where their race is in the minority was
rejected by U. S. District Judge Frank
Wilson as he approved a gradual plan
of desegregation. (Mapp et al v. Chat
tanooga Board of Education, SSN,
March, 1962.)
The superintendent, who said there
had been no difficulty at the two
schools, reported in September that six
white students had enrolled at the two
schools.
Awaited Outcome
Dr. Carmichael explained that some
of the white students had spent the
first few days of the term attending
other schools,
pending outcome
of their requests
for transfers.
The superin
tendent said the
board of educa
tion took no ac
tion on the re
quests.
Along with the
gradual desegre
gation plan, the
court also ap
proved a new set of school zone boun
daries.
At least three instances of white
students voluntarily attending pre
dominantly Negro schools in Tennes
see have been reported in the past.
Those enrolled in the Chattanooga
schools are believed to be the only
white students in predominantly Negro
schools during the current year.
Two white students began the year
in a predominantly Negro school at
Memphis, but later were withdrawn,
and one white student attended Pearl
Elementary School in Nashville last
year.
Another white student attended
classes previously at a small Negro
school in Sevier County but officials
said she was not enrolled officially.
The student’s family reportedly has
moved out of the community.
CARMICHAEL
Legal Action
U. S. Judge Approves
Desegregation Plan
Submitted By Board
U. S. District Judge Frank W. Wilson
on Nov. 26 approved a court-requested
plan by the Chattanooga Board of Edu
cation for desegregation of the Chat
tanooga Technical Institute beginning
Dec. 9.
The institute, which provides voca
tional training for adults, is scheduled
under the order to begin desegregation
with the opening of the winter quar
ter.
Judge Wilson’s order also approved
a set of qualifications, including regu
Enrolled in Schools with 1,245
lar entrance requirements and pro
cedures, which had been proposed by
the board on Oct. 24, the date the plan
was submitted. (SSN, November.)
“All applications will be studied and
the applicants counseled with regard to
the background training which might
be substituted for the work and train
ing completed during the current first
quarter,” one of the provisions stated.
Summer Students
Students for the summer quarter will
be admitted to the adult institute un
der the same provisions. The order
stated:
“Effective with the beginning of the
1964-65 school year, admissions shall
be made on the basis of the use of the
standard procedures established for the
institute . . .”
Judge Wilson took under advise
ment another proposal submitted by
the board to desegregate Kirkman
Technical High School on a limited
basis in the fall of 1964 and a plea by
Negro attorneys that teachers, princi
pals and other personnel in the entire
district be assigned on a nonracial ba
sis.
The board had presented a plan to
allow Negroes to attend the all-white
technical high school to study courses
not offered at either of the city’s two
all-Negro high schools, Howard and
Riverside. (SSN, November.)
Faculty Issue
The question of desegregation of
principals, teachers and other person
nel as well as the desegregation of
vocational courses had been raised by
Negro plaintiffs in earlier appeals to
the U. S. Sixth Circuit Court of Ap
peals.
The appeals court on July 8 sent the
questions back to the district court for
further proceedings.
Negro attorneys contended in a hear
ing before Wilson on Nov. 15 that Ne
groes were denied vocational and
technical training courses offered to
white students.
The judge verbally issued his ruling
at that time, and the formal order was
handed down 11 days later.
At Wilson’s request, the board also
presented a report on school desegre
gation. The district began biracial
classes in the first three grades of
“selected” schools last year and ex
tended them to the first four grades
in the system this fall, under a plan
approved by the court.
Tennessee Highlights
Two elementary schools in Chat
tanooga reported 18 white students
enrolled with 1,245 Negroes.
The Chattanooga Board of Educa
tion’s proposal to desegregate an
adult vocational training school was
approved by U.S. District Judge
Frank W. Wilson and will go into
effect Dec. 9.
Plaintiffs in the Franklin County
school desegregation case filed ob
jections to a school-bard plan to
start biracial classes on a geograph
ical zone basis next fall.
Two white professors, believed to
be the first employed on a full-time
basis, are members of the faculty at
Tennessee A&I University at Nash
ville, a predominantly Negro state-
supported institution.
Three Negro candidates for
school-board posts were defeated in
a city election in Memphis on Nov.
7 as City Judge William B. Ingram
won a four-year term as mayor.
Raymond B. Witt Jr., vice chairman
and counsel for the board, declared in
a memorandum filed with the court
that the plaintiffs’ request for faculty
desegregation was “an attempt to en
graft some nebulous sociological and
psychological concept upon the hold
ings” of the Supreme Court. He said
the high tribunal has not decided that
issue.
★ ★ ★
Franklin County Plaintiffs
Object to Board Proposal
Attorneys for plaintiffs seeking de
segregation of the Franklin County
school system on Nov. 13 filed objec
tions to a school board proposal to be
gin biracial classes next fall.
The objections were submitted to
U. S. District Court at Chattanooga,
which on Oct. 1 ordered the board to
present a desegregation plan.
On Oct. 31, the board proposed to
begin desegregation of students, teach
ing staff and other personnel along
with transportation facilities at the
start of the 1964-65 school year.
The plan established a timetable for
biracial classes in each of eight ge-
og~aphical zones, made up of one or
more civil districts in the county. (SSN,
November.)
Nashville attorney Avon N. Williams
Jr., one of the attorneys for the plain
tiffs, said objections to the plan in
cluded the allegation that it did not
provide for elimination of racial segre
gation “with all deliberate speed.”
Plaintiffs in the case (Hill et al v.
Franklin County Board of Education)
include members of eight families, four
white and four Negro.
U. S. District Judge Charles G. Neese
was expected to set a date for a hear
ing on the board’s plan and the plain
tiffs’ objections.
Franklin County, located in South
ern Middle Tennessee, has about 7,000
students, 10 per cent of whom are Ne
groes.
Political Action
Ingram Elected
Memphis Mayor;
Negroes Defeated
City Judge William B. Ingram on
Nov. 7 won a four-year term as mayor
of Memphis, Tennessee’s largest city,
in an election that brought defeat for
three Negro candidates for school
board positions.
Ingram polled 57,513 votes, compared
with 50,037 for former gubernatorial
candidate William W. Farris, Memphis
public works
commissioner, and
14,113 for Shelby
County Sheriff M.
A. Hinds.
All three of the
candidates for
mayor made
strong bids for
Negro votes, but
the segregation-
desegregation is
sue was not
prominent in that
Three incumbent members of the
Board of Education defeated contend
ers including the Negro candidates. Re
elected were John T. Shea, opposed
Negroes
by the Rev. E. W. Williamson, a Ne
gro minister; Mrs. Arthur N. Seessel
Jr., opposed by. A. O. Cannon and Ne
gro dentist Vasco Smith; and Edgar
H. Bailey, who won over Dr. Hollis F
Price, Negro, president of LeMoyne
College.
Also defeated in the election was an
other Negro candidate, Ben Hooks,
who had sought the city judge’s post '
Dr. Price had been endorsed by the
Press-Scimitar, Memphis’ afternoon
newspaper, while Hooks received the
editorial support of the morning Com
mercial Appeal.
‘Moderate’ Positions
School desegregation had been men
tioned during the campaign for school-
board posts, with the Rev. Mr. Wil
liamson and Dr. Price taking what
were described as “moderate” posi
tions.
Dr. Smith, however, had said he
would “accept nothing but immediate
and complete integration, and this
means faculties” if he were elected.
Charles G. Morgan, an attorney, also
had raised the issue in his campaign
against Mrs. Lawrence Coe for a fourth
school board post. No Negro candi
dates were entered in that race.
Morgan, who said he did not favor *
accelerating Memphis’ gradual deseg
regation plan unless ordered to do so
by the courts, was defeated by Mrs.
Coe, also an incumbent.
Other officials elected included
Claude Armour and James Moore, in
cumbent city commissioners; Pete Sis
son and Hunter Lane Jr., new com
missioners.
Mayor Ingram will succeed Henry
Loeb who resigned last month to re
enter private business.
In The Colleges
White Professors
Added To Faculty
Two white professors are believed
to be the first of their race to be em
ployed on a full-time basis at pre-
dominantly-Negro Tennessee A & I
University at Nashville.
They are Dr. Edward N. Cullum, 35.
of Nashville, an associate professor of
history, and Robert N. Holzmer, 45, of
(See TENNESSEE, Page 3)
INGRAM
Johnson Backs Civil Rights Legislation
(Continued From Page 1)
achieve the late president’s goal of
equality for all our citizens.”
The group pledged to work to eradi
cate the spirit of hatred and violence
“which claimed President Kennedy’s
life and which has denied freedom and
justice to so many of our citizens.”
The council consists of Roy Wilkins,
executive secretary of the NAACP;
Whitney M. Young Jr., executive di
rector of the National Urban League;
Dr. King; James Farmer, national di
rector of the Congress of Racial Equal
ity; Dorothy I. Height, president of the
National Council of Negro Women;
James Foreman, executive secretary of
the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee; and Jack Greenberg, di
rector-counsel of the NAACP Legal
Defense and Education Fund.
At a meeting in Washington, some
members of the council suggested a
moratorium on civil rights demonstra
tions during the period of transition
following Kennedy’s death, but the
group took no action on the proposal.
Moratorium Rejected
The idea of a moratorium was re
jected outright by Foreman at a lead
ership training conference held by
SNCC at Howard University Nov. 29.
He said the civil rights movement
might well be accelerated by Presi
dent Kennedy’s assassination.
“Where Mr. Kennedy because of his
record and past actions in the civil
rights field might have slipped by with
words and promises,” Foreman said,
“Mr. Johnson, being a Texan, will have
to prove himself to Negroes and lib
erals by his actions.”
Author James Baldwin, keynote
speaker for the SNCC conference,
agreed that civil rights leaders
“shouldn’t let any such pious consider
ation” impose a moratorium on their
efforts.
NAACP Executive Secretary Roy
Wilkins conferred with President
Johnson at the White House Nov. 29
and said afterward that he had “very
great faith” in the president’s attitude
on civil rights.
But Wilkins also warned that the
nation should not expect a moratorium
on civil rights demonstrations. He said:
“If Congress continues to postpone
action as though a man had not been
murdered in Jackson, Miss., and as
though four girls had not been killed
in a church in Birmingham, and as
though the president of the United
States had not been assassinated in this
climate, there is nothing for Negroes
to do but demonstrate.”
Wilkins told reporters that President
Johnson is generally held in respect by
the Negro community, although Ne
groes “naturally are skeptical of a man
with a Southern background.”
President Johnson conferred Dec. 3
The New Foreman Doesn’t
Waste Any Time
Engelhardt, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
with Dr. King in what the latter des
cribed as a “very fruitful session.”
President Johnson’s strong appeal
for enactment of the civil rights pro
gram, which contains, among other
provisions, authorization for the attor
ney general to initiate and maintain
school desegregation actions and for
the federal government to provide
technical and financial assistance to de
segregating school districts, is not ex
pected to hasten Congressional action.
Committee Delay
The Senate leadership’s strategy is
to wait until the House has passed a
civil rights bill, and in the House the
measure is now in the Rules Commit
tee. Rules Chairman Howard W. Smith
(D-Va.) has made it clear that he will
do all he can to delay the bill.
“The Supreme Court laid down a
law that things should be done with
deliberate speed, and I’m a law-abid
ing citizen,” Smith has said.
Rep. Smith said Dec. 2 that he had
“no plans” to take any action on the
bill this year. He made it clear that he
did not intend to heed President John
son’s plea for speedy action.
The Democratic floor leader, Rep.
Carl Albert of Oklahoma, said he did
not think it “possible as a matter of
practical parliamentary fact” to move
the measure to a house vote in Decem
ber.
The House Judiciary Committee
passed the civil rights bill on to the
Rules Committee on Nov. 21—the day
before President Kennedy’s assassina
tion. The measure was held up for
more than three weeks while the Ju
diciary Committee prepared a 121-page
report explaining it. Before that the
bill had been in the committee for
five months before a bipartisan com
promise worked out by Kennedy was
approved Oct. 29 by 23-to-ll vote.
The report filed Nov. 21 contained
eight different sets of views. The Judi
ciary Committee majority called the
compromise legislation “a reasonable
and responsible bill ... to meet an
urgent and most serious national prob
lem.”
A minority report signed by s*
Southern democrats called it e
greatest grasp for executive P owe ^
conceived in the 29th century, an „
charged that the “extreme and vicious
bill had been “railroaded” throug
Judiciary Committee without oppo
tunity for debate or amendment.
called for full hearings in the u
Committee.
Republicans Complain
> Southern Republicans
d that the measure was in
drafted, imprecisely worded a ^
fectly oriented.” R e P- „
nmaier (D-Wis.) nailed it
but not strong enough. *
Republicans wrote separate
:ting the way the bl1 it _
nrollered” through the comnu
se Speaker John 3
;ed President Johnson 0 „ (0
e would make “every effort^
e bill out of the Rules jj*
cCormack told newsmen ^
ent was intensely mte
action on the bill. -^tition
brmack said a discharge P jn
pass the Rules _ wo uld
ag the measure to the fl r ue l
d Dec. 9 by Chairman Em^.
(D-N.Y.) of the House J ^
ittee. He declined to pred ^
but said he expected a
—
the necessary 21o s g
once the legislation is fear's | d
.logical landmark o mot*
ibservers expect an Even
ly pace in the new > i^ariO
;w president s close f ^ £% .
he ways of Congre s disrupt
to avert long ^before an>
[es in both houses be
enacted into law.