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SOUTH CAROLINA
SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—FEBRUARY, 1964—PAGE II
Charleston Holds Segregation
Aids Negroes; Appeal Rejected
COLUMBIA
T he Fourth Circuit Court of
Appeals rejected on Jan. 27
an appeal by officials of South
Carolina’s only desegregated
school district.
The decision came a week after
lawyers for Charleston’s School Dis
trict 20 had contended before the ap
peals court, sitting in Richmond, Va.,
that Negro education is helped rather
tlran hurt by racially segregated
schools.
The brief opinion in denying the
claim recited in summary the lower
court action, said it (the circuit court)
was in accord and adopted it as its
own.
The appeal sought a reversal of an
order issued on Aug. 22, 1963, by U.S.
District Judge J. Robert Martin which
opened Charleston white schools last
September to 13 minor plaintiffs in a
desegregation suit. (Brown et at v.
School District 20 of Charleston Coun
ty). Ten of the 13 Negroes now are
enrolled in white schools; two moved
away and one dropped out to return
to his former all-Negro school after a
few days.
Complete Desegregation
A second portion of the ruling orders
complete desegregation of the district
in September of 1964.
All five members of the Court of
Appeals were called to sit on the ap
peal instead of the usual three-judge
panel. However, South Carolina’s rep
resentative on the court, Judge Cle
ment F. Haynsworth of Greenville, was-
ill and the case was heard by Chief
Judge Simon E. Sobeloff of Baltimore,
and Judges Herbert S. Boreman of
Parkersburg, W. Va., Albert V. Bryan
of Alexandria, Va., and J. Spencer Bell
of Charlotte, N.C.
The request that they be allowed
to use “recent scientific studies” in an
effort to prove that segregated school
ing actually benefits the Negro child
was the main line of attack used by
school district lawyers headed by
George S. Leonard of Washington, D.C.
In the event the court refused that
request, the school district asked the
«>urt to call on the U.S. Supreme
Court to declare whether its 1954
decision was based on law or on fact.
This request prompted Mrs. Con
stance Baker Motley of New York,
?? NAACP attorney appearing for the
egro plaintiffs, to suggest that
narleston officials “want a second
crack ” at the 1954 ruling
The Charleston legal battery was
j C Ua Uy divided into two groups—
t^nard and former Lt. Gov. Burnet
Maryland
(Continued From Page 10)
on*a^ y faCe or sex w °uld be made
tion non P°htical basis with considera-
Man , S1V j n to outsiders as well as,
Pram a , ers - Checked in late January,
"’he P said he did not know exactly
indie j hiterviews would begin but
stat e \ 6d t ^ ley would start shortly. The
supeH ? ard ex P ects to name the new
Puller,’ e ? c * ent well in advance of Dr.
^ s departure from office.
duanjt *’ e ' T e ® rarn sent in December, Mrs.
of t i lo a ,': ac hs o n Mitchell, as president
had ur ® ry i an d NAACP Conference,
Dr n, , T' rarn Ptom not to consider
ty>‘ 'l“ ar W. Willis, Harford Coun-
te iegram° j superintendent. The NAACP
super;-, “escribed Willis as a district
iiaintajj. ndent . who had “fought to
and c i . Public school segregation,”
still but d^at even now “there is
in “ken desegregation of pupils
°f teach° rd Count y and the program
least j-, Gr desegregation is among the
jj^Pressive in the state.”
out of'Tf Cuupty, as of last faff, in 21
"Lite anH Public schools had both
’he hj[,u„ Negroes enrolled, giving it
vr sta* i^r cen tage of mixed schools
^ogroeg _ e ' twenty-five per cent of its
sohoois ’,,. r ,^° me 540 pupils, were in the
^ a higbp ” white classmates, which
111 n)o re Percentage than prevailed
n'd distr; + 11 °f the other Mary-
dorford b = C j S su bject to desegregation.
j °n of H- . n , ot yet begun desegrega-
Hicts b j a ching staff, which 10 other
*Vatn f done -
th an ln f ^ ai d in late January that
a dlis, b e 6 NAACP opposition to
df^t conrm n0t , aware °f any protests
for arat ion of specific candi-
e Pullen post.
■$ / si- ' '- ■■ \ X.. J
South Carolina Highlights
The Fourth Circuit Court of Ap
peals rejected an appeal by Charles
ton school officials in a suit that
brought about South Carolina’s
first public-school desegregation last
September.
Six Negro adults were admitted
without incident to previously all-
white evening classes at Columbia’s
Dreher High School.
The annual convention of the
Episcopal Diocese of Upper South
Carolina took no action on a move
to desegregate its facilities and
activities, including schools.
Attorneys representing a Darling
ton school board argued in answer
to a 20-month-old desegregation suit
that Negro plaintiffs had not been
denied privileges guaranteed under
the Constitution.
R. Maybank Jr. for a group of inter
vening white parents and Charles H.
Gibbes and Huger Sinkler for the
school board.
Gibbes, who joined Leonard in oral
arguments, told the court that Judge
Martin had “foreclosed” consideration
of factual question in his district court
decision by arbitrarily concluding that
a system of compulsory segregation
prevailed without examining the merits
of the school board’s earlier decision
in refusing to permit the 13 Negro
children to transfer to the white
schools.
Mrs. Motley, in contesting arguments
by both Leonard and Gibbes, said the
Supreme Court had indeed “fore
closed” factual determination of the
effect of segregation on Negro children
when it declared that state segregation
action branded Negro children as in
ferior and was unconstitutional.
The matter, she added, “is no longer
open to question.” She said Judge
Martin had decided properly that he
was not at liberty to rule on certain
facts in the Charleston case.
Leonard, saying the overriding con
sideration should be “a better educated
Negro population,” contended that re
cent scientic studies support the claim
that Negroes do better in all-Negro
schools.
Heredity vs. Environment
He said the research showed that
the personalities and mental charac
teristics of children are matters of
heredity rather than of environment.
He stressed “difference” rather than
“superiority” and “inferiority” in his
arguments.
He claimed it is “the business of the
district court to find out where the
facts are.” Up to now, he contended,
it has simply been assumed that seg
regation hints the Negro, whereas, in
the light of new evidence, the reverse
is true as a matter of provable fact
He urged the court to review all
scientific evidence available on the
point.
Both Mrs. Motley and Judge Sobeloff
indicated disagreement with Leonard’s
argument. The jurist said he did not
think the research was related to the
case and added, “. . . nor would it
bowl me over if it did.”
Mrs. Motley contended that poor
Negro grades on achievement and
other tests were primarily due to in
ferior schools and unequal facilities.
School District 20 comprises what is
known as peninsula Charleston—the
old part of the city between the Ash
ley and Cooper rivers. The area in
cludes most of the historic landmarks
associated with the city that was
founded in 1670. It has more Negro
school children than white.
★ ★ ★
Darlington District Says
Constitution Not Violated
Darlington County School District
No. 1, answering a desegregation suit
Jan. 30, denied that the Negro plain
tiffs in the case had been denied any
of the immunities and privileges
guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.
Representing the defendant in the
case of Stanley et al v. Darlington
County School District No. 1, attorneys
also alleged that:
• The administrative remedies pro
vided by South Carolina law had not
been exhausted by the plaintiffs.
• The plaintiffs are not members of
a “class.”
• No one has been injured by the
operation of the schools in the dis
trict.
The case was brought May 29, 1962,
by the parents of five Negro children,
all of whom live in the district that
includes the City of Darlington, the
county seat of the rich agricultural
county in the heart of the state’s to
bacco-growing Pee Dee section.
The school board’s answer followed
a refusal on Jan. 14 by U.S. District
Judge J. Robert Martin to dismiss the
action. Dismissal had been requested
at a hearing Dec. 18.
Schoolmen
Evening Classes
Admit Negroes
Six Negroes, most of them long
identified with desegregation activi
ties in Columbia, were admitted to
adult evening classes at the Capital
City’s all-white Dreher High School
Jan. 27.
The action came without advance
publicity, but the chairman of the
school board of Richland County
School District 1 (Columbia) said the
applications, submitted by mail, were
processed in advance with knowledge
that they came from Negroes.
Chairman Caldwell Withers said in
a prepared statement after newsmen
discovered the entrance: “After three
applications were detected, it was de
cided that personal publicity was de
sired by the applicants. Consequently,
the applications were processed in the
hope that publicity would be lessened.”
Dreher High, and all of Columbia’s
schools, remain completely segregated.
Dreher’s facilities are used for adult
improvement courses—all non-credit—
which are taught once a week for six
weeks each year.
The school system offers a similar
program for Negroes at Booker T.
Washington High School.
The enrolling Negroes were Mrs.
Modjeska Simkins, Dr. H. T. Monteith,
Richard Monteith, the Rev. John W.
Mungin, Mrs. W. P. Lassiter and Lewis
Hall.
Miss Monteith’s Relatives
Mrs. Simkins, long a leader in the
Columbia Negro community, is an aunt
of Henri Monteith, the Negro girl in
whose name the suit was brought that
resulted in desegregation at the Uni
versity of South Carolina, also in
Columbia.
Dr. Monteith is her uncle. It was in
the yard of his suburban home that
a bomb was exploded last summer be
fore Miss Monteith, who lived nearby,
entered USC.
Richard Monteith, 21, is her brother.
The Rev. Mr. Mungin has been a
leader in recent downtown antisegre-
Community Action
Before the First Adult Evening Class
Lewis Hall, Mrs. Modjeska Simkins, Dr. H. T. Monteith, the Rev. John W. Mungin.
gation demonstrations in Columbia.
Mrs. Simkins, Dr. Monteith, Mungin
and Hall enrolled in a business law
class taught by a young Columbia at
torney. Mrs. Lassiter took vocabulary
building. It was not immediately
known what course Richard Monteith
took.
Mrs. Simkins told newsmen the Ne
groes enrolled at Dreher because they
were dissatisfied with courses offered
at Booker T. Washington.
White adult education, a 30-year-
old program, offered 38 courses this
year; the Negro school 14. The regis
tration fee for whites—$4.00—is one
dollar more than for Negroes. Over
500 persons took courses at Dreher
last year.
★ ★ ★
Restoration of a compulsory attend
ance law was urged Jan. 23 by Dr.
Henry Hill, president emeritus of Pea
body College, Nashville, Term., in a
wideranging speech on education be
fore the S.C. Association of School
Boards.
Such a law was repealed by the
General Assembly following the Su
preme Court’s decision of 1954 against
school segregation.
Dr. Hill is consultant to a legislative
committee studying public education
in South Carolina. On the day of his
speech, the committee recommended to
the legislature that school oifiicials
“vigorously pursue the task of bring
ing about regular school attendance,
using the full power of the law and the
courts.”
The recommendation was interpreted
to advocate greater use of a state law
providing for punishment of parents
convicted of contributing to the de
linquency of a minor.
In The Colleges
No More Negroes
Known to Enroll
No additional Negroes apparently
enrolled at state-supported colleges at
the beginning of the second semester
of the current school year.
The six who entered last September
reportedly all passed and were back
in school.
Neither the University of South
Carolina at Columbia, which has four
Negro students, nor Clemson College,
which has two, officially will discuss
Negro enrollment and progress as such,
but a Negro source told the Associated
Press that all of the present Negro
students were continuing and that they
had no knowledge of any others en
rolling.
At USC, Negro co-ed Henri Mon
teith, a sophomore transfer from the
College of Notre Dame in Baltimore,
said she got two A’s and a couple of
B’s in her premedical course.
Political science junior Robert G.
Anderson Jr. said he had maintained
a B average. Graduate student James
L. Solomon Jr. said he did “all right..
about average.”
There was no direct comment from
Harvey B. Gantt and Lucinda Brawley
at Clemson or Sgt. James H. Hollins, a
Negro Marine who is attending the
university’s branch at Beaufort near
Parris Island Marine Base.
Legislative Action
Punishment Sought
For Demonstrators
And Their Parents
Fines and prison terms for juvenile
racial demonstrators and their parents
were spelled out in a bill introduced
in the S.C. House of Representatives
by Orangeburg Rep. Jerry M. Hughes
Jan. 18.
The measure would provide fines of
$100 or 30-day jail terms for young
sters under 17 who participate in
demonstrations or picketing of any
kind. Parents or guardians would be
liable for the same penalties.
“We’ve got to teach these 11- and
12-year-olds some respect for the law
and those enforcing it,” Rep. Hughes
said.
The bill obviously was an out
growth of recent antisegregation dem
onstrations in downtown Orangeburg
that brought about arrest of more than
1,500 Negroes.
Episcopalians Leave Issue Undecided
The annual convention of the Epis
copal Diocese of Upper South Carolina
failed to act on the issue of desegre
gating its schools and other diocesan
activities when it met in Greenville
Jan. 28-29.
The matter was brought up in a
motion by the Rev. John I. Kilby of
Greenville. It asked that racial dis
crimination be banned in ail diocesan
activities and on all diocesan property.
The Rev. Mr. Kilby told the con
vention: “In my mind, it is blasphemy
to deny a child the teaching facilities
and the training facilities of the dio
cese.”
He moved that the officials of the
diocese be instructed to remove all
bases of discrimination in all diocesan-
owned or related properties and in
stitutions. He also moved that the
treasurer of the diocese be prohibited
from distributing any funds to any
institutions owned or related to the
diocese that maintain discriminatory
barriers.
A roll call was ordered on the mo
tion to table that immediately fol
lowed the Rev. Mr. Kilby’s action.
The clergy, with four exceptions, voted
overwhelmingly against tabling. The
lay delegates voted 52-48 against
tabling.
After further parliamentary ma
neuvering, the motion was referred to
a committee appointed by the Rt. Rev.
John A Pinckney, recently ordained
bishop of the diocese.
On the second day of the conven
tion, the committee failed to report
the matter back to the floor and it
died.
In his opening address to the con
vention, Bishop Pinckney had ap
plauded moves to end segregation
within the diocese but he expressed
disapproval of recent resolutions and
statements issued by the national
Episcopal Church and the National
Council of Churches in regard to seg
regation.
He urged church members not to
react against these pronouncements by
ceasing or decreasing church financial
support.
★ ★ ★
Church Near Marine Bases
Accepts Negro Members
A Methodist Church in an area of
Beaufort County that has known
school desegregation for several years
has voted to admit Negroes to its
congregation.
The church board of the Laurel Bay
Methodist Church took the action after
a Negro family had requested permis
sion to attend services.
The area contains military housing
for families of men stationed at two
nearby Marine Corps installations. The
church has 222 military members and
only four civilans.
The Laurel Bay elementary school
was sold by Beaufort County to the
United States government several
years ago for a nominal sum. It is
operated as a biracial school for
children of Marines under the Com
mandant of Parris Island Marine Base.
Few—if any—other church congre
gations in South Carolina admit both
whites and Negroes.