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u<e ,nQ 'J ^ Factual Southern « <3 / ^TTAAI VOL. 10, NO. 10 THE s * 0,s ''"o w ' A I 5> I n 0 3 v . yio«o 3 | 3 J^ v ffln eooe^i? 9 \»jn Objective APRIL, 1964 Gradual Plans Before High Court; Five Districts To Open All Grades Leadership Confers in Little Rock 0zell Sutton of COCA; school board president Russell H. Matson Jr.; Dr. Garman P. Freeman of COCA; Dr. W. H. Townsend, COCA president. ARKANSAS Little Rock Board Votes 12-Grade Desegregation T he U.S. Supreme Court is ex pected to rule this spring on gradual desegregation plans for schools. Five Southern districts already have announced they would end their gradual plans and open all grades in all schools to both races in the fall. Gradual desegregation programs came under sharp attack before the Supreme Court in March when NAACP attorneys argued that Atlanta’s grade- a-year plan does not meet the criterion of “deliberate speed.” The court has heard arguments recently on the At lanta, Ga., and Prince Edward County, Va., cases, and the ruling in both suits is expected to have considerable legal implications for school desegregation in general. The five districts planning to extend their desegregation plans in the fall in clude Knoxville and Knox County, Tenn.; Little Rock, Ark.; Reidsville and Randolph County, N. C. In addition, Carburrus County, N. C., has agreed to begin desegregation in September by allowing all children to attend any school in the district in which they re side. LITTLE ROCK T he Little Rock school board voted March 24 to extend its desegregation plan to all 12 grades next September. Four of the 12 grades were segre gated this year, and two would have been desegregated this fall under the previous plan. Thus, the new decision "ill extend desegregation to all 12 grades one year earlier than had been planned. The board’s decision came almost simultaneously with an announcement ham Little Rock Negro groups that their dissatisfaction with the board had reached the point that they would Pmket the board’s next meeting, and w ould urge all Negro students to boy- wtt the public schools on Monday Pnl 6. The picketing was carried out, at the board on April 3 met some of e Negroes’ terms and the boycott * as postponed. (See Community action.) In the eight desegregated grades this . e ^~ a U hut the second, third, fifth and 1X grades—123 of the 7,046 Negroes in the Little Rock system are attending school with the white pupils. They are scattered through 15 schools. The second and fifth grades would have been desegregated in September by the promotion of the Negro children in the first and fourth grades this year. The board’s decision in March was to proceed with desegregation of the third and sixth grades in the 1964-65 school year, instead of waiting one more year. Little Rock put its desegregation plan into effect in September, 1957. The original plan was to desegregate the three high-school grades that year, then in due time the three junior high school grades, then the six elementary school grades, and to have all 12 grades desegregated by the 1963-64 school year. This plan was drawn up volun tarily by the Little Rock school board but it was attacked by the NAACP as being too slow. The federal courts ap proved the plan and ordered it put into effect. The school board did not proceed with its original plan because of the intervention of Gov. Orval E. Faubus (See LITTLE ROCK, Page 8) DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA S WASHINGTON enate debate on the Admin- c . istra ti°n’ s civil-rights bill an _, d l ast through the summer M > n to the fall, Majority Leader •Wd 1 ^ ans ^ e ld (D-Mont.) said p^, 1 T- His appraisal of the pros- 3 S S ^ nvo ^ing cloture against ° ut hem filibuster was the most inustic yet made by any sup- X er .of the legislation. t u Vil ~ rights m easure formally be- ate n if penc *I n g business of the Sen- "'eek^ j rc ^ 26 after two and a half the bln 0 * ^ e ^ ate on whether to place 'all °n the calendar. In two roll- to caj° tes ^\ e Senate voted 67-to-17 she^T* 1 Up The bill and 50-to-34 to ID.0J. a m °tion by Sen. Wayne Morse Ike Sen t t0 sen< ^ legislation to day- , a e Judiciary Committee for 10 i, 1 hearings. beiwj 6 two Procedural votes, Sen. ^ L>. Rile coll /"Tt /-«„ \ a 1 3 p RiVA-CULUcU VULCb, OC11 tr of iL ' Bussell (D-Ga.), floor lead- ^hforti 6 ®° ut hern forces, declared: hh o-j na J-ely, we have lost a skirm- i i k> fink! ® battle. We shall now begin „ the war.” 1Jf e focy aate discussions of the meas- ll °tls a „ on such tangential ques- Su newsletter” issued by North- ^t>er &c] POrters of the bill and news- .'j'ertisements placed by a group j. se n the Coordinating Com- °t fundamental American at ion S ’ nc ” w hich opposes the leg- Southemers sharply attacked the newsletter and Northerners criticized the advertisements, charging that they were financed largely through the Mis sissippi State Sovereignty Commission with funds appropriated by the Missis sippi state legislature. As the debate moved into the sub stance of the civil-rights bill, Sen. James O. Eastland (D-Miss.) charged March 21 that the effect of Title IV, which deals with school desegregation, would be to impose desegregation on the South while preserving de facto segregation in the North. He said this would happen because segregated hous ing patterns are more prevalent in Northern communities. Eastland said Southern senators would offer an amendment to the bill requiring school transfers to end racial “imbalances.” As it now stands, the bill includes an amendment added in the House of R e p r e sentatives stating that deseg regation was not intended to re quire transporting pupils out of their school neighbor hoods. Eastland said the amend- eastland ment was written to accommodate New York, and should not be allowed to stay in the bill. Knoxville announced its plans for complete desegregation when school board attorneys appeared in the U. S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals at Cin cinnati on Feb. 20 to argue an appeal by the Negro plaintiffs in the Knoxville suit. The city system began admitting Negroes to schools with whites by court order in 1960, and about 220 Ne groes now attend the first six grades of 13 previously all-white schools. County Joins City The Board of Education of Knox County, surrounding Knoxville, voted on April 1 to extend desegregation through the remaining grades this fall. The county schools voluntarily began a desegregation plan similar to Knox ville’s after the city had received its court order. The county now has about 48 Negroes in biracial schools. Little Rock’s decision to extend its desegregation plan to all 12 grades next school year will complete the school board’s plan one year earlier than had been planned. This school year, the city system has 123 Negroes attending bi racial schools in all grades but the second, third, fifth and sixth. The sec ond and fifth originally were the only ones scheduled to be added next fall but the board decided on March 24 to include all four grades. Both Randolph County and Reids ville had begun desegregation volun tarily in 1963, using a gradual approach, and they still faced desegregation suits filed by Negro students. On March 20, U. S. District Judge Edwin M. Stanley signed a consent order, approving an agreement negotiated by attorneys for both sides. The Reidsville plan pro vided that students entering the school system, either at the first grade or above, must request admission to the school of their choice. In Randolph County, any pupil may be reassigned to any school within the attendance area in which he resides, provided the school teaches the child’s grade. Three days earlier, Judge Stanley had signed a similar consent order in the Cabarrus County school suit. The district will desegregate for the first time next September. All children can be assigned “without cause or reason, to any school in the district in which said parents and child or children may reside, . . .” the order provides. In addition to consent agreements (See THE REGION, Page 20) In This Issue State Reports Alabama 10 Arkansas 1 Delaware 4 District of Columbia 1 Florida 3 Georgia 1 Kentucky 15 Louisiana 12 Maryland 18 Mississippi 14 Missouri 13 North Carolina 16 Oklahoma 7 South Carolina 5 Tennessee 6 Texas 7 Virginia 1 West Virginia 11 Special Articles The Region 1 SERS Board 4 Ford Foundation Grants 19 GEORGIA Stairstep Program Used By Atlanta Challenged Leader Sees Summer-Long Debate MACON Tn a case that could have legal reverberations far beyond Atlanta, the Supreme Court of the United States was asked in Washington March 31 to decide whether that city’s grade-a-year school desegrega tion plan meets the criterion of “deliberate speed.” Mrs. Constance Baker Motley, associate counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, argued that it does not, and asked the high court to order Atlanta school officials to “disestablish segrega tion.” Mr. Motley was supported by Assistant U.S. Attorney Burke Mar shall, who appeared as a friend of the court to declare that “any sys tem that starts with initial racial assignment and depends on transfer afterwards does not comport with” the court’s original school desegre gation decision of May 17, 1954. But A. C. (Pete) Latimer, a former member of the Atlanta Board of Edu cation and now its attorney, urged the Supreme Court to allow gradual transi tion “from a totally segregated system to a desegregated one.” Sharp Differences “I do not propose to sit idly by and see the State of New York by some sort of double standard be placed in the category of a state that can oper ate its public schools to suit its own peculiar ideas of what is and it not discrimination . . . and have Missis sippi conform to some standard that is written by the federal government,” said Eastland. Sen. Jacob K. Javits (R-N.Y.) said he saw a substantial difference be tween New York efforts to achieve de segregation beyond the requirements of court decisions and Mississippi’s re fusal to make a start desegregating. Sen. Kenneth B. Keating (R-N.Y) also de fended his state’s efforts and predicted that only har^rtcore opponents of the civil-rights bill would vote for East land’s amendment. But Sen. Sam J. Ervin (D-N.C.) in dicated he would not favor the racial (See MANSFIELD, Page 17) In more than two hours of final arguments on the case (Calhoun vs. Latimer), the Supreme Court heard sharp differences on the facts as well as the legal implications of Atlanta’s stairstep plan. “It’s quite evident that we’re con fused,” Chief Justice Earl Warren said. He asked both sides to file additional papers for clarification. A decision is expected this spring. The confusion apparently stemmed from the fact that Atlanta’s plan has been revised since it was sustained last fall by the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. A number of pupil-trans fer criteria to which Mrs. Motley and Marshall addressed objections are to be dropped this fall in favor of only one standard—proximity to the school to which assignment is requested, Lati mer told the court. Under the Atlanta plan, 12th and 11th grades were desegregated in 1961, (See U. S., Page 2) VIRGINIA Prince Edward School-Opening Decision Asked RICHMOND a 13-year legal history i ’ITING of “delays and frustrations,” NAACP General Counsel Robert L. Carter asked the Supreme Court of the United States on March 30 to order prompt reopen ing and desegregation of the pub lic schools of Prince Edward County, Va. The high court in Washington heard more than three hours of final argu ments in the case (Griffin vs. County Board of Prince Edward), and then took it under advisement. Prince Ed ward County was one of five localities that figured in the court’s original (See PRINCE EDWARD, Page 20) Next Month; Ten Years in Review A comprehensive, factual, objective survey of developments in the decade since the Supreme Court's school desegregation deci sion of May 17, 1954. Written and edited by the staff of Southern School News