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' </) £ 1*1 „ , Factual ,7 Southern VOL- II. NO. 7 At Meeting in Little Rock While House Advisor Brooks Hays; his son, Steele Hays, member of the Arkansas Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission; Leslie Dunbar of the Southern Regional Council. ARKANSAS Schoolmen Meet To Hear Civil Rights Regulations LITTLE ROCK T'he school desegregation re- *- quirements of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, under regulations ef fective Jan. 4, 1965, were laid out for Arkansas schoolmen Dec. 7 at a meeting at Little Rock spon sored by the Arkansas Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. In essence, desegregation is required lor participation in any program of fed- fral aid, except those for milk and lunches, and a school district’s desegre gation plan must be at least as broad as that required by the federal courts in that area. About 150 of the 500 persons at the *eeting were school officials. Brooks Rays, White House advisor and former congressman from Little Rock, and J*slie W. Dunbar of Atlanta, executive “hector of the Southern Regional Council, were the principal speakers. Hays said it is time for the South to find ways of doing things with the Ne- rather than for him. Dunbar said j nation is firming up its historical etn °cracy through the Civil Rights Act ®ul such other programs as the War on °verty and the reapportionment of legislatures. ‘Cool Reception’ Reported At the sectional meeting for school q Pj e > the speakers were Mrs. Ruby | ■ Martin, a Negro lawyer, and Dean tfman, both of the Civil Rights Emission staff. Most of the school ^°ple were white, and the Arkansas , v. e , tte they gave Mrs. Martin a j ^ reception.” . ^eral aid comes to about $3,600,000 i° r the Arkansas school districts i >„ ^eluding nearly that much for '^es and milk. •aiw school district expecting to re- , 4 g? federal aid after Jan. 4 will have ^ e an acceptable desegregation plan 'ie TT ^ omm i ss i° n er Francis Keppel in '■ci Office of Education, Mrs. Mar- sard. Commissioner Keppel must Ii jI° Ve die plan before any federal aid Th^ t0 a district, she added. 5t Mch inc ^ U( f es those school districts 'hp , are °Perating under a voluntary »hj c , of desegregation as well as those mg are still segregated,” Mrs. Martin p Under Court Orders •Ader t ^ ose districts already operating : -av e c ? Ur t desegregation orders, they C 0 ' OIU y to file copies of court orders Wl er Wlt h their pledges to abide by the say 1 ^ modifications of them, bth er ' r ic>W " an that, she said she did not kind of desegregation plan sai^ rn *f sioner would find acceptable ' tti u>tUiT. S ” e bought it logical that the required would be what the courts in the area have included in their orders. She said most of the courts now were rejecting grade-a-year plans and were requiring two or more grades a year. “In the 10 years that have elapsed since the first school desegregation cases, the requirements of school de segregation have developed rather slowly, but have become quite definite on some points,” Mrs. Martin said. “The most recent court cases have clearly stated that it is the responsibiliy of the school boards, and not Negro parents, to initiate the desegregation process. The defense sometimes offered by the school boards that the Negro pupils have not applied for admission to white schools is being given little or no con sideration by the federal courts today.” Perhaps Unacceptable She said that some of the volunary desegregation plans being used might not be acceptable to the commissioner. “The elimination of dual boundary lines for white and Negro schools and the rezoning of schools on a nonracial basis seems to be essential features of an acceptable desegregation plan,” she said. Supt. Floyd W. Parsons of Little Rock and B. E. Whitmore of Pine Bluff, Jef ferson County school supervisor, who were on the platform with Mrs. Martin, both spoke briefly. Parsons said Little Rock is using the state pupil assignment law, not attend ance areas, and assumed that it could continue this way since the federal (See RIGHTS, Page 6) OriJAAI 2 0SC«- ?9 ‘SN3H1V S N 0 I S I A I 0 SNOlllSinODV s 3 i a v a 8 n V I 9 8 0 3 9 JO A IN n w Department of Justice Institutes First School Suits Under New Law WASHINGTON T he U.S. Department of Jus tice filed school desegrega tion suits against Campbell County, Tenn., and Bossier Par ish, La., on Jan. 4, 1965—the first such actions under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The suit filed in U.S. District Court at Chattanooga, Tenn., against Camp bell County, comes under Title IV, which allows the federal attorney gen eral to bring suit when he receives a complaint from people unable to take such action themselves. In the case of Bossier Parish, the government is intervening in a suit al ready before the court, Lemon v. Bos sier Parish School Board (See Louisi ana report). The original suit was filed Dec. 2, 1964, in U.S. District Court at Shreveport on behalf of eight Negro children. The justice department on Jan. 4 asked to participate in the suit under civil rights act provisions that authorize the attorney general to in tervene in segregation cases he be lieves to be of general public importance. Acting Attorney General Nicholas deB. Katzenbach, commenting in Washington, said: “We have brought suit in both these cases only after at tempting to seek voluntary compliance with the law.” The intervention in the Bossier Parish case represents the govern ment’s second attempt to desegregate the district’s public schools. In Jan uary, 1963, the justice department asked the district court to desegregate the parish schools because they re ceived federal aid to impacted areas. District Judge Ben C. Dawkins dis missed the case on Aug. 20, 1963, and the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Ap peals on Aug. 25, 1964, upheld the dismissal. ★ ★ ★ Seven Government Agencies Announce New Rules on Aid Seven federal departments and agencies—including the Department of Health, Education and Welfare—an nounced on Dec. 4 the rules they will follow in carrying out Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1984, which bars racial discrimination in federally as sisted programs or activities. The regulations, approved by Presi dent Johnson, were published in the Federal Register (Vol. 29, No. 236) on Dec. 4, to go into effect 30 days later. The seven agencies and departments, which administer the major federal aid programs, were, in addition to the De partment of HEW, the Departments of Interior, Agriculture and Labor, the General Services Administration, the Housing and Home Financing Agency and the National Science Foundation. The White House indicated that other government agencies would issue their regulations for implementation of Title VI within a few weeks. In a statement announcing his ap proval of the regulations, President Johnson described them as “just and reasonable,” and said they will “insure that disputes or failures to comply with the principle of nondiscrimination in administering federal programs will be FLORIDA 17,000 Negroes Boycott Schools at Jacksonville MIAMI Tl/I' ore than 17,000 Negro pupils ■ * boycotted the Duval County schools Dec. 7 as a protest against what the leaders of the movement called “general conditions in the schools and elsewhere.” The mass movement in and around Jacksonville was touched off by action of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. On Dec. 1 it removed accreditation for all 15 high schools in the county on grounds that they did not receive adequate support to meet edu cational standards. SACS had warned the Duval authori ties they were on probation over a year ago. While the community was in an up roar over the decision, Negro groups called the boycott to dramatize the plight of Negro pupils, which they said called for special consideration. Rutledge Pearson, a social studies teacher at Jacksonville’s Cookman Junior High School and chairman of the Florida NAACP, announced the “sit-out” at a news conference called several days in advance. Pearson said it was supported by the NAACP. He submitted a 10-point list of grievances that went beyond the quality of education provided Negro youngsters. Among his complaints on behalf of the Negro community were “complete lack of representation in (See NEGROES, Page 7) SOUTH CAROLINA Furman Trustees Maintain Stand COLUMBIA F urman University’s trustees, ignoring an adverse vote on the point by the 1964 South Caro lina Baptist Convention, reaf firmed on Dec. 8 their previous decision to admit qualified stu dents without regard to race. The action brought an outcry from segregationist leaders in the denomina tion. There were also threats that fi nancial aid from some chinches would be cut off. The issue between Furman, located on a new campus in the foothills just north of Greenville, and its parent organization was joined in October of 1963 when the board of trustees an nounced Negroes would be accepted. The state convention a month later debated the issue at length and finally asked Furman to delay its decision pending a year-long study by a com mittee of the denomination’s General Board. That board recommended that the trustees of the various Baptist- affiliated colleges in the state be al lowed to set their own admission policies. But in November the representatives of the over half-million Baptists in the state voted 943-915 to reject the Gen eral Board’s recommendation. Then on a specific motion on whether the con vention favored “integration” in its schools, it said “no” by a 905 to 575 margin. Chairman’s Statement The announcement that the univer sity’s trustees had decided to ignore the convention votes came in a state ment from Board Chairman J. Wilbert Wood of Anderson. It said: “The board has approved a recom mendation from the executive com mittee that the existing policy of admissions be reaffirmed by the board.” He would not elaborate but others quickly made it clear that he was talking about the suspended 1963 policy to admit qualified Negroes. Dr. Francis M. Bonner, vice presi dent and dean of Furman, said the next day that the university has re ceived no recent inquires from pros pective Negro students and that, to his knowledge, it had never received any formal applications. Dr. Bonner is acting as chief ad ministrative officer of Furman until Dr. Gordon W. Blackwell, now head of Florida State University, assumes the presidency on Feb. 1. “My position,” said Dr. Bonner “is that the trustees have acted in the best interests of the university and as administrator I will carry out poli cies set by the trustees.” He added that direction of policy is granted to the trustees by the school’s charter and that the action of (See FURMAN, Page 8) promptly and justly decided.” The President added that “the na tion’s commitment to the principle of equality of treatment and opportunity for all Americans will be well served by the new regulations.” Federal officials have been instructed to co-operate with state and local gov ernments and private organizations “to ensure that there is complete under standing of the regulations and compliance with the congressional mandate,” Johnson said. In discussing the regulations during a talk Dec. 10 to the Community Action Assembly of the National Urban League, Johnson stressed that “our first objective will always be to assure nondiscriminatory operation rather than to put an end to programs which are vital to the welfare of all Ameri cans.” The HEW regulations require that all applications for new or renewed federal financial assistance must be accompanied by “assurance” of non discriminatory operation. School Regulations In the case of elementary and sec ondary schools, the regulations state, the requirements will be satisfied if a school or school system: “1) is subject to a final order of a court of the United States for the de segregation of such school or school system, and provides an assurance that it will comply with such order, in cluding any future modification of such order, or “2) submits a plan for the desegre gation of such school or school system which the Commissioner of Education determines is adequate to accomplish the purposes of the Act and this part, and provides reasonable assurance that it will carry out such plan.” The regulations note that in any case where a court orders school desegrega tion after submission of a compliance plan to HEW, the plan must be amend ed to take the court order into effect. In the case of institutions of higher learning, “the assurance required by this section shall extend to admission practices and to all other practices relating to the treatment of students,” the regulations state. Provision is made for periodic review of compliance with Title VI and for “prompt investigation” of complaints that discrimination is being practiced in federally aided programs. Procedure Spelled Out Under the regulations, federal funds may not be withheld until: “1) the responsible Department offi cial has advised the applicant or re cipient of his failure to comply and has determined that compliance cannot be secured by voluntary means; 2) there has been an express finding on the record, after opportunity for hearing, of a failure by the applicant or recipient to comply with a require ment imposed by or pursuant to this part; 3) the action has been approved by the Secretary . . . ; “4) the expiration of 30 days after the Secretary has filed with the com mittee of the House and the committee (See JUSTICE, Page 2) In This Issue Monthly Reports Alabama Arkansas j Florida Georgia Louisiana 10 Mississippi North Carolina 9 South Carolina 1 Tennessee 5 Texas 2. Virginia 4 Washington ...1