Newspaper Page Text
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SOUTH!
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VOL Hi NO- 10
u '>«l News
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Objective
the region
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APRIL, 1965
Few Boards Have Received Approval of Compliance Plans
»
F ew Southern state and local
school boards have received
federal approval of their plans for
compliance with the new federal
aid regulations issued under the
1 Civil Rights Act of 1964. School
officials in several states have
complained that the vagueness of
1 the new federal policies has ham
pered compliance efforts.
Through April 5, the U.S. Office of
Education had approved in the South
only the “Statements of Compliance”
signed by the state boards of Arkansas
and North Carolina, and the compli
ance plans from 39 school districts—33
all-white districts in Arkansas, one dis
trict in Florida, and five districts in
Georgia.
Three-fourths of the South’s 2,950
school districts have agreed to comply.
In This Issue
Monthly Reports
Alabama 1
Arkansas 2
Florida 6
Georgia 3
Louisiana 12
Mississippi 9
North Carolina 11
South Carolina 14
( Tennessee 4
Texas 5
Virginia 1
Washington 1
Special Articles
The Region 1
SERS Gets New Grant 1
Missouri 5
Books and the Issue 16
VIRGINIA
Court Limits
Grants to Use
As Supplement
\ SPECIAL
RICHMON
THREE-judge federt
court held on March 10 the
A
Virginia’s tuition grants laws
?°t unconstitutional on their fac
“ u t that grants cannot lawfully b
Used to provide the whole or th
Skater part of the cost of open
jj on of a segregated school. (Gri]
n v. State Board of Education.)
The court said that in order to avoi
Eruption of classes this year, the rui
?*» w °uld not go into effect until aft<
Ju «e, 1965.
Attorneys for the Negro plaintif
“ild they would appeal the ruling.
Ten private school systems are d:
.^fiy affected. Spokesmen for the sy:
said the schools would operai
• ext year without the grants, if neces
(See Schoolmen.)
■ J,? 16 special court—consisting <
q. ge Albert V. Bryan of the Fourt
*' our E of Appeals and Distrii
g ges Walter E. Hoffman and John I
in i? er dr —summed up its
Vus manner:
Three Points
Vpen consideration of the Virginia
‘■bat .tuition grant laws, we hold: (1)
the’ f 6y are no * unconstitutional on
lint- . e, as fostering forbidden race
a W fT?i^ ons ’ (2) that the grants may
y b>e used in a private, segre-
.w ’ n °n-sectarian school if t hey do
onsttiute the preponderant Anan
iy support of the schools, but (3) if
316 P a * d hj the govern-
Will' T* authorities knowing the funds
tg e used to provide the whole or
ti otl gr , eater P art of the cost of opera-
- each f segregated school, as it is in
^ u ° Private schools described
e complaint, then such disburse-
(See GRANTS, Page 7)
Education officials in one state, Ala
bama, have been warned that they
must act “immediately” to comply with
the rights law or face the loss of fed
eral school aid. The Alabama State
Board of Education has refused to
sign a federal compliance statement,
but State Supt. of Education Austin R.
Meadows submitted the required state
ment to the U.S. Office of Education.
At least 107 of the state’s 118 districts
signed the forms or submitted desegre
gation plans.
‘Grave Concern’
The U.S. Commissioner of Education,
Francis Keppel, wrote Meadows a let
ter on April 2 expressing “grave con
cern as to whether this office can con
tinue legally to provide funds to your
department under the several programs
which we administer.” Keppel said the
state superintendent’s statement “could
only come about from the most serious
misunderstanding and misreading of
the requirements of the act.” “As you
know,” Keppel added, “virtually all the
public-school districts of Alabama are
still operated on a segregated basis/’
However, Keppel has agreed to ac
cept, as “good faith” effort to comply,
the statements signed by 170 of Geor
gia’s 196 school districts. Another 21
Georgia districts have submitted plans
for compliance. Keppel sent a telegram
to Gov. Carl Sanders after the governor
became angry over the misunderstand
ing about compliance statements.
Georgia educators had thought they
had only to sign the certificates to
comply with the rights law. Federal
officials then announced that only
“totally desegregated” districts were
eligible to sign.
Gov. Sanders telephoned President
Johnson, Commissioner Keppel and
other federal officials. “I think it’s a
pretty ridiculous situation when people
send out forms, and then say they’re
worthless,” the governor said.
Later, on March 26, the U.S. Commis
sioner of Education sent Gov. Sanders
the telegram accepting the statements.
Keppel said that in some instances, ad
ditional information would be needed.
Georgia’s state school superintendent,
Dr. Claude Purcell, has sought to ob
tain specific and official guidelines from
the government on what school dis
tricts must do to comply with the law
and to qualify for federal funds. He
was unsuccessful, as were other South
ern educators, who conferred in
Chicago with federal officials about
the law.
Variations Noted
Purcell said the U.S. Office of Ed
ucation was reluctant to put detailed
compliance criteria in writing because
this would establish a rigid “hard line”
formula for every system. The school
desegregation problem varies with
each section of the country and each
district, Purcell noted, and federal
officials believe each system should be
judged on its own merits.
Although North Carolina was the
first in the South to have the federal
government approve the statement
signed by its State Board of Education,
the state superintendent of public in
struction advised the 171 local school
districts to delay signing their pledges
until he received clearer guidelines
from Washington. Dr. Charles Carroll
issued his advice on March 12 after
60 units already had signed.
Magazine Prints Memo
The nearest thing to official instruc
tions appeared in the Saturday Review
of March 20, 1965 (pages 60-61, 76-79).
The magazine reprinted a memoran
dum prepared by G. W. Foster Jr.,
professor of law at the University of
Wisconsin and a consultant to the Of
fice of Education. The Saturday Re
view editors wrote an introduction, ex
plaining the status of the Foster memo:
“Aware of the complex responsibility
assigned to it, the Office of Education
has moved with its own version of ‘all
deliberate speed.’ To date it has been
more notable for its caution than for its
accomplishment in providing specific
direction to school authorities faced
with the necessities of radical change
under Title VI.
“There are, to be sure, good reasons
for caution. An official statement of
well-defined standards for desegrega
tion would almost certainly be inter
preted as an acceptable minimum, and
(See COMPLIANCE, Page 10)
WASHINGTON REPORT
Office Begins Reviewing
Thousands of Assurances
ALABAMA
Alabamians Get Warning
From U. S. Commissioner
WASHINGTON
he U. S. Office of Education
began in March to review
thousands of assurances of non
discrimination filed by Southern
and border school districts and
state education agencies under
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of
1964. Officials reported at the end
of the month that favorable action
had been completed on the first
few compbfmce forms.
Four court - ordered desegregation
plans submitted by Southern districts
were “found acceptable” by U.S. Com
missioner of Education Francis Keppel.
They came from Brevard County, Fla.,
and three Georgia districts — Atlanta,
Bibb County and Muscogee County.
Statements of compliance from nine
state departments of education—includ
ing Missouri, North Carolina and seven
Northern and Western states—were ac
cepted by the Office of Education. Also
approved were statements of compli
ance from four state library agencies,
including those of Alabama and North
Carolina.
Another 13 states filed acceptable as
surances of compliance (Form HEW-
441) in behalf of state-operated educa
tion agencies receiving direct federal
assistance. This list included, from the
Southern and border region, state de
partments in Arkansas and Maryland.
Officials reported that some sort of
compliance action has been taken by
all 50 state education agencies, though
the assurances from some Southern
states are expected to receive close
scrutiny to determine whether they
meet requirements of the Civil Rights
Act.
By the end of March, compliances had
been received from a total of 12,748
local school districts, including 1,729 in
the 11 Southern states and 1,673 in the
six-state border region.
More than 400 districts submitted
voluntary desegregation plans to com
ply with Title VI, and 74 districts sent
court orders.
Assurances of nondiscrimination were
also filed by more than 1,700 of the na
tion’s 2,100 colleges and universities.
Allan Lesser, director of the Title VI
compliance program in the Office of
Education, said “several dozen” volun
tary desegregation plans had been re
viewed and were close to approval by
the Commissioner of Education.
In Negotiation
“A great many other voluntary de
segregation plans are in negotiation,”
Lesser said, “and we have asked for
additional information on many of the
assurances (Form HEW-441). we have
received.”
Lesser said the “most complete” plans
were getting priority attention, while
efforts were made to obtain added facts
on doubtful compliance forms.
All but three or four of the state edu
cation agency plans “will be cleared up
(See THOUSANDS, Page 16)
MONTGOMERY
labama state education offi
cials were warned April 2
that they must act “immediately”
to comply with the Civil Rights
Act of 1964 or face the loss of
millions of dollars in federal
school assistance funds.
In a strongly worded letter to Ala
bama State Supt. of Education Austin
R. Meadows, the U.S. Commissioner
of Education expressed “grave concern
as to whether this office can continue
legally to provide funds to your de
partment under the several programs
which we administer.”
Commissioner Francis Keppel told
Meadows that Title VI of the Civil
Rights Act, which bars federal aid to
segregated state and local activities,
“makes it clear that the operation of
segregated schools—a dual school sys
tem for white and Negro pupils—con
stitutes discrimination which is pro
hibited by law.”
The Alabama State Board of Edu
cation has refused to sign a statement
that it is complying with Title VI, but
submitted the statement of compliance
required by the Office of Education.
Keppel said Meadows’ statement
“could only come about from the most
serious misunderstanding and misread
ing of the requirements of the act.”
“As you know,” Keppel wrote,
“virtually all the public-school districts
of Alabama are still operated on a
segregated basis.
“Unless this situation is changed in
these districts, they will not be eligible
to participate in the vocational educa
tion program, the National Defense
Education Act, the program of school
assistance to federally affected areas,
or any other federally assisted pro
gram.”
Alabama schools would receive al
most $27.5 millions in federal funds
from the Office of Education in the
fiscal year starting next July 1, ac-
(See U. S., Page 8)
SERS Gets Ford Grant for New Program
O outhern Education Reporting
^ Service has received a two-
year grant of $456,000 from the
Ford Foundation to support a
new program that will begin on
July 1.
C. A. McKnight, chairman of the
SERS Board of Directors and editor
of the Charlotte (N.C.) Observer, an
nounced that the Nashville-based
agency will focus its attention on cre
ative experiments to improve educa
tion for the culturally disadvantaged
in the 17 Southern and border states.
Since its founding in 1954, SERS has
collected and disseminated information
on developments in education arising
from the United States Supreme Court
decision declaring compulsory segrega
tion of the races in the public schools
to be unconstitutional. The SERS poli
cies of factual, objective reporting and
non-advocacy will remain in effect,
McKnight said.
In tracing the broad outlines of the
new program, McKnight explained that
details will be decided at a meeting
of the SERS Board of Directors next
month. Major emphasis will be placed
on a periodical ft> replace the monthly
Southern School News, the last issue
of which will appear in June.
Other phases of SERS operations also
will be affected. The annual summary
of statistics on school desegregation
will continue, but in abbreviated form.
SERS no longer will microfilm the an
nual additions to its library, which
contains more than one million items
on race relations in the United States.
Some 60 libraries, located throughout
the country, have purchased the micro
film, which is complete for the decade
1954-64.
Law Reporter
After July 1, SERS will have no
further responsibility for Race Rela
tions Law Reporter, for which it has
performed business management func
tions since 1959. The publication is
edited in the Law School of Vanderbilt
University, which has received from
the Ford Foundation a direct grant
to support the publication for two
more years.
The new grant for SERS was made
to George Peabody College for Teach
ers, which has acted as fiscal agent
for the project from the beginning.
“The original purposes of Southern
Education Reporting Service have been
accomplished,” McKnight said in an
nouncing the new program. “Some de
segregation has taken place in every
state in the South, and the patterns of
future compliance are fairly well
established. However, many of the
Southern states are moving into a new
era of positive action to improve the
education of their culturally disad
vantaged children.
New Dimension
“The story no longer is one of com
pliance and non-compliance with the
Supreme Court decision. Some areas of
the South are taking positive, creative
approaches to education for the dis
advantaged. There is a whole new di
mension that is not being reported, and
this may prove to be the most impor
tant part of the whole story of South
ern education in this generation.
“The South, along with the rest of
the nation, is on the threshold of a
great new venture in education—the
provision of maximum educational op
portunity for all disadvantaged chil
dren, white and Negro. Desegregation
is a prelude to solution to the problem
of equal educational opportunity. As
the process of desegregation has spread
through the Southern and border
states, the realization has grown that
more than desegregation is necessary
to give culturally deprived children the
kind of education they require to be
come useful, productive individuals and
citizens.
New Approaches
“The private foundations have been
the pioneers in stimulating new ap
proaches to educating children who in
the past have been neglected. The fed
eral government has sponsored research
and experimental programs in the field,
as have state and local governments
and community groups.
“From this concentration of effort,
which is certain to increase, impor
tant breakthroughs are to be expected.
Professional educators and concerned
laymen alike will need quick, accurate,
objective, comprehensive information
about developments. At present no
central source for such information
exists. The purpose of the new SERS
program is to meet this need in the
Southern and border states.”