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SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—JUNE, 1965—RASE 17 North Carolina (Continued from Page 16) “Cases of the dismissal of Negro teachers have continuously been re- ■ ported the headquarters of the NCTA since February . . . Should the emerg ing pattern of Negro dismissals con tinue, many more will be displaced . . . “This leaves the NCTA no alternative but to call upon the National Education Association, the NAACP, the office of the attorney general, the U.S. com- ‘ missioner of education and the White House to cope with this problem.” The NCTA represents 12,500 mem bers. ‘Some Reshuffling’ Dr. Charles Carroll, state superin tendent of public instruction, said: I “I feel that all competent teachers will be able to find employment in North Carolina. There will be some teacher reshuffling with the reshuffling J of student enrollment. Some may be dropped in one place, but I feel sure they can find employment somewhere else. i “I cannot understand how anyone could estimate that 500 or more teach ers would lose employment because of desegregation of schools in North Caro lina. I have no information to sub stantiate such an estimate.” Ralph Moody, deputy attorney gen eral, said, “I don’t know which teachers are being employed.” He gave an opinion that the Civil Rights Act does not involve the employment of teachers. Various school leaders spoke, too. A. S. Alford, superintendent-elect of Pitt Couny, said: “We will have approximately 160 Negro students who have requested to attend predominantly white schools. This may cause some changes in per sonnel at the Negro schools but we plan to utilize these people if at all possible.” Asked about placing Negro teachers in white schools, Alford said, “This will be done if they are needed. Our hiring will be done without respect to race.” Legal Action Court of Appeals Throws Out Plan Used by Durham The Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., ruled June 1 that the Durham City Board of Educa tion was assigning pupils to some schools on an unconstitutional basis. The decision was another round of the long-standing cases of Wheeler v. Dur ham City Board of Education and Spaulding v. Durham City Board of Education. The court ruling came only one day after the city board had approved a plan for assignment. This is a geo graphical plan with school districts and a feeder school setup. Parents have the right to request transfers under this procedure. One judge in the appelate court ad vised that the Durham plan should be “completely discarded and abandoned.” Judge Herbert S. Boreman said: “If the board so desires, it may abandon its objectionable plan and sub stitute in lieu thereof the restricted freedom of choice system . . . “Or the board may submit to the court some other assignment plan free of objections as to the constitutionally; but the present plan should be com pletely discarded and abandoned as a basis for determining initial and subse quent pupil assignment. ” Geographical Districts Disapproving of the geographical dis tricts, the court stated: “Channeling pupils into schools by a method involving them, or even per mitting them, to extricate themselves from situations thus illegally created, W U1 not be approved. “To permit the board’s plan to operate as the basic method of deter mining initial assignments from gerry mandered zones and to control subse quent assignments ... is contrary to this court’s pronoun cements concerning a permissible plan which, in operation, ' v ould afford complete freedom of choice entirely free of any imposed facial consideration. A freedom of choice system, to war rant approval, must operate to prevent discrimination, and not merely to cor- 1 re °t conditions which have been de liberately created by unlawfully dis criminatory procedures . . . Neighborhood Schools “It will be distinctly understood that Nothing we have said herein shall be construed or interpreted as expressing disapproval of neighborhood schools designed to serve a geographic area so long as such schools are not used to foster racial discrimination and segre gation.” Herman Rhinehart, chairman of the school board, said after hearing of the court ruling, “Until the school board has had a chance to meet and discuss the matter among ourselves and with our attorney, I’d rather not comment.” Durham schools have operated on a court-ordered freedom-of-choice plan for the past two school years because courts have rejected its assignment proposals. The case was begun in 1960. ★ ★ ★ Negro parents in Charlotte filed an action May 26 to prevent the Charlotte- Mecklenburg Board of Education from assigning Negro children to 10 schools not included in the board’s recently ap proved desegregation plan. The Negroes want the school system’s assignments to be made after a scheduled July 12 hearing. Two days later, the Charlotte-Mack- lenburg school board acted to halt the proposed injunction by stating that de fying assignments would “disrupt and disorganize the entire assignment pro cedure for all schools.” The board also noted that it announced its plan March 11, but the plaintiffs waited until seven days before the end of school to do something. This action involved parents of 25 Negro children in the case of Swann et al v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, filed Jan. 19. ★ ★ ★ The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals acting in Richmond, Va., April 7 re turned the case of Nesbitt v. Statesville City Board of Education to the U.S. District Court for further study with questions about the city’s stairstep plan, approved by Judge J. B. Craven of the U.S. Western District Court. “A three-year progression in which half of the grades are opened the first vear may well be within the restricted discretion which still remains in a dis trict court,” the appeals court said. “We are not prepared to say that the District Court’s approval of it here was beyond his discretionary authority . . . Some uncertainties now appear which require a remand of the case for fur ther findings . . . “The record, however, is indefinite. It is singularly unspecific about the as signment of new pupils coming into the system above the first grade level. Since these uncertainties cannot be re solved by reference to the past record, we cannot determine the correctness of the district court’s conclusion that the board’s plan is a valid voluntary one ... Parents of 11 Negro children sought the appeal after Judge Craven had ap proved the Statesville plan desegregat ing grades one through six in 1964-65, 10-12 in 1965-66 and seven through nine in 1966-67. ★ ★ ★ The Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled its approval of the Bun combe County school desegregation plan on the condition that high-school students are included. The system’s plan offered immediate desegregation opportunity to pupils in grades one through eight, but offered stairstep opportunity for high school students. The action, Bowditch et al v. Bun combe County Board of Education, was filed Jan. 23, 1964. ★ ★ ★ Parents and defendants in the Gill v. Concord City Board of Education suit, filed Dec. 12, 1963, were ordered to get together before Feb. 15, 1966, and work out an agreement by March 15, 1966, in an order signed May 12 by Judge Ed win M. Stanley of the U.S. District Court of Greensboro. The school board must send a written notice of school assignments at the end of the school year, and parents may re quest reassignment in 30 days. If the two groups cannot agree by March 15, 1966, the plaintiffs may seek further legal action. ★ ★ ★ Judge Edwin M. Stanley of the U.S. District Court approved a freedom-of- choice plan for Durham County in which the county would make no initial assignment of pupils after three years. The plan is a stairstep program to be completed in three steps. The court action added only one point to an assignment plan approved May 10 by the Durham County Board of Education offering a three-step freedom-of-choice program. Judge MISSISSIPPI Majority of Appeals Court Votes To Dismiss Jolmson-Barnett Case (Continued from Page 15) ordinary citizen or, perhaps, a registrar of voters runs if he is indicted for criminal contempt. “No one will ever know,” he con tinued, whether Barnett “could have made that Sunday (Sept. 30, 1962) a day to be remembered as marking the Deep South’s turn toward a peaceful solution of its racial problems. What we do know is that the rioting and insur rection in Oxford . . . was the worst of many bad days in the Deep South marked by bloodshed, bombings, and church burnings. “On that day . . . the governor . . . struck a blow against American fed eralism, and defied the nation.” Meredith filed suit on May 31, 1961, in a federal district court in Mississippi seeking to become the first Negro to attend the University of Mississippi. Judges filing the majority opinion were Richard Rives of Montgomery, Warren Jones of Jacksonville, Walter P. Gewin of Tuscaloosa, Ala., and Griffin B. Bell. ★ ★ ★ Two More Districts Told To Submit Plans to Court U.S. District Judge Harold Cox has ordered two more school systems in Mississippi t» submit desegregation plans. On June 4, he issued a temporary injunction against the Enterprise Con solidated School District designed to halt desegregation. He ordered the Meridian school board to May 27 to prepare a plan calling for desegregation to begin with at least one grade this fall. Eight Clarke County Negroes filed suit in federal district court on June 2 seeking desegregation of the Clarke County schools. The case was filed Stanley also required that all new stu dents entering the system the first time, regardless of grade, will be given free dom of choice. This ruling was made with the agree ment of attorneys for both sides in the case of Thompson et al v. Durham County Board of Education et al, filed July 23, 1963. Miscellaneous Negro Wins Office In Largely White Junior High School A Negro pupil was elected to a stu dent government office for the first time May 5 in the predominantly white Wiley Junior High School in Winston- Salem. The new officer is Harold Ken nedy III, 12, son of Mr. and Mrs. Harold Kennedy Jr., a husband-and-wife law yer team. Harold was voted secretary of the student body with 414 votes, more than 100 votes ahead of his nearest com petitor. The city’s biracial Hanes Junior High School has Negro officers, but it has a majority of Negroes in its student body. Only four Negroes are enrolled at Wiley. ★ ★ ★ One Negro college student, Sherlin Black of Winston-Salem State College, was among six college students selected to work eight weeks in the special interest and fine arts program at Dalton Junior High School in Winston-Salem this summer. The students will be paid $480 each. This program is held each summer by the special education department of the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County school system. All students chosen are resi dents of Forsyth County. This project is open to all students of the school system without regard to race. ★ ★ ★ The North Carolina Fund included 56 Negro students among 285 college stu dents selected to work in its summer anti-poverty program as North Caro lina Volunteers. These students will work in a variety of projects throughout the state after a training period starting June 14 at Duke University. The program used 100 volunteers last summer. against Enterprise, the Quitman Con solidated School District and the Clarke County Board of Education. Cox ruled there was not enough evi dence in the suits to warrant desegre gation injunctions against Quitman and Clarke County. The complaints charged the Negro schools were inadequate and inferior to white schools. Enterprise and Quit- man are in Clarke County. The Meridian school board was given until July 15 to submit a desegregation plan. Cox also called for at least one additional grade to be desegregated each year following the initial lowering of racial barriers this fall. Eighth District Meridian became the eighth school district in the state ordered by a federal court to halt separate education of whites and Ne groes. Schools in Jackson, Biloxi, Clarksdale and Leake Counties were desegregated last fall. Cox re cently ordered de segregation plans to be submitted for Moss Point, Madison County and Canton, Madison County seat. The Greenville school system voluntarily removed first- and second- grade racial barriers last month, effec tive at the start of the 1965-66 school year. The suit against Meridian charged that the city’s Negro schools were in adequate and inferior to white facili ties and that Negroes were unable to transfer to white schools. Thirteen white and seven Negro grade schools were involved in the legal action. The complaint was filed against the Meridian Separate School District, its officers and numerous city and county officials. ★ ★ ★ U. S. District Judge Harold Cox re fused on May 13 to order 197 expelled school children reinstated in Issaquena and Sharkey county schools. The pupils were expelled for insub ordination last winter after refusing to remove “freedom badges” they were wearing to classes. They claimed they had a “constitutional right” to wear the badges during school hours. Cox termed the incidents a discip linary problem. He said the children sought “to defy the school authorities rather than any problem of free speech, due process, fair trial or the like.” The suit filed on behalf of the children sought a temporary injunction rein stating the pupils. “It’s not for a court to pass judg ment upon wisdom or necessity for any rule or regulation promulgated for teaching in a formerly all-white high school. One Negro teaches Spanish and another chemistry and physics. Community Action Texas Communities Ask Federal Funds For ‘Head Start’ Many Texas communities applied for federal funds to operate “Head Start” and youth employment programs. The State also applied for $5,448,595 of “economic opportunity” funds to ex pand the state program for improving the education of migrant labor families, mostly Latin-Americans. It would call for increasing from the present 6,000 to 18,000 the number of school-age children given concentrated six-month courses in South Texas, be fore their families head north to do farm work. Additional adult training, aimed at illiterates, also would be of fered. Gov. John Connally estimated 128,000 migrants in Texas would be in volved. by the school under the circumstances here,” Cox said in Vicksburg. “These children simply elected not to attend the public school except on their terms and conditions.” Schoolmen Greenville Makes Salaries Equal The Greenville City Council on May 12 equalized salaries for white and Ne gro teachers, only hours after Negro teachers named a committee to protest the difference. Board member Frank England Jr. moved that classroom teachers’ basic salaries be equalized, beginning in Sep tember. The motion was approved un animously. Earlier in the day, the Greenville Teachers Association, a 225-member Negro group, named a committee to “express dissatisfaction” with the $100 difference in salary between white and Negro teachers. England said the pay increase would amount to $21,960 during the next school year. The board had given the plan tentative approval at a meeting on May 10. Miscellaneous NAACP Fund Sees ‘Cracks in Walls’ An NAACP Legal Defense Fund re port on civil rights activities issued in New York on May 14 said Mississippi was moving toward “moderate token ism” as opposed to total segregation. “Cracks in the walls of Mississippi’s closed society widened as never before during 1964,” the report said. It also said “Mississippi is becoming more like North Carolina; North Caro lina is becoming more like New York.” The report said public school dese gregation came to Mississippi under federal court orders and that the Uni versity of Mississippi admitted two Negro students, one without a lawsuit. ★ ★ ★ Semmes Luckett, a Clarksdale at torney, has been appointed to the State Sovereignty Commission by Gov. Paul B. Johnson. Luckett assisted the legislature in writing the 1964 private- school tuition plan, which permits chil dren to attend private, non-church schools through state grants. Luckett is counsel for the Clarks dale Municipal School District, which desegregated under federal court orders last fall although no students applied to enter all-white schools. ★ ★ ★ Carl Holman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights told a Dallas confer ence that Texas Christian University in Fort Worth furnished a good ex ample by commencing a study of steps to desegregate its faculty. ★ ★ ★ Dr. Milton K. Curry, president of Bishop College at Dallas, said the steps taken to remove racial barriers so far have been only “token.” He predicted the South will be the best area of the U.S. to live in once it can solve the problems of its “split society.” ★ ★ ★ Shelton Granger, deputy assistant secretary of HEW, said in Dallas that hospitals and other applicants no longer will be able to qualify for federal grants if their racial integration is “token.” “No longer can they expect to trot out that one visible Negro, the instant Negro, and expect it to be conducive evidence of compliance,” he said. “These sham efforts will be detected.” ★ ★ ★ At Houston, eight Negroes were among 17 students trying for places with the All-City Orchestra. It was the first invitation for Negroes to parti cipate. cox Texas (Continued from Page 5)