Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 6—JUNE, 1965—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
ARKANSAS
41 More School Districts Pledge
Compliance; Plans Of 27 Approved
LITTLE ROCK
Dy the end of May, all but 84
-U Arkansas School districts, all
of them biracial, had been heard
from as to their intentions to com
ply with the Civil Rights Act by
desegregating.
This was getting close to the pre
diction that state Education Commis
sioner A. W. Ford has been making
that 350 to 375 of the 411 districts, or
all but a few as he sometimes puts it,
would comply with the law. It was
thought likely also that many of those
84 either were working on compliance
plans or had sent in compliance plans
but had said nothing publicly about it.
At least 27 biracial districts had re
ceived approval from the U. S. Office
of Education for their desegregation
plans, and at least 10 had had their
original plans rejected.
It was obvious when the government
finally announced its guidelines April
29 that not all of the Arkansas plans
known up to that time would meet the
requirements. Many Arkansas plans do
not cover as many as four grades of
desegregation in 1965 and several more
School Districts
Seeking to Comply
With Rights Law
Following are the latest Arkansas
districts which have pledged their
attempts to comply with the 1964
Civil Rights Act, listed with their
white and Negro enumerations (all
persons aged five through 17):
District
White
Negro
De Queen
1,073
63
Plum Bayou
189
233
Marianna
1,369
2,548
Morrilton
2,066
313
Chicot County
104
40
Searcy
2,376
165
Prattsville
227
71
Blevins
257
309
Vanndale
496
179
Sherrill
166
433
Altheimer
302
991
Watson Chapel
1,819
1,511
Harrisburg
1,317
54
Weiner
622
42
Cherry Valley
310
48
Hughes
819
1,973
Palestine
314
283
Prescott
782
620
Kensett
423
114
Wabbaseka
180
664
Ozark
1,293
9
Brickeys
143
536
Moro
314
435
Haynes
71
318
Paris
1,368
15
Gurdon
771
510
Glenwood
369
4
Arkadelphia
1,725
894
Lepanto
1,065
109
Emerson
269
444
Marked Tree
1,411
467
Stuttgart
1,991
1,031
Bay
1,180
20
Okolona
123
169
Osceola
2,040
1,412
Brinkley
1,327
1,120
Horatio
402
27
Shawnee
490
679
Wilson
657
644
Luxora
598
428
Bryant
1,416
25
go beyond 1967 in covering all 12
grades.
Arkansas schoolmen, who had been
pressing hard for some message from
the government as to what they had
to do to comply, were a little surprised
but not too dismayed at the stiffness of
the requirements, according to a sur
vey by the Arkansas Gazette.
‘Tough Plan’
Ford said: “It’s been my feeling all
along that the districts would be in bet
ter position to develop their own plans
without demanding guidelines. How
ever, there was
mounting pressure
and this is the
answer. It is a
tough plan. Many
districts could
have received ap-
w— proval of plans
not as tough as
will now be nec-
ess ary,” Ford said.
' vllSlll& Plans that have
been rejected in
Arkansas are
those of Benton, Foreman, Pocahontas,
Jonesboro, DeWitt, Arkansas City,
Watson, Desha-Drew, Desha County
and Desha Central.
Plans that have been rejected in
Arkansas are those of Benton, Fore
man, Pocahontas, Jonesboro, DeWitt,
Arkansas City, Watson, Desha-Drew,
Desha County and Desha Central.
Jonesboro’s was the first rejected.
Dick Cole, president of the school
board, announced May 3 that he had
received the rejection letter from U. S.
Commissioner Francis Keppel. It did
not say in what way the plan was de
ficient. The plan had been sent to
Washington long before the guidelines
were announced. Cole said the board
would revise it in an effort to meet the
new guidelines.
Officials from the other districts, all
in Arkansas County or Desha County,
flew to Washington the week of May 11
to talk it over with federal officials.
Benton, Foreman and Pocahontas re
ceived their rejection letters from the
government late in May.
Rejected Plans
Benton, which has 3,554 white and
254 Negro students, had planned to de
segregate the top six grades and apply
freedom of choice to the lower six
grades. The elementary schools are lo
cated so that there would have been no
desegregation in the lower grades un
less Negro children requested schools
outside their present attendance areas.
Foreman had published notice that
it would use the freedom-of-choice
system but without specifying grades.
After the rejection, Supt. Ramy Gar
land proposed that Negro high-school
students be admitted to the white high
school this fall but the school board
declined. Instead, the board hired John
Stroud Jr., a Texarkana lawyer, to help
draw up a plan. Foreman has 532 white
and 275 Negro students.
The Pocahontas plan for full desegre
gation of the upper four grades and
freedom of choice in the lower eight
was rejected. After that the board
adopted a new plan of full desegrega
tion of all 12 grades. The district has
1,766 white and 16 Negro students. It
has been sending its high-school stu
dents to school in Newport and has
maintained a one-room one-teacher for
the lower Negro grades. The board said
the Negro teacher, Mrs. Eddie Mae
McDonald, would be retained in the
system.
None of the letters of rejection said
what was wrong with the rejected
plans but a set of the U. S. guidelines
was enclosed with each.
All Provided Choice
All of the rejected plans were free
dom of choice. Some of them made no
mention of faculty desegregation.
The Warren Eagle-Democrat re
ported a telephone interview with G.
W. Foster Jr., consultant to the Office
of Education, in which he mentioned
another kind of barrier to getting a
plan accepted. It was that some dis
tricts in Southeast Arkansas with the
h ghest proportion of Negro students,
such as Gould, Dumas, Lake Village
and Eudoia, have decided to desegre
gate all 12 grades the first year, while
other districts with lesser proportions
of Negro students, such as Rison, War
ren, Monti cello and Pine Bluff, want to
spread desegregation over three or four
years.
Speedy compliance in the districts
where the problem might be expected
to be the most acute is going to make
it “a hell of a lot harder” for slower
plans to be accepted in other districts,
Foster was quoted. And if any districts
are waiting for a softening of federal
policy, they might as well stop, Foster
said, for “there won’t be any late sum
mer sale prices.”
Charges ‘Lousy Job’
Supt. Ned W. Moseley of Warren laid
the blame on the government for plans
being rejected. “They’ve done a lousy
job of giving us advice and guidance,”
he said, and let schoolmen flounder
around with a minimum of information,
until the guidelines were finally an
nounced.
The Crossett News Observer, the
Benton Courier and the Blytheville
Courier News all reported on their
school boards after the guidelines came
out and the general attitude seemed
to be one of resignation.
Crossett had not even got its first
plan in the mail when the guidelines
came out; that plan was scrapped and
the board went to work on a new one.
Board President William Wyatt of
Blytheville said he felt that the Blythe
ville plan would be rejected but the
board decided to wait and see before
starting on another one. Supt. A. D.
Parsons of Benton said his board had
decided to go ahead with pre-regis
tration this spring under the plan sub
mitted, instead of waiting to see
whether it would be approved.
When the Prescott plan was approved
May 18, the Pine Bluff Commercial
thought it could detect a softening of
government policy already. That was
because Prescott’s freedom of choice
will apply to grades 1 through 6 this
year, while the federal guidelines had
said that at least grades 1, 7, 10 and 12
should be included in the first year.
Keppel’s letter of approval to the
Prescott School Board noted that the
plan submitted did not specifically pro
vide for freedom of choice for pupils
in the desegregated grades every year,
and said that this would have to be
made a part of the plan started in
1986-67.
Some Confusion
Newport’s plan was approved May 19
amid some confusion. Gov. Orval E.
Faubus had been in Washington the
day before with other Southern gov
ernors to talk to their congressional
delegations about relaxing the Office of
Education guidelines. On the morning
of May 19 in Little Rock, Faubus told
What They Say
Arkansas Highlights
Forty-one more Arkansas districts
pledged to try to comply with the
1964 Civil Rights Act by desegregat
ing their schools. This left 84 of the
411 districts not heard from. State
Education Commissioner A. W. Ford
still said that all but a few districts
would comply, but so far only 27
plans had been approved for biracial
districts and 10 had been rejected.
At least 10 Negro teachers had lost
or were about to lose their jobs be
cause of the new wave of desegrega
tion, and many were expected to be
affected.
Again reversing their course, the
professional teacher organizations,
Arkansas Education Association
(mostly white) and Arkansas Teach
ers (Negro) Association, decided to
start work anew toward a merger.
Some state school aid funds must
be withheld from local school dis
tricts that fail to comply with the
rights act, the state was told by the
U. S. Education Commissioner in an
swer to a question.
Plaintiffs in the Little Rock deseg
regation case filed an attack on the
new freedom-of-choice plan.
Testimony was heard from the
plaintiffs in the West Memphis de-
his news conference he had heard in
Washington that the Newport plan
originally had been disapproved but
now, with the implication that pres
sure was responsible, had been ap
proved. This turned out not to be ac
curate.
During the afternoon, the Newport
school officials said that, after the
guidelines came out, they had submit
ted a revised plan without ever hear
ing from the government on the first
plan. The first plan called for free-
dom-of-choice desegregation of the first
three grades this year and three more
each year to cover all 12. The revised
plan covers the first four grades this
year and will reach all 12 in three
years instead of four.
The Hope and Arkadelphia plans,
both covering the first six grades this
year, were approved May 18. Fayette
ville, Texarkana and Gillett won ap
proval May 13. Texarkana began de
segregation voluntarily in September,
1964, and Fayetteville started volun
tarily in 1954. By this year, Fayette
ville had desegregated everything ex
cept a single Negro elementary school
with about 65 students; under the new
policy all elementary-grade pupils will
segregation suit opposing that
board’s freedom-of-choice plan.
The Eighth Circuit Appeals Court
at St. Louis upheld the Fort Smith
School District in its revised desegre
gation plan.
A Negro professor at Pine Bluff
retained his seat on the Dollarway
School Board by winning an elec
tion contest filed by his defeated
white opponent.
A consent judgment filed in fed
eral court bound the University of
Arkansas not to discriminate in any
of its programs.
After agreeing to the North Little
Rock desegregation plan expansion,
Negro leaders changed their minds
and registered a protest, renewing
their demands for wider desegrega
tion.
Freedom of choice is so new that
it has not been used for a single
school semester in Arkansas but al
ready is under widespread attack in
Little Rock and West Memphis de
segregation lawsuits and in statements
of the Student Non-violent Co-ordi
nating Committee, the North Little
Rock Council on Human Relations, a
Memphis official of the U. S. Com
mission on Civil Rights and an offi
cer of the Little Rock Council on
Community Affairs.
be assigned to schools according to at
tendance areas without regard to race.
113 Approvals
Eight biracial districts and 105 dis
tricts with no racial differences re
ceived approval of their compliance
plans May 1. The eight were Benton -
ville, Walker, Van Buren, Melbourne,
Jefferson County, Gosnell, Alread and
Havana. Bentonville, Van Buren, Gos
nell and Havana had been desegregat
ing previously.
Charleston, Danville and Mansfield
received approval May 24. All three
have been desegregated previously.
Commissioner Ford announced May
27 that all but eight of the 191 districts
either all-white or all-Negro had been
approved and he sent notice to Wash
ington urging quick approval of those
eight.
Many of the districts were receiving
freedom-of-choice preference requests
during May under their new desegre
gation plans, but only a few reports
were available on how many Negro re
quests were made. Government advis
ors have suggested that this is a cru-
(See 41 MORE, Page 7)
Teachers’ Achievement Gaps Noted
At the State PTA Congress May 3 at
Little Rock, Forrest Rozzell, executive
secretary of the Arkansas Education
Association, said there is justice in the
Negro demands for equal rights and
access to opportunity and the methods
they are using to achieve them.
On the average, he said, there is a
difference in the academic achievement
of white and Negro children in Ar
kansas and between the competence of
white and Negro teachers. This comes
not from racial inferiority or superior
ity, he said, but from differences in
educational opportunity, from the very
segregated schools that now are to be
eliminated.
This first requires compensatory edu
cation to help bring the Negro level
up, he said, and then it requires the
elimination of the circumstances that
allow it to exist.
Once the dual school system has been
eliminated, Rozzell said, the kind of
special protection that Negro teachers
received from that system also will
be gone. If they are then to get and
keep jobs, they simply will have to
bring themselves up to the standards
of the white community, he said.
★ ★ ★
A stiff exchange over Little Rock’s
new freedom-of-choice desegregation
plan took place May 11 and 12 between
Ozell Sutton, secretary of the Negro
Council on Community Affairs (COCA)
at Little Rock, and Everett Tucker, Jr.,
member of the Little Rock School
Board. Sutton delivered his criticism
in a speech to the board of directors of
the Little Rock PTA Council and Tucker
replied in a statement the next day.
Sutton called the freedom-of-choice
plan a scheme to frustrate desegrega
tion. He said it permits school officials
to “escape responsibility” to see that
desegregation is carried out and places
the responsibility instead on the Negro
children and their parents.
Sutton said the Negro community
would get tired of that and that it now
possessed resources to back up its
protest. He said Negro voters are num
erous enough now to be able to defeat
any bond issue or tax proposal the
school board might offer.
He said the only acceptable alterna
tive to freedom of choice would be
non-overlapping attendance areas
where all the students in the area
around a school would attend that
school, regardless of race, and where
the faculty would be desegregated so
that there would be no “white” or “Ne
gro” schools.
Cites Board Effort
Tucker said he believed that most
whites and most Negroes in Little Rock
still prefer segregation but that the
school board had made a real effort to
accommodate those who prefer deseg
regation. Tucker said that “no court
has ever directed any school board to
take affirmative action to integrate
schools. The courts have merely said
the boards shall not discriminate on
account of race.”
As for using attendance areas. Tucker
said this was the surest way to bring
about de facto segregation, and another
objection was that it would lock sev
eral hundred white children into schools
that are now all-Negro schools.
★ ★ ★
Federal Appeals Court Judge Thur-
good Marshall of New York spoke Ma>
16 in Little Rock. It was his first visit to
Arkansas since the Little Rock schoo
crisis of 1957-58 when, as NAA ^
counsel, he was representing the Nos*
plaintiffs in the Little Rock case 1
federal court.
He came back to speak at an
racial dinner marking the 80th
niversary of St. Philip’s EpiscoP“
Church, a pr
dominantly
church with f e
er than 90 mem
bers. Marshall
a vestryman o
Philip’s m
York, the larg h
Episcopal ch
in the country ,
The *e3*
speech
the govf.
has and ,
adn £d
doing its
his
that
ment
share—through
uuiiig iio auaic gjiu
istrations of Eisenhower, Kenne y ^
Johnson, through the rulings ® ygb
U. S. Supreme Court, and now tn ^
the acts of Congress—and n ° ^gga-
main thing holding back T^^ddle
tion is simply the apathy of the
group of Americans, the ones 0 ^ gt j the
the left nor the right. He
church in that group.
w «raS
During the dinner, Marshall ^'^cate-
sented an Arkansas Traveler
an honorary document, signe
Orval E. Faubus.
Gc'