Brown @ 50
The Evolution of an Idea:
That Equality Requires
Integration
1
• On Monday, May 17, 1954, in Brown v.
Board of Education, the Supreme Court
declared that racial segregation in public
schools violated the Fourteenth
Amendment‘s guarantee of equal protection
of the laws.
2
The Idea Embedded in Brown
• Brown further stated:
• Equal opportunity to education is a linchpin
to success in all areas of life for African
Americans.
– Today, it [education] is a principal instrument in awakening the child to
cultural values, in preparing him for later professional training, and in
helping him to adjust normally to his environment. In these days, it is
doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed in life if he
is denied the opportunity of an education. Brown v. Board of Education,
347 U.S. 483, ___ (1954).
3
A Framework for Assessing the
Legacy of Brown
• Brown called for the end of racial
segregation in schools which for many
meant integration.
• Brown pinned life‘s improvements to an
integrated quality education.
• As the years unfolded, what can we say
about the hopes embedded in an integrated
school system?
4
Testing the Idea
• Using Baltimore as a focus, here is a
comparison of integration in education and
selected meaningful conditions in 1954 and
in 2004.
5
Testing Brown in Baltimore
Baltimore in 1954 Baltimore in 2004
– Public school – Public school
enrollment is about enrollment is 89%
60% White Black
– If you are Black, – If you are Black,
chances are 99% you chances are 74% you
attend an all Black attend an all Black
school school
– Chances are __% you – Chances are about 41%
drop out before you drop out before
completing high school completing high school
6
Fifty Years of Integration
• Baltimore in 1954 • Baltimore in 2004
– All-Black Schools:__ – All-Black Schools: ___
– All-White Schools:__ – All-White Schools: 0
– Schools with a small – Schools with a small
number of Black number of White
students: ____ students (<20%): ___
– Integrated Schools – Integrated Schools
(White and Black (White and Black
enrollment is at least enrollment is at least
20%): 0 20%): 0
7
Life‘s Chances in Baltimore
• Baltimore in 1954 • Baltimore in 2004
– Chances are __ % you – Chances are __% you
go to college go to college
– Chances are __% – Chances are __ %
you‘re out of work you‘re out of work
– Chances are __% you – Chances are __5 you
own your home own your home
8
Measures of Economic Success
• Baltimore in 1954 • Baltimore in 2004
– If you are Black, you – If you are Black, you
make 60% of what a make 71% of what a
White person earns White person earns
– Is to have wealth that is – Is to have wealth that is
__% of what a White __% of what a White
household possesses household possesses
9
A Journey in Time – 1954 - 2004
• How did our integration ideals arise from
Brown and what happened in the wake of
the decision?
10
The Problems of An Evolving
Ideal
• The history of Brown is dynamic. What societal
and political changes over the years affected how
and to what degree the ideals of Brown would get
implemented?
• Assessing the impact of Brown is complex as the
promise of ending segregation in public schools
means differing things to different people.
Against what set of expectations do you assess the
outcome of Brown?
11
Pre-Brown Environment
• Add some Jim Crow
law picture anywhere
from 1896-1950‘s
would be okay -
check with Phillip to
see if he has an actual
artifact???
12
Pre-Brown Environment
• Plessy v. Ferguson - Supreme Court
decision handed down in 1896. It‘s
principle is known as ―Separate But Equal.‖
• Findings: ―Jim Crow‖ laws requiring
separate accommodations for Whites and
Blacks do not violate the 14th amendment
(equal protection of the laws) as long as the
accommodations are equal.
13
The Strategy to Undo Plessy
• Attack the equal in ―separate but equal‖
• Focus on education, particularly in professional schools.
– Reasons:
• ―Education is preparation for the competition of life,‖
• Professional schools could be the source of sorely needed black
leaders.
• Judges—as products of professional schools themselves—could
appreciate the consequences of the inequalities that indisputably
existed.
• Opposition to integration of professional schools, affecting relatively
small numbers of older students, threatened southern whites far less
than did the immediate integration of primary and secondary schools.
14
The Strategy to Undo Plessy
• The NAACP choose the path of making
segregation with equality too expensive to
maintain. It would seek to demonstrate beyond
question the inequalities that exist in education
• Provide hard evidence of the salary differentials
between black and white teachers and the limited
opportunities that exist for black students
compared to their white counterparts
15
The Architect
• Charles Hamilton Houston
(1895-1950)
• – Vice-Dean at Howard
University Law school,
mentor to generation of
Black lawyers, including
Thurgood Marshall,
Special Counsel to the
NAACP, Houston
implemented legal
strategy to undo Plessy
16
Did You Know?
• Clarifying the realities
that ―Separate but
Equal‖ was not
altogether disabling –
It did produce
– Black Businesses
– HBCUs
– The Black Lawyers
who attacked Plessy
17
Initial Successes
• Series of victories in higher education led to
rulings that due to unequal facilities, Black
students seeking admissions must be
admitted to University of Maryland,
University of Texas, University of
Oklahoma
18
Murray v. Maryland
• In 1936, Donald
Murray, graduate of
Amherst, sought and
won admission to
University of
Maryland School of
Law
• From left to right, young Thurgood
Marshall, Murray, Houston
19
Missouri ex rel.Gaines v. Canada
• Represented by Charles
Houston, Gaines sought
admission to University of
Missouri.
• Missouri set about
creating a law school for
Blacks.
• In 1939 as the NAACP
prepared to challenge the
inferiority of the school,
Gaines disappeared. His
disappearance remains a
mystery. 20
McLaurin v. Oklahoma State
Regents
• McLaurin had to sit apart at a
designated desk in an
anteroom outside the
classroom, to eat in the
cafeteria at a time when no
white students were present,
and to study only at a
designated place on the
mezzanine floor of the library
21
Sweatt v. Painter
• Sweat
22
A New Strategy
• Spurred by the success
of these cases, yet
seeing the limited
impact of this type of
litigation, the NAACP
Legal arm shifts its
strategy, under
Thurgood Marshall‘s
leadership.
23
The Direct Attack on Plessy
• To argue that segregation based on race is
inherently unequal as racial separation has a
detrimental effect on Black children.
• The setting in which this argument would
have the greatest impact to end Jim Crow
would be segregated schools.
24
Assumptions of the NACCP
Strategy
• Quality education was crucial to
improvements in all areas of life.
• Racially mixed schools would facilitate
equal opportunity and led to improved
economical and political status of Blacks.
25
Other Black Views
• The evil of segregation is not that it denies Blacks
association with Whites, but that it denies Blacks
true freedom to chose whether to associate or not.
• Racially mixed schools or integration generally
would weaken Black institutions and thereby
promote Black dependence on others with whom
they would otherwise seek to be equal.
26
Voices of Some White Christians
(or did you know? Picture
• Integration ran counter to both social and religious beliefs
held by many white Christians, particularly in the South.
One of the main interpretations of the faith by many white
Southerners was a clear separation of the races. They
believed that a consequence of integration was what they
called the ―mongrelization‖ of the races –and the
consequence of that was literally hell: ―A bastard shall not
enter into the Congregation of the Lord: even to his tenth
generation none of his decendants shall he not enter into
the Congregation of the Lord‖ (Deuteronomy 23:2). Based
on the white Southerners‘ fears, it was easy to understand
why protests over integration, such as this one in New
Orleans, often turned violent.
27
Segregation Not The Issue --
W.E.B. Du Bois
• The only thing that we not only can, but
must, do is voluntarily and insistently to
organize our economic and social
power, no matter how much
segregation it involves…[R]un and
support our own institutions. (Du
Bois,The Crisis, January 1934)
• Does the Negro need separate schools?
―…No general and inflexible rule can
be laid down. Theoretically, the Negro
needs neither segregated schools nor
mixed schools. What he needs is
Education.‖
• W.E.B. Du Bois
28
On Self Reliance
• Writer, Zora Neale Hurston
(1901-1960) had grown up in
the "Pure Negro Town" of
Eatonville, Fla., which boasted
a charter, marshal, mayor,
council, plenty to eat--and
streets so peaceful that there
was no jail. She described the
Brown decision as an insult to
black communities like hers,
which had educated their own
just fine. . . .
29
These alternate views always
existed and still have strength
"The masses of blacks have historically opposed segregation,
which is state-enforced separation of the races, and fought for
desegregation, which is freedom of choice. Diabolically, the
end result was integration, which taught blacks not to want to
go to school with one another, not to want to live with one
another, and not to spend money with one another.“ Tony
Brown
http://www.issues-views.com/index.php/sect/1003/article/502
30
The Supreme Court Decides
The issue before the court:
Does racial segregation of children in public
schools deprive minority children of equal
protection of the laws under the Fourteenth
Amendment?
Supreme Court Ruling:
The Supreme Court ruled to end racial segregation in public
schools. The new chief Justice, Earl Warren wrote the opinion. The
ruling was unanimous but not every Justice saw things the same
way.
In 1955, the ruling known as “Brown II” called for ending
segregation in public schools with “all deliberate speed.”
31
1954
Thurgood Marshall with James Nabrit Jr. and George E.C. Hayes
after their victory in the Brown v. Board of Education case
before the Supreme Court, May 17, 1954.
Brown Family. Eldest daughter Linda walked past a white public school seven
a
blocks from her home, crossing dangerous railroad tracks to catch32bus
to attend her segregated school in Topeka, Kansas, 21 blocks from her home.
Did You Know?
The case known as Brown was actually 5 cases from different
parts of the country consolidated for argument before the
Supreme Court. Brown was first because the names of those
bringing the lawsuits were alphabetically listed.
Thurgood Marshall actually argued the case from South
Carolina.
Crucial to the argument was social science theory presented by
Kenneth and Mamie Clark that even facilities that were
physically equal did not take into account "intangible"
factors, and that segregation itself has a deleterious effect
on the education of black children.
33
Following Brown
• The ruling affected states that had laws on the
books maintaining desegregated schools.
(Southern & Border States)
• Judges in the lower federal courts would have
oversight regarding desegregation plans.
• School districts could devise their own strategies
to end segregation in their schools.
34
The Challenge of Complaince
Generally, school desegregation went through
stages – defiance, token compliance,
integration (modest-massive) and
resegregation
Due to a host of factors, the length of a stage
would vary greatly from community to
community.
35
Mid 1950‘s
Following Brown – South Resists
• Virginia's political establishment vows not to comply
with the federal court ruling and declares it will maintain
school segregation through a campaign that becomes
known as "massive resistance." Virginia will close any
white public schools that admit African-American
students.
36
1957
In Little Rock, Alabama, Central High
School was to begin the 1957 school
year desegregated. On September
2, the night before the first day of
school, Governor Faubus announced
that he had ordered the Arkansas
National Guard to monitor the
school the next day. When a group
of nine black students arrived at
Central High on September 3, the
were kept from entering by the
National Guardsmen.
Elizabeth Eckford, one of the Little Rock Nine walks through a mob 37
of angry white students.
1957
• Black reporter
covering Little Rock
Central High school is
physically attacked.
38
1957
… Southern whites, he said, ―are not bad
people. All they are concerned about is to
see that their sweet little girls are not
required to sit in school alongside some
big overgrown Negro‖ --- Brown v.39 Board
of Education -- James T. Patterson
http://www.vahistory.org/massive.resistance/photos/1/Diggs0027.jpg
40
Massive Resistance in Virginia
• The leaders of the Prince Edward County
public school system in Virginia went to
extreme measures to prevent desegregation,
shutting down their schools from 1959 to
1964. They could do so because the state, in
defiance of Brown v. Board of Education,
passed a series of laws allowing school
systems to close rather than to desegregate by
court order. Whites in the county built
private academy for their 1,550 students.
• Meanwhile, only a small percentage of the
area‘s 1,800 black students attended the
makeshift ―freedom schools‖ set up by the
NAACP and black ministers. The rest stayed
home, missing out on their educations. In
1964, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the
Prince Edward situation, ruling that it was
unconstitutional to close public schools to
circumvent desegregation.
41
Locally in Baltimore
42
Did You Know – 1950‘s
• ―In the late 1950's, Chicago School Supt. Benjamin Willis permitted no student
transfers to eliminate overcrowding in the predominantly black schools. Instead,
the Chicago Board purchased hundreds of mobile classrooms for these schools,
which not only solidified segregation but also eliminated school playgrounds. As
late as 1963, 562 classrooms stood empty in white neighborhoods, while schools in
the black ghetto were severely overcrowded, even with the mobile units in use.‖
• Jim Crow laws were still in existence and prohibited mixed marriages, voting
rights and equal education in several states across the country. Even after having
such a large impact on the rights (or lack thereof) of Black citizens in the U.S.,
many of today‘s students are unaware of the laws‘ existence. ―According to a
survey of students in American history classes at a major university, less than 20
percent recognized the words ―Jim Crow‖ at all. Most of them had only a vague
notion that the word once had something to do with segregation.‖
43
1960‘s
In the early 1960‘s an interpretation of Brown was that the
―Constitution… does not require integration…It merely forbids the use
of governmental power to enforce segregation.‖
Judge John J. Parker Briggs v. Elliot 132 F.Supp.776 (S. Carolina, 1955)
Pupil placement statutes were often-used. Under these plans, students
were assigned to schools on a non-racial criteria.
Effect in Charlotte, North Carolina:
3 blacks in white schools 1957-58
4 blacks in white schools 1958-1959
1 black in white school 1959-1960
44
Gov. George Wallace blocks the doorway to Foster Auditorium at the
University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, June 11, 1963. 45
Credit: The University of Alabama
Federal Intervention
• Ruby Bridges, age six, escorted
by U.S. deputy marshals to attend
William Frantz Elementary School
in New Orleans, Louisiana. Due to
a court-ordered integration law, the
first- grader became the first (and
only) black child enrolled in the
school.
• White opposition to school
integration was so intense in New
Orleans that all the parents of
William Frantz Elementary School
students pulled their children out of
school when first grader Ruby
Bridges was admitted on
Novemember 4. The white boycott
of the school lasted five months.
46
University of Georgia
In 1960, Hamilton Holmes and Charlayne
Hunter attempted to desegregate the
University of Georgia. Their admission
was held up for a year. It took a court
order to finally allow them to register at
the University of Georgia in early 1961.
White students, angered by their
admission, hurled bricks, stones and
pop bottles through the window of
Charlayne Hunter and held a banner
that read ―Nigger Go Home!!!‖ Police
used tear gas to stop the on-going
rioting. Instead of members of the mob
being suspended, Hunter and Holmes
were suspended—for their own safety,
school officials said.
In spite of the adversity they faced, they
both graduated in June of 1963.
47
University of Mississippi
• To register at the University of
Mississippi, African-American
James Meredith had to overcome
several court battles, defiance by
Governor Ross Barnett, and a
campus-wide riot. Only after the
arrival of 23,00 soldiers was
Meredith able to register, on
October 1, 1962.
• Though Meredith was harassed
virtually everyday, jeered on the
way to class and an effigy hung
outside a dorm window with the
words, ―Go back to Africa where
you belong,‖ he graduated from the
University of Mississippi in June
1963.
48
The Governor as Registrar
• Mississippi Governor
Ross Barnett appointed
himself registrar at the
University of Mississippi
to make sure he could
deny James Meredith‘s
admission. But quietly,
behind the scenes, Barnett
negotiated with the
Kennedy Administration
to allow Meredith‘s
registration.
49
On Delay in the South
• …‖Many areas of the South are
retreating to a position where they
will permit a handful of Negroes to
attend all-white schools…Thus, we
have advanced in some places from
all-out, unrestrained resistance to a
sophisticated form of delaying
tactics, embodied in tokenism.
1962 article ―The Case Against
Tokenism.‘ New York Times Magazine, Nov. 27, 1960
50
Accelerating ‗Deliberate Speed‘
In response to resistance and delaying tactics in various states
and in an atmosphere of impatience and unrest in many
Black communities, the late 1960‘s saw the Federal Courts
and the Supreme Court (―Warren Court‖) ordering States
to have plans to racially balance schools and to have
desegregation plans that worked.
The first of these decisions came 11 years after Brown I
51
United States v. Jefferson County Bd. Of Education
• 1n 1966, a federal court Judge
in Louisiana ruling on a
―freedom of choice‖ plan said ―
the only adequate redress for a
previously overt system-wide
policy of segregation directed
against Negroes as a collective
entity is a system-wide policy
of integration.‖
• The ruling included a detailed
plan for the county to have a
This is a March 1957 photo of Judge John
freedom of choice plan that
Minor Wisdom. Wisdom was the last survivor worked.
of the federal appeals court that forced the
deep South to give up segregation -- (AP
52
Photo)
Green v. County School Board
• In 1968, the Supreme Court weighed in on ―Freedom of
Choice‖ plans.
• In rural New Kent County,Virginia, the school board had
established a ―Freedom of Choice Plan‖ in 1965. Under
this plan, Black students were free to choose which school
to attend.
• The small county had two schools. Each school was a
combined elementary/high school – one school was white
the other school was black. Blacks and White students
lived and were bused throughout the county to attend the
appropriate school.
53
The Illusion of Choice
• In the ―freedom of choice plan‖ that the
Supreme Court struck down in the Green
case, 115 of 736 Black students chose to go to the
white high school, but not one of 519 white
students chose to attend the black high school.
85% of Black students attended Black schools.
54
A Tale of Two Schools
1969 George W. Watkins School Yearbook. – The County’s Black
School Courtesy of New Kent County Public Schools, Virginia.)
1967 New Kent School student
government officers. – The County‘s White School
55
The Supreme Court Decides
• In 1968, the Court rejected this ―Freedom of Choice‖ plan
saying ―plans must be effective in achieving desegregation.
• “The board must…fashion steps which promise realistically to convert
promptly to a system without a "white" school and a "Negro" school, but
just schools.” Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, Va.
1968
• Effective desegregation plans yielded proven
desegregation in student assignment, faculty, staff,
transportation, extracurricular activities and
facilities
56
The Aftermath
• Shortly thereafter, the
New Kent School Board
converted the former
Black school into the
County‘s Elementary
School and shifted all the
county's high school
students to the formerly
all-white school.
(1970 New Kent High School Yearbook.
Courtesy of New Kent County Public Schools, Virginia.)
57
A Change of Mind
• In 1969, a Supreme Court ruling stated ―all
deliberate speed‖ was no longer
constitutionally permissible. It was the
obligation of every school district to
terminate dual school systems at once and
to operate now and hereafter only unitary
schools.
• Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education (Mississippi)
58
The Status of Segregation
• In 1968 78% of White students attend
predominately White schools, or as the
graph shows 32% of White students in the
South attend schools attended by the
average Black student.
59
Percentage of White Students in Schools Attended
by the Average Black Student,
1968-2000
60
White
• At the same time, white
public school enrollment
was dropping. In
Mississippi, white public
school enrollment dropped
25 percent overall
between 1968 and 1970.
In Mississippi counties
with large black
populations, white flight
from the public schools
reached 90%.
61
Did You Know – 1960‘s
Civil Rights movement is in full swing. Desegregation in other areas, voting, public
accommodations, and employment soon follow.
After the longest filibuster in history, the 1964 Civil Rights Act was passed and included a
provision for termination of federal funds for school districts that continued to
desegregate.
1960‘s saw a rise in ―seg academies‖ – private schools arising for the children of white
families leaving the public schools.
The Civil Rights Movements was a media event. Both Movement leaders and segregationist
leaders recognized the power of the graphic image to convey a message. Martin Luther
King, Jr. referred to the brutality in Birmingham in 1963 as being ―imprisoned in a
luminous glare revealing the naked truth to the whole world.‖ Sheriff Jim
Clark in Selma, Alabama, beat up photographers, snatched their cameras and covered
camera lenses. Yet they could not prevent the ―luminous glare.‖
62
Other Voices
• James S. Coleman was
commissioned by the 1964 Civil
Rights Act to investigate the effects
of the 1954 Brown Decision. The
first national study on public
education was conducted to validate
that integration was a key variable
in equality of educational
opportunity and was in the public's
best interest.
The Coleman Report is widely considered the most important education study of the 20th century. It was named after
its head researcher, who founded the Johns Hopkins Department of Social Relations in 1959 (today the Department
of Sociology). Coleman stayed on the faculty until 1973, during which time he conducted much of his
groundbreaking work in the sociology of education, and co-founded, with Edward McDill, the Center for Social
Organization of Schools. He died in 1995.
(Johns Hopkins Magazine – 2000) 63
The Coleman Report
• Written by James Coleman of Johns
Hopkins University (Professor of Sociology
from 1926-1973), the report indicated that
the best predictor of academic achievement
in school was the economic and social
situation of the child‘s family and peers.
• Equality of Educational Opportunity (EEOS)1966
64
Other Voices
• There were Blacks who
continued to raise doubts
about the virtues of
integrated schools. Groups
such as The Black
Panthers, Student
Nonviolent Coordination
Committee, (SNCC)
Congress on Racial
Equality (CORE), Nation
of Islam and others
promoted the virtues of
economic power and
strength of community. 65
1970‘s
• A period of inconsistent rulings,
conservative action by Congress, yet some
key determinations moving towards the
dismantling of dual school systems.
66
The Supreme Court on Busing
1971 North Carolina case of
Swann vs. Charlotte-
Mecklenberg Board of
Education, the Supreme
Court granted federal judges
the authority to order district
wide busing to desegregate
schools.
67
Swan v. Charlotte-Mecklenberg
Board of Education
• Although unanimous, the decision compromised
– Not to require every school to reflect the racial
composition of the school system as a whole
– Not to forbid a small number of one-race schools
– Not to require year-by-year adjustments of the racial
composition of school enrollments
– To factor in time and distance in assessing the
obligation to desegregate
68
1973 – Attention Swifts to the
North
• In Keyes v. Denver School District No. 1, 413 U.S. 189 (1973),
the Supreme Court considers the problems of Northern
metropolitan segregation for the first time, as well as the rights
of Latinos to desegregated education.
• The court agreed that specific policies enacted by the Board
intended to keep black children out of white schools in a certain
area of the city. The Supreme Court upheld the remedy of
greater busing to eliminate segregation.
69
Busing in Denver
• Dynamiting of buses
at the Denver Public
Schools Service
Center in 1970
Patterson, p. 161 70
Busing For Desegregation Takes
A Turn
• In 1974, the court invalidated a
desegregation plan that involved busing
students between heavily black Detroit and
its heavily white suburbs. There could be no
remedies across district lines for racial
imbalance within district lines, without
proof that the lines themselves were drawn
for racially discriminatory reasons.
71
Marshall on Miliken
• The case, Milliken vs. Bradley, was a
turning point, for it deemed that voluntary
"white flight" from urban centers was
beyond the power of the courts to remedy.
• In a dissent, Marshall called the ruling a
―solemn mockery of Brown‖
72
Other Black Leaders
73
Other Black Voices on Busing
• Mayor Coleman Young of
Detroit‘s comments: ―I
shed no tears for cross-
district busing…I don‘t
think there‘s any magic in
putting little white kids
alongside little black kids
if the little white kids and
little black kids over here
have half a dollar for
education and the little
black kids and little white
kids overt there are getting
74
a dollar.
• Derrick Bell
―The insistence on
integrating every public
school that is black
perpetuates the racially
demeaning and unproven
assumption that blacks
must have a majority
white presence in order to
either teach or lean
effectively.‖
75
Busing in Boston
• Judge Arthur Garrity issues a
plan to desegregate Boston's
public schools, ordering the
busing of 21,000 students. In
response, race riots erupt in
high schools in Hyde Park,
Roxbury, and South Boston.
76
Busing Riots in Boston
• Antibusing Riot
Boston, 1974
77
Congress on Busing
• Congress prohibits the department of Health Education and
Welfare from threatening to withhold federal funds to force
school districts to bus students beyond the schools nearest their
homes as a means of achieving racial integration.
78
Did You Know?
79
Did You Know
• University of California Regents v. Bakke (1978) ruled
that the Medical School could not establish quotas for
minorities but could use race based considerations in an
effort to achieve diversity.
Brown was ………….
• In August 1979, the ACLU and a group of black parents
reopen the original Brown case in Topeka, arguing that
twenty-five years after the decision many of the city's
schools remain racially segregated.
• Some other Did you know (Rodriguez)
80
Percentage of White Students in Schools Attended
by the Average Black Student,
1968-2000
81
1980‘s
When faced with mandates to desegregate
districts that had long had rapidly
declining white and middle class
enrollment, many districts and courts
adopted limited plans that desegregated
part of the student population and that
emphasized choice. Such plans often took
the form of implementing magnet schools
or “controlled choice” plans.
• (Harvard Civil Rights – Multicultural report)
82
Riddick v. School Board of the City
of Norfolk Va.
• School district declared seg
83
Percentage of White Students in Schools Attended
by the Average Black Student,
1968-2000
84
Did You Know – 1980‘s
85
1990‘s – Towards Resegregation
• The Supreme Court rules in Board of Education of
Oklahoma City v. Dowell that school districts can
be released from desegregation plans after taking
all "practicable" steps to eliminate the legacy of
segregation. This ruling substantially altered the
Supreme Court‘s position on desegregation cases
and made it more likely that school districts would
be declared ――unitary‖‖ and freed from further
court supervision.
86
Freeman V. Ptitts
• In 1992 The Supreme Court rules that a Georgia
school district can be released from desegregation
orders even if they have never fully complied with
all aspects.
• The resegregation (50 % of black students in the
county were attending schools that were now 90%
or more black) was not a product of state action
but of private choices.
87
1995
• Supreme Court rules in Missouri v. Jenkins that
low minority achievement scores are not evidence
of a district's failure to desegregate.
• There was not a requirement that student academic
achievement must improve before a court
overseeing a desegregation plan could step aside.
• Justice Thomas writes that the mere fact that a
school has no white students does not mean that a
constitutional violation has occurred 88
• September 1999
• A district court in North Carolina dissolves the
30 year old desegregation order in the
landmark Swann case, announcing that the
Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district has
remedied its past discrimination and that the
schools must be returned to local control.
89
Percentage of White Students in Schools Attended
by the Average Black Student,
1968-2000
90
Did You Know?
• Affirmative Action
– Hopwood v. Texas – main idea
– 96 – Prop 209
91
50 Years After Brown
• Clearly, there are many issues involved in
the goal for equality in education. Brown‘s
history reveals that integration was thought
to be a necessary path to equality.
• What lessons can be drawn from the 50 year
history of Brown?
92
50 Years After Brown
• In Baltimore
– The Public Schools are no longer racially segregated by
force of law – just by dent of demographics.
– Black students still receive an inferior education, not
because the law mandates racial separation, but because
of school finance.
– Notwithstanding the harsh realities facing the schools,
talented young people remarkably overcome these
circumstances to do well –
93
But, For the Mass of Black
People in Baltimore
• 50 Years after Brown
– 6 of 10 children entering the 9th grade won‘t
finish high school.
– 1 household in 4 earns less than $15,000.
– Earnings of a Black household are 71% of what
a White household, just 11 percentage points
more than it was in 1950.
94
50 Years After Brown
• Nationally
– The percentage of White students attending
class with a Black student is less today than it
was 30 years ago.
– Major universities cannot admit a diverse class
comprised of talented Black students, without
challenging the same Constitution that Brown
construed to their benefit.
95
49 Years After Brown
• A troubled Supreme
Court Justice is forced
to hope out loud that
25 years from now
racial preferences
would no longer be
needed to serve ―the
goal of equality.‖
• Grutter v. Bollinger, ___ U.S. ___, ___
(2003)
96
The Integration Ideal –
50 Years After Brown
• Is it a noble idea that has survived 50 years of
changing times and conflicting interests without
being given a fair chance to work?
• Is it a a well-intended illusion that, for these 50
years, has poorly served as an instrument for
assuring equality in America?
• Is it a misstep we must acknowledge to learn the
lesson of how equality will happen?
97
Take out Maybe--The Implications
• If a noble idea denied a fair chance, what
does that fair chance require, and is it worth
it?
• If the illusion, what is the substance of the
remedy that well-serves the goal of
equality?
• If the misstep from which we learn, what is
the product of the final lesson?
98
http://www.lib.umich.edu/exhibit
s/brownarchive/cases.html
99
Is this the End of the Brown
Journey?
• You decide!
• Note your reflections
in the reflections book
at the end of this
exhibit
100