1961 US Commission on Civil Rights Report Book 2 - University of ...

Curriculum disparities as between white and Negro high schools, another
classic measure of tangible inequality, has led to an order to admit
a Negro to a white school, even though the pupil was not eligible for
admission under a court-approved plan. 110
These decisions seem sound in theory because the rationale of the
School Segregation Cases seems to be that where tangible equality exists,
the public interest in an orderly transition may outweigh the plaintiff's
personal rights. But where there is tangible inequality, the plaintiff's
rights may have greater weight. A difficult situation could arise, however,
if a large number of Negro pupils demanded immediate admission
to white schools on this ground. In spite of the inherent difficulties,
voluntary action to admit large numbers of Negroes to white schools
was taken in the first years after the School Segregation Cases in some
States, notably Oklahoma and Kentucky, upon the closing of substandard
Negro schools. Such voluntary recognition of the inequalities in
the existing Negro schools seems, however, to be a thing of the past.
Immediate general admission may also be required even when schools
are equal in tangible respects. In Cooper v. Aaron 1U when the court
said that in many locations, obedience to the constitutional duty to desegregate
"would require the immediate general admission of Negro
children," 112 it apparently went beyond mere tangible inequality, referring
to all cases where administrative difficulties did not warrant
delay.
Recently, complete and immediate desegregation has occurred mainly
in schools serving dependents of military personnel where the number
of Negro students was not large. Both by court order 113 and by voluntary
action 114 on the part of school authorities, in some places all schoolage
children of Negro military personnel have been admitted to the
off-base school serving dependents of white personnel.
The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Evans v. Ennis 115
recognized the need for immediate, general admission of all Negro pupils
seeking admission to the white schools in the still segregated school districts
in Delaware. It rejected a grade-a-year plan approved by the
district court and insisted upon a plan that would provide for the
immediate admission to white schools in all grades of all Negro children
who desired it, in the fall of <strong>1961</strong> and thereafter. The court distinguished
the situation in Delaware from that in Nashville where a 12-year
plan had been approved by the courts: 116
32
Many of the school districts and high school areas of Delaware with
which we are concerned are in rural or semirural areas, and the
number of presently segregated Negro schoolchildren involved in
the whole of Delaware is much less than the number involved at
Nashville. Integration problems are more difficult of solution in
heavily populated urban areas.