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

previous year. In September 1960 five more school districts opened the
doors to their white schools to Negro pupils. Dr. Miller, State Superintendent
of Schools for Delaware, testified at the <strong>Commission</strong>'s Gatlinburg
conference that the State had made noteworthy progress in desegregation
in the year immediately following the 1954 Supreme Court
decision; he pointed out, however, that before September 1959 the
process was concentrated in that portion of the State north of Dover.
He said that none of the schools south of the capital had attempted desegregation
after the unfortunate Milford incident in I954. 80
It is noteworthy, therefore, that desegregation in 1959 and 1960 was
predominantly in the lower half of the State which is traditionally
Southern in orientation. No incidents of any kind occurred. 81
Kentucky
Although school desegregation has progressed in an orderly fashion without
incidents in Kentucky, a trend toward a decrease in the actual
number of Negro pupils attending schools with white pupils may be developing.
The number of desegregated school districts in Kentucky has
increased each year since 1955, but the actual number of Negro pupils in
desegregated schools reached a peak during the school year 1959-60 and
decreased in September 1960. The Department of Education of Louisville
(where a large proportion of the State's Negro population is concentrated)
reported to the <strong>Commission</strong> that in 1959, 76.4 percent of its
Negro pupils were enrolled hi biracial schools, whereas in 1960 the
number decreased to 73.8 percent; meanwhile the percentage of white
students in biracial schools declined from 88.4 to 83.4. 6a This occurred
in spite of the fact that there was a slight numerical increase in the total
Negro school population in Louisville and a slight decrease in the white
school population in i g6o. e3 The report also stated that no records were
kept as to the number of requests for transfer out of formerly Negro
schools by white pupils, or the number of Negro pupils requesting transfer
out of formerly white schools. However, when asked to explain the
overall decrease in pupils attending biracial schools, an assistant State
superintendent said that evidently more pupils were taking advantage of
the transfer privileges to attend schools where their own race predominated."
Although no school district in Kentucky was newly desegregated by
Federal court order in 1959-60, the Owen County Board of Education
was ordered to desegregate its elementary schools at the opening of the
1 959-6o school year. 68 The county high schools had been desegregated
in the fall of 1958 by court order.
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