Desegregation of the Bulloch County school system
Harrison Palmer
The
attack on the Bulloch County School System was first launched by Department of
Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) in 1967.
In September of that year, The HEW notified the Bulloch County Board of
Education that it had failed to meet the requirements of the 1964 Civil Rights
Act. The HEW involvement in this matter
resulted in an administrative hearing in Washington, D.C. The HEW accused the board of operating a
“dual school system” and that the board had “failed and continues to fail and
refuse to take additional steps to further desegregation”.1 The Board of Education denied these
allegations and claimed that the HEW could not produce any evidence showing
that the board supported a dual school system because the board operated under
a freedom of choice plan.2
Under this plan, students were free to choose which school they wished
to attend.3 White students attended traditionally white schools, and
the great majority of black students attended black schools; however, a small
number of black students did choose to attend the white schools.4 The Board of Education further accused the
HEW of being “preoccupied with the concept of desegregation for its own sake”.5 The board also claimed that it had a
responsibility to provide education while achieving desegregation. Since the Board of Education already had
three years to comply with the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and the school system was
still segregated, it appears that most of their defense was baseless and that
they were engaged in foot-dragging methods to prevent desegregation. The HEW apparently saw this as well, and on
December 19, 1968, the Reviewing Authority of the HEW terminated all federal
funds to the Bulloch County School System.
After federal funds were pulled, the Board of
Education attempted to implement a School Designation System for the 1969-70
school year. This system required
students to fill out forms stating only their name, age, and address as well as
the school they wished to attend. The
board then stated that “the school designated in each case would be attended,
unless overcrowding results, in which case a new designation will be required”.6 The problem with this system is
two-fold. First, the board could
discriminate based on the address of students because the “black” and “white”
sections of Statesboro were and still are sharply divided. The overcrowding clause allowed the board to
change any student’s designation at their discretion.
Before the School Designation System could be
implemented, the United States Attorney General filed suit against the Bulloch
County Board of Education, the board members, and the superintendent of
schools. The grievance stated was the
maintenance of a dual school system based on race.7
The suit was filed in 1968 when the Freedom
of Choice Plan was still in effect.
However, the case did not go to Federal District Court until June 3, of
1969. The presiding judge was Alex A.
Lawrence. The defendants presented a
motion to dismiss the case on the grounds that the complaint was no longer
valid because the new School Designation System was in place. The motion was denied by Judge Lawrence; the
plaintiffs were allowed to proceed.
After hearing both arguments, the judge charged the board to find a
satisfactory plan for school operation and set the deadline for July 10,
1969. He then arranged for a hearing
to be held eight days later so that he could review the plans.
Following the initial hearing, the HEW sent
representatives to devise a plan for the Bulloch County School System. During their first visit, the team inspected
all of the school facilities within the county. During their second visit, the team drew up a plan and submitted
it to the Board of Education.8
The plan drawn up by the HEW was different from the plan that the
Justice Department submitted to Judge Lawrence. The HEW plan allowed for Mattie Lively Elementary, Sallie
Zetterower Elementary, and Marvin Pittman School, traditionally white schools,
to remain open and house grades 1-5.
The former black elementary school, Julia P. Bryant School, would have
grades 5-7. The white middle school,
Statesboro Junior High, would house grades 8 and 9. Statesboro High School, the white high school, would contain
grades 10, 11, and 12. The black high
school, William James High School, would be closed for renovations and then
reopened as a vocational school. The
white elementary schools on the outskirts of the county, Brooklet Elementary,
Nevils Elementary, and Stilson Elementary, would remain open and serve grades
1-7. The white high school on the south
end of the county, Southeast Bulloch High School, would service grades
8-12. Portal High and Elementary
School, the white schools at the north end of the county, would accommodate
grades 1-12. The plan then called for
the closing of three black schools, Willow Hill, Edward Johnson, and Mary
Jackson Schools.9 From the
HEW’s suggestions, it is clear that the white schools were in far better
condition since only one black school was kept open and the other had to be
renovated. School Superintendent Louis Woodrum stated that HEW’s purpose in
Bulloch County was to find a plan that would be “more acceptable to the total
population of Bulloch County” and also stated that “school officials were
trying to cooperate with the visiting team.10 Apparently, the HEW team did not cooperate
with school officials well at all because the board voted to reject their
plan. The official reason given by the
local Board of Education was that the plan “is unsound and cannot be
implemented in 1969-70 without extreme difficulties”.11 A more likely reason was that the board
would have liked to find a plan that was more acceptable to the total white
population of Bulloch County.
The Board of Education’s failure to come up
with a workable plan resulted in another hearing before Judge Lawrence on July
18, 1962. During this hearing, the
school officials submitted a plan with three main points. The first being freedom of choice among students
to attend the school of their choice without reference to race. The second point was the desegregation of
faculty members, but only if it was ordered by the Judge. The final point in the plan would be to
allow transfer provisions made by the school for any student who wished to
participate in activities such as sports or music if the activities were not
available at his school.12
It is clear that the board was trying to make some compromises in its
plan, but these did not seem to be satisfactory with federal law, and Judge
Lawrence rejected the plan. The Justice
Department submitted the HEW plan before the judge, and it was rejected on the
grounds that it could not be implemented in the 1969-70 school year.
With the rejection of both plans, Judge
Lawrence drew up his own plan for desegregating the Bulloch County School System.
Under the court’s plan, the county high schools would be divided into three
areas. The north would be served by
Portal High School and have grades 8-12.
The mid-section of the county would contain Statesboro High School and
Marvin Pittman High School both serving grades 9-12. The Southern end of the county would be serviced by Southeast
Bulloch High School and contain grades 8-12.
William James High School would be renovated and converted to Bulloch
County Vocational High School servicing grades 8-12. Statesboro Junior High School would serve the middle part of the
county and house grades 7 and 8. The
elementary schools of the area were divided into six regions. The schools on the exterior portion of the
county, Portal, Nevils, Brooklet, and Stilson, would service grades 1-7. Those located in the interior, West Side,
Julia Bryant, Mattie Lively, and Sallie Zetterower, would contain grades 1-6.13
With the integration of public schools now
imminent, the reaction of Bulloch County citizens was very different. Some white citizens called for the backing
of the school board at this time stating that “the problem has been with us”
for avoiding the 1964 Civil Rights Act.14 These people believed that the education of their children was
the top priority, and the question of what child goes to which school was
secondary.
However, this group of people seemed to be
in the minority. In a letter to the
editor of The Bulloch Herald and Times, Bob Patray railed against the forced
integration of schools. He claimed that
people of Bulloch County had been bombarded with propaganda and misleading
statements about the importance of education.15 Mr. Patray wrote, “I certainly do not
disagree with the importance of education, but I do disagree with the type of
education our children have been getting under this system of forced
integration”.16 Mr. Patray
went on to claim that he had discussed the matter with several schoolteachers,
and they felt the schools in Bulloch County would be set back by the court
order. He then charged the parents of
students to act now before their children are “really burned”. In a separate letter to the editor, Mrs. J.
R. Chester expressed her dissatisfaction with the new school system. She believed that the education system had
“fallen greatly” and that we should not be tolerating it.17 Mrs. Chester went so far, as to claim, “we
are destroying what our forefathers stood for. Also what our sons in Vietnam
are fighting for and even sacrificing their all”.18
The popular opinion of Bulloch County was
also manifested in the writings and actions of the school board members. In a letter to the local paper, the members
of the school board along with the superintendent of schools explained why
schools were being integrated. They
first noted that federal judges are appointed and not elected. They go on to explicate how the local board
has no power to challenge the ruling of a federal judge on the desegregation
issue and also state how hard Southern Congressman worked to prevent the
passage of the legislation on which the order was based. The board further resolved to appeal the
court decision and urged each citizen to contact his Congressman in was
Washington, D.C. and ask for his support of the freedom of choice plan. Finally, the board asked for community
support in educating the county’s children under integration.19
The board may have tried to pass the buck
to Uncle Sam on the desegregation issue, but the white citizens of Statesboro
still held them responsible. On September 11, 1969, a “concerned” group of 900
people gathered and voted unanimously to elect their school board members
directly. The group was also interested
in opening a private school for their children. The complaints listed against the public schools by these
parents: insults and threats directed by black students, overcrowding,
unsanitary bathrooms, lack of discipline, and a fear for children’s safety.20
While the white community had one majority
opinion on integration, the black community had quite another. Patrick Jones, president of the Bulloch
County Chapter of the NAACP, presented this opinion in his statements on
schools. Mr. Jones believed that the
lawsuit against the Bulloch County School System was the first step in achieving
equality for black people in the South.
Mr. Jones felt the Freedom of Choice plan failed because people wanted
it to fail. He accused landlords of
threatening to evict black tenants, employers of telling black employees they
would lose their jobs, and banks of threatening to foreclose on black accounts
if their children attended the white school.21 The black community was largely in favor of
the integrated school system because for the first time they truly would have a
freedom of choice.
The students also had mixed feelings about school
integration. A couple of real problems
with integration were overcrowding, lack of textbooks, and too few desks. Students were asked to comment on these
things and their comments varied. Some
student’s comments were related to the overcrowding such as “we need wider
halls” and
“nothing
out of the ordinary but too crowded”.
Other students comments were more ambiguous: “looks like a squished
banana” and “it’s different”. While
others were clearly dissenting: “awful”, “terrible”, and “disastrous”.22
The integration of schools in Bulloch
County went far better than other places in the South. While there was a strong opposition to
integration, the battle remained in the courtroom and did not spill over into
the streets. The opposing sides may have
had extremely different views on what was right, but they always put their
children’s education first. Though it
was a long time overdue, integration came to Bulloch County as painless as
possible.
Endnotes
“Bulloch school
conflict with HEW Dept. is outlined,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch
Times, 12 June 1969.
“Bulloch school
conflict with HEW Dept. is outlined”
“School
designation forms to be available on Tuesday,” The Bulloch Herald and the
Bulloch Times, 1 May 1969.
“Opening of
public schools postponed until Sept. 8,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch
Times, 28 Aug 1969.
“Bulloch school
conflict with HEW Dept. is outlined”
“School
designation forms to be available on Tuesday,” The Bulloch Herald and the
Bulloch Times, 1 May 1969.
“History of
Justice Dept. vs. Bulloch is given,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch
Times, 12 June 1969
“HEW
representatives working on plan for Bulloch school system,” The Bulloch
Herald and the Bulloch Times, 3 July 1969.
“Officials
reject HEW plan; hearing planned tomorrow,” The Bulloch Herald and the
Bulloch Times, 17 July 1969.
“HEW representatives working on plan for
Bulloch school system”
“Officials reject HEW plan; hearing planned
tomorrow,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 17 July 1969.
“School desegregation plan ordered at hearing
Friday,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 24 July 1969.
“Judge presents court order for school
desegregation,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 31 July 1969.
“We must support Board of Education,” The
Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 7 Aug 1969.
Patray, Bob, “Letters to the Editor,” The
Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, Sept 18 1969.
Patray, Bob
Mrs. J.R. Chester, “Letters to the Editor,” The
Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, Sept 18 1969.
Mrs. J.R. Chester
“A Special
Message From School Officials,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times,
14 Aug 1969
“Group votes elect Board of Education,” The
Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 18 Sept 1969
“ NAACP president makes statement on
schools,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 28 Aug 1969.
“Here’s what students say about school
opening,” The Bulloch Herald and the Bulloch Times, 18 Sept 18
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