Fourth Circuit Court Opinion from The United States Law Week
Public Court Documents
May 28, 1968

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Case Files, Green v. New Kent County School Board Working files. Fourth Circuit Court Opinion from The United States Law Week, 1968. 88125d11-6d31-f011-8c4e-002248226c06. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/00e0b1dd-c64d-4bf6-a6b8-3ad2f198a223/fourth-circuit-court-opinion-from-the-united-states-law-week. Accessed June 06, 2025.
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36 LW 4476 5-28-68 conscript manpower for military service is ‘beyond guestion.’” This is undoubtedly true in times when, by declaration of Congress, the Nation is in a state of war. The underlying and basic problem in this case, “however, is whether conscription is permissible in the absence of a declaration of war.* That question has not been briefed nor was it presented in oral argument; but © it is, I submit, a question upon which the litigants and the country are entitled to a ruling. I have discussed in Holmes v. United States, post, p. —, the nature of the legal issue and it will be seen from my dissenting opinion in that case that this Court has never ruled on the question. It is time that we made a ruling. This case should be put down for reargument and heard with Holmes v. United States and with Hart v. United States, post, p. — in which the Court today denies certiorari. The rule that this Court will not consider issues not raised by the parties is not inflexible and yields in “excep- tional cases” (Duignan v. United States, 274 TU. S. 195, 200). to the need correctly to decide the case before the court. E. g., Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U. S. 64; Terminiello v. Chicago, 337 U. S. 1. In such a case it is not unusual to ask for reargument. (Sherman v. United States, 356 U. S. 369, 379, n. 2, Frank- furter, J., concurring) even on a constitutional question not raised by the parties. In Abel v. United States, 362 U. S. 217, the petitioner had conceded that an admin- istrative deportation arrest warrant would be valid for "its limited purpose even though not supported by a sworn affidavit stating probable cause; but the Court ordered reargument on the question whether the war- rant had been ‘validly issued in petitioner's case. 362 U.S, at 219, n. 1; U. S. Sup. Ct. Journal, October Term, 1958, p. 193. In Lustig v. United States, 338 U. S. 74, the petitioner argued that an exclusionary rule should apply to the fruit of an unreasonable search by state officials solely because they acted in concert with federal officers (see Weeks v. United States, 232 U. S. 383; Byars v. United States, 273 U. S. 28). The Court ordered reargument on the question raised in a then pending case, Wolf v. Colorado, 338 U. S. 25: applicability of the Fourth Amendment to the States. Journal, October Term, 1947, p. 298. In Donaldson v. Read Magazine, 333 U. S. 178, the only issue presented, according to both parties, was whether the record contained sufficient *Neither of the decisions cited by the majority for the propo- sition that Congress’ power to conscript men into the armed services is “ ‘beyond question’ ” concerns peacetime conscription. As I have shown in my dissenting opinion in Holmes v. United States, post, p. —, the Selective Drajt Law Cases, 245 U. 8. 366, decided in 1918, upheld the constitutionality of a conseription act passed by Congress more than a month after war had been declared on the German Empire and which was then being enforced in time of war. Lichter v. United States, 334 U. S. 742, concerned the con- stitutionality of the Renegotiation Act, another wartime measure, enacted by Congress over the period of 1942-1945 (id. at 745, n. 1) and applied in that case to excessive war profits made in 1942-1943 (id. at 753). War had been declared, of course, in 1941 (55 Stat. 795). The Court referred to Congress’ power to raise “armies in discussing the “hackground” (ibid.) of the Renegotiation Act, which ir upheld as a valid exercise of the War Power. The United States LAW WEEK evidence of fraud to uphold an order of the Postmaster General. Reargument was ordered on the constitutional issue of abridgment of First Amendment freedoms. 333 U. S., at 181-182; Journal, October Term, 1947, p. 70. Finally, in Musser v. Utah, 333 U. S. 95, 96, reargument was ordered on the question of unconstitutional vague- ness of a criminal statute, an issue not raised by the parties but suggested at oral argument by Justice Jack- son. Journal October Term, 1947, p. 87. These precedents demonstrate the appropriateness of restoring the instant case to the calendar for reargument on the question of the constitutionality of a peacetime draft and having it heard with Holmes v. United States: and Hart v. United States. ERWIN N. GRISWOLD, Solicitor General (FRED M. VINSON, JR., Assistant Attomey General, FRANCIS X. BEYTAGH, JR., Assistant to the Solicitor General, BEATRICE ROSENBERG and JEROME M. FEIT, Justice Dept. attormeys, with him on the brief) for petitioner in No. 232 and respondent in No. 233; MARVIN K. KARPATKIN, New York, N.Y. (HOWARD S. WHITESIDE, MELVIN L. WULF, WILLIAME. CRAIN, RHODA H. KARPATKIN, HENRY P. MONAGHAN, ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, HENRY M. DI SUVERO, and ROBERT S. ROBBIN, with him on the brief) for respondent in No. 232 and petitioner in No. 233; JAMES D. ST. CLAIR, ABRAHAM GOLD- STEIN, WILLIAM P. HOMANS, JR., EDWARD BARSHAK, TELFORD TAYLOR, and LEONARD B. BOUDIN filed brief for William Solane Coffin, Jr., Michael Ferber, Mitchell Goodman, Marcus Raskin, an Benjamin Spock, as amici curiae. ! No. 695.—OcroBer TERM, 1967. Charles C. Green et al) v. On Writ of Certiorari to the County School Board off United States Court of Ap- New Kent County, peals for the Fourth Circuit. Virginia, et al. [May 27, 1968.] Mk. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. The question for decision is whether, under all the cir- cumstances here, respondent School Board's adoption of a “freedom-of-choice” plan which allows a pupil to choose his own public school eonstitutes adequate compliance with the Board's responsibility “to achieve a system of determining admission to the public schools on a non- racial basis . . . .” Brawn v. Board of Education, 349 U. S. 294, 300-301 (Brown II). Petitioners brought this action in March 1965 seeking injunctive relief against respondent’s continued main- tenance of an alleged raeially segregated school systema. New Kent County is a rural county in Eastern Virginia. About one-half of its population of some 4,500 are Negroes. There is no residential segregation in the county; persons of both races reside throughout. The school system has only two schools, the New Kent school on the east side of the county and the George W. Watkins school on the west side. In a memorandum filed May 17, 1966, the District Court found that the “school system serves approximately 1,300 pupils, of which 740 are Negro and 550 are white. The School Board operates one white combined elementary am high school [New Kent], and one Negro combined elermentary and high school [George W. Watkins]. There are no attendance zones. Each ; S a i s ? ” I R R N S O R E e a 5 S R R vg R E E RRR or S E S R 5 A R E ~~, 5-28-68 The United States LAW WEEK 36 LW 4477 school serves the entire county.” The record indicates that 21 school buses—11 serving the Watkins school and 10 serving the New Kent school—travel overlapping routes throughout the county to transport pupils to and from the two schools. - The segregated system was initially established and maintained under the compulsion of Virginia constitu- tional and statutory provisions mandating racial segre- gation in public education, Va. Const., Art. IX, § 140 (1902); Va. Code § 22-221 (1950). These provisions were held to violate the Federal Constitution in Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, decided with Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483, 487 (Brown I). The respondent School Board continued the segregated operation of the system after the Brown decisions, presumably on the authority of several statutes enacted by Virginia in resistance to those decisions. Some of these statutes were held to be unconstitutional on their face or as applied.* One statute, the Pupil Place- ment Act, Va. Code §22-232.1 et seq. (1964), not re- pealed until 1966, divested local boards of authority to assign children to particular schools and placed that authority in a State Pupil Placement Board. Under that Act children were each year automatically reassigned to the school previously attended unless upon their applica- tion the State Board assigned them to another school; students seeking enrollment for the first time were also assigned at the discretion of the State Board. To Sep- tember 1964, no Negro pupil had applied for admission to the New Kent school under this statute and no white pupil had applied for admission to the Watkins school. The School Board initially sought dismissal of this suit on the ground that petitioners had failed to apply to the State Board for assignment to New Kent school. . However on August 2, 1965, five months after the. suit was brought, respondent School Board, in order to remain eligible for federal financial aid, adopted a “freedom-af- choice” plan for desegregating the schools.? Under that 1E. g., Griffin v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, 377 U. 8. 218; Green v. School Board of City of Roanoke, 304 F. 2d 118 (C. A. 4th Cir. 1962); Adkins v. School Board of City of New- “port News, 148 F. Supp. 430 (D.C. E. D. Va.), aff’d, 246 F. 2d 325 (C. A. 4th Cir. 1957); James v. Almond, 170 F. Supp. 331 (D. C. -E. D. Va. 1959); Harrison v. Day, 200 Va. 439, 106 S. E. 2d 636 1959). ! 2 oo concerned with the lack of progress in school desegre- gation, included provisions in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to deal with the problem through various agencies of the Federal Govern- ment. 42 U. S. C. §§2000c et seq., 2000d et seq. 2000h-2. In Title VI Congress declared that “No person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance” 42 U. 8S. C. § 2000d. The Department of Health, Education, and Welfare issued regula- tions covering racial discrimination in federally aided school systems, as directed by 42 U. 8. C. §2000d-1, and in a statement of policies, or “guidelines,” the Department's Office of Education established standards according to which school systems in the process of deseg- regation can remain qualified for federal funds. 45 CFR $8 80.1- ’ = plan, each pupil may annually choose between the New Kent and Watkins schools and, except for the first and eighth grades, pupils not making a choice are assigned to the school previously attended; first and eighth grade pupils must affirmatively choose a school. ~ After the plan was filed the District Court denied petitioner’s prayer for an injunction and granted respondent leave to submit an amendment to the plan with respect to employment and assignment of teachers and staff on a racially nondis- criminatory basis. The amendment was duly filed and on June 28, 1966, the District Court approved the “free- dom-of-choice” plan as so amended. The Court of Ap- peals for the Fourth Circuit, en banc, 382 F. 2d 326, 338.2 affirmed the District Court’s approval of the “freedom-of- choice” provisions of the plan but remanded the case to the District Court for entry of an order regarding faculty “which is much more specific and more comprehensive” and which would incorporate in addition to a “minimal, objective time table” some of the faculty provisions of the decree entered by the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Cir- cuit in United States v. Jefferson County Board of Educa- tion, 372 F. 2d 836, aff'd en banc, 380 F. 2d 385 (1967). Judges Sobeloff and Wimters concurred with the remand on the teacher issue but otherwise disagreed, expressing the view “that the District Court should be directed . . . also to set up procedures for periodically evaluating the effectiveness of the [Board's] ‘freedom of choice’ [plan] in the elimination of other features of a segregated school system.” 382 F. 2d, at 330. We granted certiorari, 389 U. S. 1003. The pattern of separate “white” and “Negro” schools in the New Kent County school system established under compulsion of state laws is precisely the pattern of segre- gation to which Brown I and Brown II were particularly addressed, and which Brown I declared unconstitution- ally denied Negro school children equal protection of the laws. Racial identification of the system’s schools was complete, extending net just to the composition of stu- dent bodies at the twa schools but to every facet of school operations—faculty, staff, transportation, extracurricular activities and facilities. In short, the State, acting through the local school board and school officials, orga- nized and operated a dual system, part “white” and part “Negro.” It was such dual systems that 14 years ago Brown I held unconstitutional and a year later Brown II held 80.13, 181.1-181.76 (1967). “Freedom-of-choice” plans are among those considered acceptable, so long as in operation such a plan proves effective. 45 CFR § 181.54. The regulations provide that a school system “subject to a final order of a court of the United States for the desegregation of such sehool . . . system” with which the system agrees to comply is deemed to be in compliance with the statute and regulations. 45 CFR $80.4 (¢). See also 45 CFR § 181.6. See generally Dunn, Title VI, the Guidelines and School Desegrega- tion in the South, 53 Va. L. Rev. 42 (1967); Note, 55 Geo ' L. J 325 (1966); Comment, 77 Yale L. J. 321 (1967). 8 This case was decided per curiam on the basis of the opinion in Bowman v. County School Board of Charles City County, 382 F. 2d 326, decided the same day. Certiorari has not been sought for the Bowman case itself. 36 LW 4478 The United States LAW WEEK 5-28-68 must be abolished: school boards operating such school systems were required by Brown II “to effectuate a transition to a racially nondiscriminatory school system.” 349 U. S., at 301. It is of course true that for the time immediately after Brown II the concern was with making an initial break in a long-established pattern of excluding "Negro children from schools attended by white children. The principal focus was on obtaining for those Negro children courageous enough to break with tradition a place in the “white” schools. See, e. g., Cooper v. Aaron, 358 U. S. 1. Under Brown II that immediate goal was only the first step, however. The transition to a unitary, nonracial system of public education was and is the ultimate end to be brought about; it was because of the “complexities arising from the transition to a system of public education freed of racial discrimination” that we provided for “all deliberate speed” in the implementation of the principles of Brown I. 349 U. S., at 299-301. Thus we recognized the task would necessarily involve solution of “varied local school problems.” Id., at 299. In referring to the “personal interest of the plaintiffs in admission to public schools as soon as practicable on a - nondiscriminatory basis,” we also noted that “[t]o effec- tuate this interest may call for elimination of a variety of obstacles in making the transition ....” Id., at 300. Yet we emphasized that the constitutional rights of Negro children required school officials to bear the burden of establishing that additional time to carry out the ruling in an effective manner “is necessary in the public interest and is consistent with good faith compliance at the earliest practicable date.” Ibid. We charged the district courts in their review of particular situations to “consider problems related to administration, arising from the physical condition of the school plant, the school transportation system, personnel, revision of school districts and attendance areas into compact units to achieve a system of determining admission to the public schools on a nonracial basis, and revi- sion of local laws and regulations which may be necessary in solving the foregoing problems. They will also consider the adequacy of any plans the defendants may propose to meet these problems and to effectuate a transition to a racially nondiscrim- inatory school system.” Id., at 300-301. It is against this background that 13 years after Brown II commanded the abolition of dual systems we must measure the effectiveness of respondent School Board's “freedom-of-choice” plan to achieve that end. The School Board contends that it has fully discharged jts obligation by adopting a plan by which every student, regardless of race, may “freely” choose the school he will attend. The Board attempts to cast the issue in its broadest form by arguing that its “freedom-of-choice” plan may be faulted only by reading the Fourteenth Amendment as universally requiring “compulsory inte- gration,” a reading it insists the wording of the Amend- ment will not support. But that argument ignores the thrust of Brown II. In the light of the command of that case, what is involved here is the question whether the Board has achieved the “racially nondiseriminatory school system” Brown II held must be effectuated in order to remedy the established unconstitutional deficiencies of its segregated system. In the context of the state- imposed segregated pattern of long standing, the fact that in 1965 the Board opened the doors of the former “white” school to Negro children and of the “Negro” school to white children merely begins, not ends, our inquiry whether the Board has taken steps adequate to abolish its dual, segregated system. Brown II was a call for the dismantling of well-entrenched dual systems | “tempered by an awareness that complex and multifaceted problems would arise which would require time and flex- ibility for a successful resolution. School boards such as the respondent then operating state-compelled dual sys- tems were nevertheless clearly charged with the affirma- tive duty to take whatever steps might be necessary to “convert to a unitary system in which racial discrimina: “tion would be eliminated root and branch. See Cooper Vv. Aaron, supra, at 7; Bradley v. School Board, 382 U. S.: 103; cf. Watson v. City of Memphis, 373 U.S. 523. The constitutional rights of Negro school children articulated in Brown I permit no less than this; and it was to this end that Brown II commanded school boards to bend their efforts. : : In determining whether respondent School Board met that command by adopting its “freedom-of-choice” plan, it is relevant that this first step did not come until some 11 years after Brown I was decided and 10 years after Brown II directed the making of a “prompt and reason- able start.” This deliberate perpetuation of the uncon- stitutional dual system can ‘only have compounded the harm of such a system. Such delays are no longer tolerable, for “the governing constitutional principles no longer bear the imprint of newly enunciated doctrine.” Watson v. City of Memphis, supra, at 529; see Bradley v. School Board, supra; Rogers v. Paul, 382 U. S. 198. Moreover, a plan that at this late date fails to provide meaningful assurance of prompt and effective disestab- lishment of a dual system is also intolerable. “The time “For mere ‘deliberate speed’ has run out,” Griffin v. County School Board, 377 U. S. 218, 234; “the context in which we must interpret and apply this language [of Brown II] to plans for desegregation has been significantly altered.” Goss v. Board of Education, 373 U. S. 683, 639. See Calhoun v. Latimer, 377 U. 8. 263. The burden on a school board today is to come forward with a plan that + “We bear in mind that the court has not merely the power but the duty to render a decree which will so far as possible eliminate the discriminatory effects of the past as well as bar like discrimina- tions in the future.” . Louisiana v. United States. 380 U. S. 145, 154. Compare the remedies discussed in, e. g., NLRB v. Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., 308 U. S. 241; United States v. Crescent Ameusement Co., 323 U. S. 173; United States v. Standard Oil Co., 221 U. 8. 1. See also Griffin v. County School Board, 377 TU. S. 218, 232-234. » Ll 5.28-68 The United States LAW WEEK 36 LW 4479 Eau promises realistically to work, and promises realistically Sr oy i % i to work now. The obligation of the district courts, as it always has been, is to assess the effectiveness of a proposed plan in achieving desegregation. There is no universal answer to complex problems of desegregation; there is obviously no ore plan that will do the job in every case. The matter must be assessed in light of the circumstances present and the options available in each instance. is incumbent upon the school board to establish that its proposed ‘plan promises meaningful and immediate “progress toward disestablishing state-imposed segregation. “It is incumbent upon the district court to weigh that claim in light of the facts at hand and in light of any alternatives which may be shown as feasible and more promising in their effectiveness. Where the court finds the board to be acting in good faith and the proposed plan to have real prospects for dismantling the state- imposed dual system “gt the earliest practicable date,” “then the plan may be said to provide effective relief. Of “eourse, where other, more promising courses of action are “open to the board, that may indicate a lack of good faith; “and at the least it places a heavy burden upon the board . to explain its preference for an apparently less effective method. Moreover, whatever plan is adopted will re- "quire evaluation in practice, and the court should retain jurisdiction until it is clear that state-imposed segregation has been completely removed. See No. 805, Raney v. Board of Education, post, at p. 5. ~~ We do not hold that “freedom of choice” can have no place in such a plan. We do not hold that a “freedom- of-choice” plan might of itself be unconstitutional, al- though that argument has been urged upon us. Rather, all we decide today is that in desegregating a dual system "a plan utilizing “freedom of choice” is not an end in itself. "As Judge Sobeloff has put it, « Freedom of choice’ is not a sacred talisman; it is only a means to a constitutionally required end—the abolition of the system of segregation and its effects. If the means prove effective, it is ac- ceptable, but if it fails to undo segregation, other means must be used to achieve this end. The school officials have the continuing duty to take whatever action may be necessary to create a ‘unitary, non- racial system.”” Bowman v. County School Board, 382 F. 2d 326, 333 (C. A. 4th Cir. 1967) (concurring opinion). Accord, Kemp v. Beasley, 389 F. 2d 178 (C. A. 8th Cir. 1968); United States v. Jefferson County Board of Education, supra. Although the general experience under “freedom of choice” to date has been such as to indicate its ineffective- ness as a tool of desegregation,’ there may well be in- 5The views of the United States Commission on Civil Rights, which we neither adopt nor refuse to adopt, are as follows: “Freedom of choice plans, which have tended to perpetuate racially identifiable schools in the Southern and border States, require affirmative action by both Negro and white parents and pupils before such disestablishment ean be achieved. There are a number stances in which it ean serve as an effective device. ~—¥here it offers real promise of aiding a desegregation program to effectuate conversion of a state-imposed dual system to a unitary, monracial system there might be no objection to allowing such a device to prove itself in operation. On the atther hand, if there are reasonably available other ways. such for illustration as zoning, promising speedier amd more effective conversion to a “unitary, nonracial sehool system, “freedom of choice” "must be held unacceptable. The New Kent School Board's “freedom-of-choice” plan cannot be accepted as a sufficient step to “effectuate a transition” to a unitary system. In three years of oper- ation not a single white child has chosen to attend Wat- kins school and although 115 Negro children enrolled in New Kent school #n 1967 (up from 35 in 1965 and 111 in 1066) 85% of the Negro children in the system still attend the all-Negre Watkins school. In other words, the school system resnains a dual system. Rather than further the dismantBing of the dual system, the plan has operated simply to burden children and their parents with a responsibility which Brown II placed squarely on the School Board. The Board must be required to for- mulate a new plan and, in light of other courses which appear open to the Board. such as zoning,’ fashion steps of factors which have pmeevented such affirmative action by substan- tial numbers of parents mnd pupils of both races: “(a) Fear of retaliation and hostility from the white community continue To deter many Negro families from choosing formerly all- white schools; : “(b) During the past school year [1966-1967], as in the previous year, in some areas of the South, Negro families with children attend- ing previously all-white: schools under free choice plans were targets of violence, threats of 'wiolence and economic reprisals by white persons and Negro children were subjected to harassment by white classmates notwithstandimg conscientious efforts by many teachers and principals to prevent such misconduct; “(¢) During the pasit school year, in some areas of the South public officials improperly influenced Negro families to keep their children in Negro sehaols and excluded Negro children attending formerly all-white schesls from official functions; ; “(d) Poverty deters many Negro families in the South from choosing formerly all-white schools. Some Negro parents are em- barrassed to permit tfwir children to attend such schools without suitable clothing. Im some districts special fees are assessed for courses which are availible only in the white schools; “(e) Improvements: in facilities and equipment . . . have been instituted in all-Negre schools in some school districts in a manner that tends to discourazze Negroes from selecting white schools.” Southern School Deseggregation, 1966-1967, at 88 (1967). See id. at 45-69; Survey of ‘School Desegregation in the Southern and Border States 1065-1956, at 30-44, 51-52 (U. S. Comm'n on Civil Rights 1966). 6 “In view of the situation found in New Kent County, where there is no residential segregation, the elimination of the dual school system and the establishment of a ‘unitary, non-racial system’ could be readily achieved wsith a minimum of adminixtrative difficulty by means of geographie zoning—simply by assigning students living in the eastern half of #he county to the New Kent School and those living in the westerm ‘half of the county to the Watkins School. Although a geograplaieal formula is not universally appropriate, it is evident that here the Board, by separately busing Negro children E e 36 LW 4480 5-28-68 which promise realistically to convert promptly to a system without a “white” school and a “Negro” school, but just schools. ; The judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated inso- far as it affirmed the District Court and the case is remanded to the District Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It 1s so ordered. S. W. TUCKER, Richmond, Va. (JACK GREENBERG, JAMES M. NABRIT, III, FRANKLIN E. WHITE, MICHAEL MELTSNER, and MICHAEL J. HENRY, with him on the brief) for petitioners; FRED- ERICK T. GRAY, Richmond, Va. (WALTER E. ROGERS, ROBERT E. EICHER, WILLIAMS, MULLEN & CHRISTIAN, ROBERT Y. BUTTON, Attorney General of the State of Virginia, and ROBERT D. McILWAINE, III, First Assistant Attorney General, with him on the brief) for respondents; HOWARD M. SQUADRON, JOSEPH B. ROBISON, LESTER GREENBERG, and ALEXANDER KOL BEN filed brief for American Jewish Congress, as amicus curiae, seek- ing reversal; ERWIN N. GRISWOLD, Solicitor General, STEPHEN J. POLLAK, Assistant Attorney General, LOUIS F. CLAIBORNE and LAWRENCE G. WALLACE, Assistants to the Solicitor Gener- al, and BRIAN K. LANDSBERG, Justice Dept. attomey, filed brief for the United States, as amicus curiae, seeking reversal. No. 740.—OctoBer TERM, 1967. Brenda K. Monroe et al, ) Petitioners, v. Board of Commissioners of the City of Jackson, Tenn., et al. On Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. [May 27, 1968.] + Mg. Justice BRENNAN delivered the opinion of the Court. This case was argued with No. 695, Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, ante, p. —, and No. 805, Raney v. Board of Education of the Gould School District, ante, p. —. The question for decision is similar to the question decided in those cases. Here, however, the principal feature of a desegregation plan— which calls in question its adequacy to effectuate a transition to a racially nondiscriminatory system in com- pliance with Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U. S. 294 across the entire county to the ‘Negro’ school, and the white children to the ‘white’ school, is deliberately maintaining a segregated system which would vanish with non-racial geographic zoning. The con- ditions in this county present a classical case for this expedient.” Bowman v. County School Board, supra, n. 3, at 332 (concurring - opinion). Petitioners. have also suggested that the Board could consolidate the two schools, one site (e. g., Watkins) serving grades 1-7 and the other (e. g., New Kent) serving grades 8-12, this being the grade division respondent makes between elementary and secondary levels. Petitioners contend this would result in a more efficient system by eliminating costly duplication in this relatively small dis- trict while at the same time achieving immediate dismantling of the dual system. These are two suggestions the District Court should take into ‘account upon remand, along with any other proposed alternatives and in light of considerations respecting other aspects of the school system such as the matter of faculty and staff desegregation remanded to the court by the Court of Appeals. The United States LAW WEEK (Brown II)—is not “freedom of choice” but a variant commonly referred to as “free transfer.” The respondent Board of Commissioners is the School Board for the City of Jackson, located in midwestern Tennessee. The school district coincides with the city limits. Some one-third of the city’s population of 40,000 are Negroes, the great majority of whom live in the city’s central area. The school system has eight elementary schools, three junior high schools, and two senior high schools. There are 7,650 children enrolled in the system’s schools, about 40% of whom, over 3,200, are Negroes. In 1954 Tennessee by law required racial segrega- tion in its public schools. Accordingly, five elementary schools, two junior high schools, and one senior high school were operated as “white” schools, and three ele- mentary schools, one junior high school, and one senior high school were operated as “Negro” schools. Racial segregation extended to all aspects of school life including faculties and staffs. After Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483 (Brown I), declared such state-imposed dual systems unconstitutional, Tennessee enacted a pupil placement law, Tenn. Code § 49-1741 et seq. (1966). That law continued previously enrolled pupils in their assigned schools and vested local school boards with the exclusive - authority to approve assignment and transfer requests. No white children enrolled in any “Negro” school under the statute and the respondent Board granted only seven applications of Negro children to enroll in “white” schools, three in 1961 and four in 1962. In March 1962 the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held that the pupil placement law was inadequate “as a plan to con- vert a biracial system into a nonracial one.” - Northcross v. Board of Education of City of Memphis, 302 F. 2d 818, 821. In January 1963 petitioners brought this action in the District Court for the Western District of Tennessee. The complaint sought a declaratory judgment that re- spondent was operating a compulsory racially segregated school system, injunctive relief against the continued maintenance of that system, an order directing the ad- mission to named “white” schools of the plaintiff Negro school children, and an order requiring respondent Board to formulate a desegregation plan. The District Court ordered the Board to enroll the children in the schools in question and directed the Board to formulate and file a desegregation plan. A plan was duly filed and, after modifications directed by the court were incorporated, the plan was approved in August 1963 to be effective immediately in the elementary schools and to be grad- ually extended over a four-year period to the junior high schools and senior high schools. 221 F. Supp. 968. The modified plan provides for the automatic assign- ment of pupils living within attendance zones drawn by the Board or school officials along geographic or “natural” boundaries and “according to the capacity and facilities of the [school] buildings . . .” within the zones. Id, at 974. However, the plan also has the “free-transfer’” S i a ? ” x BR A L R T B S a i a wh 3 ea Eo BR R SL he he s HA ER E RA R AI NE i T T a High 5-28-69 The United States LAW WEEK 36 LW 4481 provision which was ultimately to bring this case to this Court: Any child, after he has complied with the require- ment that he register annually in his assigned school in his attendance zone, may freely transfer to another school of his choice if space is available, zone residents having priority in cases of overcrowding. Students must pro- vide their own transportation; the school system does not operate school buses. : By its terms the “free-transfer” plan was first applied in the elementary schools. After one year of operation petitioners, joined by 27 other Negro school children, moved in September 1964 for further relief in the District Court, alleging respondent had administered the plan in a racially discriminatory manner. At that time, the three Negro elementary schools remained all Negro; and 118 Negro pupils were scattered among four of the five formerly all-white elementary schools. After hearing evidence, the District Court found that in two respects the Board had indeed administered the plan in a dis- criminatory fashion. First, it had systematically denied Negro children—specifically the 27 intervenors—the right to transfer from their all-Negro zone schools to schools where white students were in the majority, although white students seeking transfers from Negro schools to white schools had been allowed to transfer. The court held this to be a constitutional violation, see Goss Vv. Board of Education, 373 U. S. 683, as well as a violation of the terms of the plan itself. 244 F. Supp. 353, 359. Second, the court found that the Board, in drawing the lines of the geographic attendance zones, had gerry- mandered three elementary school zones to exclude Negro residential areas from white school zones and to include those areas in zones-of Negro schools located farther away. Id. at 361-362. In the same 1964 proceeding the Board filed with the court its proposed zones for the three junior high schools, Jackson and Tigrett, the “white” junior high schools, and Merry, the “Negro” junior high school. As of the 1964 school year the three schools retained their racial identities, although Jackson did have one Negro child among its otherwise all-white student body. The facul- ties and staffs of the respective schools were also segre- gated. Petitioners objected to the proposed zones on two grounds, arguing first that they were racially gerry- mandered because so drawn as to assign Negro children to the “Negro” Merry school and white children to the “white” Jackson and Tigrett schools, and alternatively that the plan was in any event inadequate to reorganize the system on a nonracial basis. Petitioners, through expert witnesses, urged that the Board be required to —gdopt a “feeder system,” a commonly used method of “assigning students whereby each junior high school would draw its students from specified elementary schools. The groupings could be made so as to assure racially inte- grated student bodies in ‘all three junior high schools, with due regard for educational and administrative con- siderations such as building capacity and proximity of students to the schools. The District Court held that petitioners had not sus- tained their allegatioms that the proposed high school attendance zones were gerrymandered, saying “Tigrett [white] is located in the western section, , Merry [Negro] is located in the central section and Jackson [white] is located in the eastern section. The zones proposed by the defendants would, gen- erally, allocate the western section to Tigrett, the central section te Merry, and the eastern section to Jackson. The boundaries follow ‘major streets or highways and railroads. According to the school population maps. there are a considerable number of Negro pupils im the southern part of the Tigrett zone, a considerable number of white pupils in the middle and northern parts of the Merry zone, and - a considerable mumber of Negro pupils in the south- ern part of the: Jackson zone. The location of the three schools in: @n approximate east-west line makes: it inevitable thait the three zones divide the city in three parts fromm north to south. While it appears that proximity eff pupils and natural boundaries are: not as importanit in zoning for junior highs as in zoning for elementary schools, it does not appear that Negro pupiils will be discriminated against.” 244 F. Supp. at 362. As for the recommended “feeder system,” the District Court concluded sitmply that “there is no constitutional requirement that this particular system be adopted.” Ibid. The Court ©f Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed except om @n issue of faculty desegregation, as to which the case was remanded for further proceedings. 380 F. 2d 955. We granted certiorari, 389 U. S. 1033, and set the case for oral argument immediately following Green v. County Swhool Board, supra. Although the case presented by the petition for certiorari concerns only the junior high schools, the plan in its application to ele- mentary and senieir high schools is also necessarily im- plicated since the: right of “free transfer” extends to pupils at all levels. The principles governing determination of the ade- quacy of the plam as compliance with the Board's re- sponsibility to effizctuate a transition to-a racially non- discriminatory system are those announced today in Green v. County School Board, supra. Tested by those principles the plam is clearly inadequate. Three school years have followed the District Court's approval of the attendance zones for the junior high schools. Yet Merry Junior High Schoml was still completely a “Negro” school in the 1967-196% school year, enrolling some 640 Negro pupils, or over 83% of the system's Negro junior high school students. ‘Not one of the “considerable number of white pupils Iu the middle and northern parts of the Merry zone” assigned there under the attendance zone aspect of the plan chose to stay at Merry. Every one exercised his option to transfer out of the “Negro” school. The “white” Tigrett school seemingly had the same ex- perience in reverse. Of the “considerable number of Negro pupils im the southern part of the Tigrett zone” a r — a T r —— - Be a i A a - 36 LW 4482 The United States LAW WEEK 5-28-68 mentioned by the District Court, only seven are enrolled - in the student body of 819; apparently all other Negro children assigned to Tigrett chose to go elsewhere. Only the “white” Jackson school presents a different picture; there, 349 white children and 135 Negro children com- prise the student body. How many of the Negro chil- dren transferred in from the “white” Tigrett school does not appear. The experience in the junior high schools mirrors that of the elementary schools. Thus the three elementary schools that were operated as Negro schools in 1954 and continued as such until 1963 are still at- tended only by Negroes. The five “white” schools all have some Negro children enrolled, from as few as three (in a student body of 781) to as many as 160 (in a stu- dent body of 682). This experience with “free transfer” was accurately predicted by the District Court as early as 1963: “In terms of numbers . . . the ratio of Negro to white pupils is approximately 40-60. This figure is, however, somewhat misleading as a measure of the extent to which integration will actually occur under the proposed plan. Because the homes of Negro children are concentrated in certain areas of the city, a plan of unitary zoning, even if prepared without consideration of race, will result in a con- centration of Negro children in the zones of here- tofore ‘Negro’ schools and white children in the zones of heretofore ‘white’ schools. Moreover, this tendency of concentration in schools will be further accentuated by the exercise of choice of schools. ...” 221 F. Supp., at 971. (Emphasis supplied.) Plainly, the plan does not meet respondent’s “affirma- tive duty to take whatever steps might be necessary to convert to a unitary system in which racial discrimnination would be eliminated root and branch.” Green v. County School Board, supra, at p. 7. Only by dismantling the state-imposed dual system can that end be achieved. And manifestly, that end has not been achieved here nor does the plan approved by the lower courts for the junior high schools promise meaningful progress toward doing so. “Rather than further the dismantling of the dual system, the [“free transfer’] plan has operated simply to burden children and their parents with a responsibility which Brown II placed squarely on the School Board.” Green v. County School Board, supra, at p. 11. That the Board has chosen to adopt a method achieving minimal disruption of the old pattern is evident from its long delay in making any effort whatsoever to desegregate, and the deliberately discriminatory manner in which the Board administered the plan until checked by the District Court. ; The District Court approved the junior high school attendance-zone lines in the view that as drawn they assigned students. to the three schools in a way that was capable of producing meaningful desegregation of all three schools. But the “free-transfer” option has permitted the “considerable number” of white or Negro students in at least two of the zones to return, at the implicit invitation of the Board, to the comfortable security of the old, established discriminatory pattern. Like the transfer provisions held invalid in Goss v. Board of Education, 373 U. S. 683, 686, “[i]t is readily apparent that the transfer [provision] lends itself to perpetuation of segregation.” While we there indicated that “free- transfer” plans under some circumstances might be valid, we explicitly stated that “no official transfer plan or pro- vision of which racial segregation is the inevitable conse- quence may stand under the Fourteenth Amendment.” Id., at 689. So it is here; no attempt has been made to justify the transfer provision as a device designed to meet “legitimate local problems,” ibid.; rather it pat- ently operates as a deviee to allow resegregation of the races to the extent desegregation would be achieved by geographically drawn zones. Respondent’s argument in this Court reveals its purpose. We are frankly told in the Brief that without the transfer option its is appre- hended that white students will flee the school system altogether. “But it should go without saying that the vitality of these constitutional principles cannot be al- lowed to yield simply because of disagreement with them.” Brown II, at 300. We do not hold that “free transfer” can have no place in a desegregation plan. But like “freedom of choice,” if it cannot be shown that such a plan will further rather than delay conversion to a unitary, nonracial, nondis- criminatory school system, it must be held unacceptable. See Green v. County School Board, supra, at pp. 9-11. We conclude, therefore, that the Board “must be re- quired to formulate a mew plan and, in light of other courses which appear open to the Board, . . . fashion steps which promise realistically to convert promptly to a system without a ‘white’ school and a ‘Negro’ school, but just schools.” Id., at pp. 11-12.* The judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated inso- far as it affirmed the District Court’s approval of the plan in its application #o the junior high schools, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion and with our opinion in Green v. County School Board, supra. It 1s so ordered. JAMES M. NABRIT, III, New York, N.Y. (JACK GREENBERG, MICHAEL MELTSNER, MICHAEL J. HENRY, AVON N. WILLIAMS, JR., Z. ALEXANDER LCOBY¥, J. EMMETT BALLARD, GERALD A. SMITH, and FRANKLIN XE. WHITE, with him on the brief) for petitioners; RUSSELL RICE, #R., Jackson, Tenn., for respondents; ERWIN N. GRISWOLD, Solicitor General, STEPHEN J. POLL AK, Assistant Attorney General, L£JUIS F. CLAIBORNE and LAWRENCE G. WALLACE, Assistants te the Solicitor General, and BRIAN K. LANDSBERG, Justice Dept. attomey, filed brief for the United States, as amicus curiae, seeking reversal. *We imply no agreement with the District Court’s conclusion that under the proposed attemdance zones for junior high schools ~ “it does not appear that Negro pupils will be discriminated against.” We note also that on the reewrd as it now stands, it appears that petitioners’ recommended “feesfer system,” the feasibility of which respondent did not challenge in the District Court, is an effective alternative reasonably availak#e to respondent to abolish the dual system in the junior high schools. E R R S S or s p — 5-28-68 The United States LAW WEEK" 36 LW 4483 No. 805.—O0OctoBeER TERM, 1967. Arthur Lee Raney et al, Petitioners, v. The Board of Education of The Gould School District et al. On Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Ap- [May 27, 1968.] MR. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court. This case presents the question of the adequacy of a “freedom-of-choice” plan as compliance with Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U. S. 294 (Brown II), a question also considered today in No. 695, Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, ante, p. —. The factual setting is very similar to that in Green. This action was brought in September 1965 in the District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Injunctive relief was sought against the continued main- tenance by respondent Board of Education of an alleged racially segregated school system. The school district has an area of 80 square miles and a population of some 3,000, of whom 1,800 are Negroes and 1,200 are whites. Persons of both races reside throughout the county; there is no residential segregation. The school system consists of two combination elementary and high schools located about 10 blocks apart in Gould, the district’s only major town. One combination, the Gould Schools, is almost all white and the other, the Field Schools, is all Negro. In the 1964-1965 school year the schools were totally segre- gated; 580 Negro children attended the Field Schools and 300 white children attended the Gould Schools. Faculties and staff were and are segregated. There are no attendance zones, each school complex providing any necessary bus transportation for its respective pupils. The state-imposed segregated system existed at the time of the decisions in Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483, 349 U. S. 294. Thereafter racial separa- tion was required by School Board policy. As in Green, respondent first took steps in 1965 to abandon that policy to remain eligible for federal financial aid. The Board adopted a “freedom-of-choice” plan embodying the essen- tials of the plan considered in Green. It was made im- mediately applicable to all grades. Pupils are required to choose annually between the Gould Schools and the Field Schools and those not exercising a choice are assigned to the school previously attended. The experience after three years of operation with “freedom of choice” has mirrored that in Green. Not a single white child has sought to enroll in the all-Negro Field Schools, and although some 80 to 85 Negro children were enrolled in the Gould Schools in 1967, over 859 of the Negro children in the system still attend the all- Negro Field Schools. This litigation resulted from a problem that arose in the operation of the plan in its first year. The number of peals for the Eighth Circuit. children applying for enrollment in the fifth, tenth, and eleventh grades at Gould exceeded the number of places available and applications of 28 Negroes for those grades were refused. This aetion was thereupon filed on behalf of 16 of these children and others similarly situated. Their complaint sought injunctive relief, among other things, against their being required to attend the Field Schools, against the provision by respondent of public school facilities for Negro pupils inferior to those pro- vided for white pupils, and against respondent’s “other- wise operating a racially segregated school system. While the case was pending in the District Court, respondent made plans to replace the high school building at Field Schools. Petitioners sought unsuccessfully to enjoin con- struction at that site, eontending that the new high school should be built at the Gould site to avoid perpetuation of - the segregated systems. Thereafter the District Court, in an unreported opiniom, denied all relief and dismissed the complaint. In the District Court’s view the fact that respondent had adopted “freedom of choice” without the compulsion of a court order, that the plan was approved by the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, and that some Negre pupils had enrolled in the Gould Schools “seems to imslicate that this plan is more than "a pretense or sham to meet the minimum requirements of the law.” In light of this conclusion the District Court held that petitioners were not entitled to the other relief requested, including an injunction against building the new high school at the Field site. The Court of Appeals far the Eighth Circuit affirmed the dismissal. 381 F. 2d 252. We granted certiorari, 389 U. S. 1034, and set the case for argument following No. 740, Monroe v. Board of Commissioners of the City of Jackson, post, p. —. : The Court of Appeals suggested that “no issue on the adequacy of the plamr adopted by the Board or its imple- mentation was raisesi in the District Court. Issues not fairly raised in the District Court cannot ordinarily be considered upon appeal.” 381 F. 2d, at 257. Insofar as this refers to the “freedom-of-choice” plan the suggestion is refuted by the reeord. Not only was the issue em- braced by the prayer in petitioners’ complaint for an injunction against mwespondent “otherwise operating a racially segregated school system” but the adequacy of the plan was tried ard argued by the parties and decided by the District Cour#. Moreover, the Court of Appeals went on to consider the merits, holding, in agreement with the District Cart, that ©. . . we find no substantial evidence to support a finding that the Board was not proceeding to carry ut the plan in good faith.” Ibid? In the circumstances the question of the adequacy of “freedom of choice’ is properly before us. On the merits, our decision in Green v. County School Board, supra, 1 Compare the developing views of the feasibility of “freedom-of- choice” plans expressed Fsv various panels of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit x Kemp v. Beasley, 352 F. 2d 14; Clark v. Board of Education, 374 F. 2d 569; Kelly v. Altheimer, 378 F. 2d 483: Kemp v. Beasley, 359 F. 2d 178; and Jackson v. Marvell School District No. 22, 339 F. 2d 740. a a a s S N e a u pe p n p AA A 36 LW 44384 The United States LAW WEEK - 5-28-68 establishes that the plan is inadequate to convert to a unitary, nonracial school system. As in Green, “the school system remains a dual system. Rather than fur- ther the dismantling of the dual system, the plan has operated simply to burden children and their parents with a responsibility which Brown IT placed squarely on the School Board, The Board must be required to formu- late a new plan and, in light of other courses which appear open to the Board, such as zoning, fashion steps which promise realistically to convert promptly to a sys- tem without a ‘white’ school and a ‘Negro’ school, but just schools.” Id. at pp. 11-12. The petitioners did not press in the Court of Appeals their appeal from the denial of their prayer to have the new high school facilities constructed at the Gould Schools site rather than at the Field Schools site. Due to the illness of the court reporter there was delay in the filing of the transcript of the proceedings in the District Court and meanwhile the construction at the Field Schools site was substantially completed. Petitioners therefore modified their position and urged in the Court of Appeals that respondent be required to convert the Could Schools to a completely desegregated high school and the Field site to a completely desegregated pri- mary school. The Court of Appeals rejected the propo- sition on the ground that it “was not presented to the trial court and no opportunity was afforded the parties to offer evidence on the feasibility of such a plan, nor was the trial court given any opportunity to pass there- on.” 381 F.2d, at 254. Since there must be a remand, petitioners are not foreclosed from making their proposal an issue in the further proceedings.’ Finally, we hold that in the circumstances of this case, the District Court’s dismissal of the complaint was an improper exercise of discretion. Dismissal will ordi- narily be inconsistent with the responsibility imposed on the district courts by Brown II. 349 U. S., at 299-301. In light of the complexities inhering in the disestablish- ment of state-established segregated school systems, Brown II contemplated that the better course would be to retain jurisdiction until it is clear that disestablishment has been achieved. We agree with the observation of another panel of judges of the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in another case that the district courts “should retain jurisdiction in school segregation cases to - insure (1) that a constitutionally acceptable plan is adopted, and (2) that it is operated in a constitutionally permissible fashion so that the goal of a desegregated, non-racially operated school system is rapidly and finally 2 The Court of Appeals, while denying petitioners’ request for relief on appeal, did observe that “there is no showing that the Field facilities with the new construc-- tion added could not be converted at a reasonable cost into a com- pletely integrated grade school or into a completely integrated high school when the appropriate time for such course arrives. We note that the building now occupied by the predominantly white Gould grade school had originally been built to house the Gould High School.” 381 F. 2d, at 255. achieved.” Kelley v. Altheimer, 378 F. 2d 483, 489. See also Kemp v. Beasley, 389 F. 2d 178. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed and the case is remanded to the District Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion and with our opinion in Green v. County School Board, supra. It is so ordered. JACK GREENBERG, New York, N.Y. (JAMES M. NABRIT, III, MICHAEL MELTSNER, MICHAEL J. HENRY, JOHN W. WALKER, and NORMAN CHACHKIN, with him on the brief) for petitioners; ROBERT V. LIGHT, Little Rock, Ark. (HERSCHEL H. FRIDAY and G. ROSS SMITH, with him on the brief) for respondents; ERWIN N. GRISWOLD, Solicitor General, STEPHEN J. POLL AK, Assist- ant Attomey General, LOUIS F. CLAIBORNE and LAWRENCE G. WALLACE, Assistants to the Solicitor General, and BRIAN K. LANDSBERG, Justice Dept. attorney, filed brief for the United States, as amicus curiae, seeking reversal. Nos. 247 axp 319.—Octoser TERM, 1967. The Puyallup Tribe, ete., Petitioner, 247 v. ~ Department of Game of On Writs of Cer- ~ Washington et ak tiorari to the Supreme Court Nug Cautz 1., Petitioners, aa Nugent Kautz et al, Petitioners of Wadiihton, 319 : . Department of Game of Washington et al. [May 27, 1968.] Mg. Justice Douvcras delivered the opinion of the Court. These cases present a. question of public importance which involves in the first place a construction of the Treaty of Medicine Creek made with the Puyallup and Nisqually Indians in 1854 (10 Stat. 1132) and secondly the constitutionality of certain conservation measures adopted by the State of Washington allegedly impinging on those treaty rights. : These suits were brought by respondents in the state court against the Indians for declaratory relief and for an injunction. The trial comrt held for respondents and with exceptions not relevani to our problem the Supreme Court affirmed in part and remanded for further findings on the conservation aspect of the problem. The Depart- ment of Game et al. v. The Puyallup Tribe, 70 W. D. od 241, 422 P. 2d 754; The Department of Game et al. v. Kautz et al, 70 W. D. 2d 270,422 P. 2d 771. We granted the petitions for certiorari and consolidated the cases for oral argument. 389 U. S. 1013. : While the Treaty of Medicine Creek created a reserva- tion for these Indians, ne question as to the extent of those reservation rights, if any, is involved here. Our question concerns the fishing rights protected by Article III, which so far as relevamt reads as follows: 1 Tt should be noted that white a reservation was created by Arti- cle II of the Treaty, Article ¥I provided that the President might remove the Indians from the reservation “on remunerating them for their improvements and thze expenses of their removal, or may T r o t e g s n a