Letter from Lani Guinier to Wiley A. Branton, Esg. RE: Suggested Candidates for Director Counsel

    ~PRESS RELEASE® @ 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
1O COLUMBUS CIRCLE + NEW YORK 19,N.Y. © JUdson 6-8397 

DR. ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS oa THURGOOD MARSHALL 
President Director-Counsel 

THREE SCHOOL SUITS FILED IN N. C. 
February 11, 195¢ 

GREENSBORO, N.C. -- Legal steps were taken this week in three 

separate actions to compel North Carolina school officials to operate 

the public school system of that State on an integrated basis. 

In 2 complaints filed on Tuesday, February 10, 1959, with the 

U. S. District Court in Greensboro, N, C,, attorneys for the NAACP 

Legal Defense and Educational Fund sought permanent injunctions 

restraining the Greensboro Board of Education from assigning Negro 

students to racially segregated schools, 

The third suit was also filed on Tuesday with the U, S, District 

Court in Charlotte. It sought a similar injunction to restrain the 

Mecklenberg County Board of Education from refusing to admit Negro 

students to schools nearest to their homes. 

Named as defendants in the 3 cases are the North Carolina Advis- 

ory Committee on Education and the North Carolina State Board of 

Education, They are accused of having counselled with and working in 

concert with all the school boards in the State “for the purpose of 

preventing desegregation of the schools of North Carolina, or for. keep- 

ing such desegregation to a minimum," 

The North Carolina Advisory Committee on Education was created 

in 1955 by the General Assembly to frustrate desegregation efforts. 

Attorneys for the Negro students asked that both the State Board 

of Education and the Advisory Committee be permanently enjoined and 

restrained from counselling and working with any school board for the 

purpose of preventing desegrepation of schools, 

One of the 2 actions filed in Greensboro and the one filed in 

Charlotte attacked the policy of requiring Negro students to register 

in schools nearest their residences for Negroes only, regardless of 

how far the distance might be, One student lives 11 miles from the 

all-Negro school he must attend, 



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The other complaint charged the Greensboro School authorities 

with assigning Negro students to a 6-room dilapidated building on 

the campus of a school attended by white students only, The build- 

ing is administratively attached to an all-Negro school and is with- 

out playground facilities, auditorium, cafeteria, gymnasium and 

other school facilities. 

It is charged by the attorneys that luncheon food and eating 

utensils are transferred, some in large garbage cans, from the Negro 

school to the 6-room building. The students are compelled to eat 

and lunch in halls, classrooms or on the building grounds, They are 

not permitted on the grounds of the building occupied by white stu- 

dents or to use any of the facilities on the campus. Classes are 

dismissed 15 minutes early alternately in the 2 buildings so as to 

prevent contact by the Negro end white students. 

Attorneys for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund representing the 

Negro students in the 3 complaints are Thurgood Marshall and Jack 

Greenberg of New York. Local counsel are C, 0, Pearson of Durham, 

G. H, Wyche of Charlotte, and J. Kenneth Lee of Greensboro. 

a0e