Ask U.S. District Court to Halt White Student Transfer

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10 Columbus Circle 
New York, N.Y. 10019 
JUdson 6-8397 

Legal Defense and Educational Fund 
PRESS RELEASE 
President 

Dr, Allan Knight Chalmers FOR RELEASE 
Director-Counsel ate 

sisbiGrecnlers heceaeer 9, 1965 

ASK U. S, DISTRICT COURT TO 
HALT WHITE STUDENT TRANSFER 

CHARLOTTE, N. C.---Attorneys of the NAACP Legal Defense and 
Educational Fund today asked the U. S. District Court here to block 
the parents of Terrence H. McClain in their efforts to remove their 
son from an integrated school. 

The white parents have asked the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board 
of Education for a tuition grant, payable from North Carolina's 
state treasury, which would allow Terrence to leave his’ present 
school. 

The parents base their action on a North Carolina statute 
passed in 1956, 

‘ 
That statute also states that local school districts and the 

electors of such districts, may vote to close school when 
integration takes place. 

It gives exemption, from compulsory attendance laws, to 
students who are assigned, against the wishes of their parents, 
to integrated classrooms. 

Legal Defense Fund attorneys are asking the District Court to: 

*enjoin the tuition grant plan 
*prevent local school boards and electors from closing 
schools 

*enforce the compulsory school attendance law when 
schools become integrated. 

The Negro plaintiffs brought the action in their own behalf 
and in “behalf of the Negro children attending the public schools 
of this state," 

This suit follows on the heels of three other Legal Defense 
Fund victories in the U. S. Supreme Court in the area of school 
integration, 

LastMonday, the High Court ruled out the grade-a-year plan in 
Fort Smith, Arkansas. 

Several weeks before that, the Court called for integration 
of teachers and administrative personnel in Richmond and Hopewell 
Junction, Virginia. 

This North Carolina action is brought in behalf of the 
children of Dr. and Mrs. Reginald Hawkins, Rev. and Mrs. Darius 
Swann and Rev, and Mrs. E. J. Moore, all of Charlotte. 

Defendants are the North Carolina State Board of Education, 
Edwin Gill, treasurer of the state of North Carolina; and, the 
Charlotte-Mechlenburg Board of Education. 

Attorneys for the plaintiffs are Julius LeVonne Chambers of 
Charlotte, and Legal Defense Fund Director-Counsel Jack Greenberg 
and Charles H, Jones of the Fund's New York headquarters. 

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Jesse DeVore, Jr., Director of Public Information—Night Number 212 Riverside 9-487 Ss