Statement by William T. Coleman, Jr. Re: Austin School Desegregation Suit

Press Release
August 4, 1971

Cite this item

Statement by William T. Coleman, Jr. Re: Austin School Desegregation Suit preview

Document text

The following text has been generated automatically during the document scanning process. It may contain errors, omissions, or incorrect formatting. Please refer to the PDF document if this text is not usable.

Download

By downloading, publishing, or reusing the Materials outside of the Website, you hereby confirm and attest that you have read and agree to the LDF Archival Collection Terms of Use linked below. We draw your attention to the following:

For those Materials owned by LDF, your use of the Material outside the Site is solely for one or more of the following (the “Permitted Purposes”):

Non-commercial research and private study;
Teaching, scholarship and instruction (including distance learning);
Non-commercial print and non-commercial online use;
Criticism, comment or news reporting; or
For people with visual disabilities (See Section 121 of the Copyright Act).
For those Materials not owned by LDF you understand that:
- It is your responsibility to determine whether the way you plan to use the materials falls within the copyright exception of Fair Use.
- For any use outside of Fair Use, it is your responsibility to seek and obtain all required permissions from any existing rights holders.

LDF hereby grants you the right to use LDF owned Materials for the Permitted Purposes without seeking further permission from LDF.

If you publish or redistribute any Materials (including excerpts and quotes), you must include a credit line and/or proper citation to the source of the Material. However, you may not use the name of LDF in any manner which creates any false association between you and LDF or that incorrectly implies any sponsorship or endorsement of you by LDF.

NOTICE: Uses that do not comply with these Terms or that do not fall under Fair Use (or another exception) may make you liable for copyright infringement.

Read the full LDF Archival Collection Terms of Use Here.

I agree to the terms and conditions for use of this content.

If you would like to use this content in other ways, contact us at

Collection
- Press Releases
Creator
- LDF
Taxonomy
Identifier
- 443ac3ac-ba92-ee11-be37-00224827e97b

Cite this item

Press Releases, Volume 6. Statement by William T. Coleman, Jr. Re: Austin School Desegregation Suit, 1971. 443ac3ac-ba92-ee11-be37-00224827e97b. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/71889a5a-b5da-49df-934e-79b54880115d/statement-by-william-t-coleman-jr-re-austin-school-desegregation-suit. Accessed July 20, 2025.

Copied!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

AUGUST 4, 1971

STATEMENT BY WILLIAM 1’. COLEMAN, JR.

PRESIDENT OF THE

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND, INC.

RE: AUSTIN SCHOOL DESEGREGATION SUIT

NEW YORK, N.Y. --- I have requested the staff of the Legal

Defense Fund to take steps to see that the constitutional rights

of Negro children are protected in the Austin, Texas desegregation

case. When the Supreme Court last term in the Charlotte case held

that school districts must integrate completely, even if that

requires busing, the President of the United States announced that

was the law of the land and would be enforced by him.

Following that, the Department of Health, Education and

Welfare submitted a complete desegregation plan for Austin. After

that plan was rejected by the U.S. District Court, the Department

of Justice announced yesterday that it would appeal. We had

at the appeal would seek to implement the administration's

own HEW plan. Apparently, however, political "southern strategy"

considerations immediately took over. And now the administration

announces that it is opposed to the plan which it submitted to the

courts pursuant to the Supreme Court decision.

In view of the fact that as a result of the change in the

administration's position only the Legal Defense Fund represents

the rights of black children in Austin, Texas, we will be doing

whatever is appropriate to see that those rights are preserved.

ACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc. | 10 Columbus Circle | New York, N.Y. 10019 | (212) 586-8397

William T. Coleman, Jr. - President Jack Greenberg - Director-Counse

Copyright notice

This collection and the tools to navigate it (the “Collection”) are available to the public for general educational and research purposes, as well as to preserve and contextualize the history of the content and materials it contains (the “Materials”). Like other archival collections, such as those found in libraries, LDF owns the physical source Materials that have been digitized for the Collection; however, LDF does not own the underlying copyright or other rights in all items and there are limits on how you can use the Materials. By accessing and using the Material, you acknowledge your agreement to the Terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the Materials.

Additional info

To the extent that LDF includes information about the Materials’ origins or ownership or provides summaries or transcripts of original source Materials, LDF does not warrant or guarantee the accuracy of such information, transcripts or summaries, and shall not be responsible for any inaccuracies.

Statement by William T. Coleman, Jr. Re: Austin School Desegregation Suit

Collection

Creator

Taxonomy

Identifier

Cite this item

Copyright notice

Additional info

You may also be interested in