Englewood, New Jersey School Board Ordered to End Racial Segregation

Press Release
May 20, 1955

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Press Releases, Loose Pages. Englewood, New Jersey School Board Ordered to End Racial Segregation, 1955. 0f9fe102-bc92-ee11-be37-00224827e97b. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/76a2df1a-327b-4c0d-8fd1-9c4e8112720b/englewood-new-jersey-school-board-ordered-to-end-racial-segregation. Accessed November 07, 2025.

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    PRESS RELEASE® e 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
107 WEST 43 STREET «© NEW YORK 36, N. Y. ¢ JUdson 6-8397 

THURGOOD MARSHALL ARTHUR 8. SPINGARN c= Disclosed Chet rei 
ROBERT L. CARTER WALTER WHITE Assistant Counsel a 
ARNOLD De MILLE 

ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS Press Relations 
Treasurer 

ENGL™WOOD, NEW JFRSEY SCHOOL BOARD ORDERED 
TO END RACIAL SEGREGATION 

May 20, 1955 

TRENTON, N. J., May 19.--Frederick M., Raubinger, Commissioner 

of Education of the State of New Jersey, today upheld the segregation 

complaint of Mrs. Mary Walker of Englewood against the Englewood Board 

of Education, 

The Commissioner ruled that the Board drew school zone lines 

affecting kindergarten pupils attending Liberty and Lincoln elementary 

schools in such a way as to result in the segregation of Negro child- 

ren in the Lincoln School. The Commissioner also ruled that there is 

no. justification on educational or other grounds for the maintenance 

of a separate junior high school at the Lincoln School, which is attend- 

ed exclusively by Negro children. 

The Commissioner ordered the Board to draw new lines affecting 

attendance at Lincoln and Liberty schools by July 1, 1955 and to elim- 

inate the Lincoln Junior High School by September 1956. 

The Commissioner pointed out that although the Englewood Board may 

not have intended segregation, he was obliged to condemn the end result. 

Mrs. Walker filed her complaint with the New Jersey Division 

Against Discrimination in July, 1954, alleging that her son, Theodore 

Walker, aged 5, had been registered in the Liberty School during the 

month of May, 1954, in accordance with the school zone lines then in 

effect. She alleged that in September, 195l) he was required to attend 

the kindergarten at Lincoln, pursuant to new school zone lines adopted 

by the Board of Fducation on June 28, 195). Mrs. Walker charged that 

these new lines resulted in segregating Negro children in the Lincoln 

school, pursuant to a consistent plan and scheme of racial segregation 

on the part of the Englewood Board of Education. 

The Division Against Discrimination attempted to conciliate Mrs. 

Walker's complaint with the Board. When the Division failed to con- 
ciliate the complaint, a public hearing was ordered. The public hear- 

ing was held before Commissioner Raubinger in October and November 195). 
Mrs. Walker's case was presented to the Commissioner by NAACP Legal 

Defense attorneys Constance Baker Motley and Jack Greenberg and NAACP 
Attorney Leonard Williams of Trenton, New Jersey.

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Englewood, New Jersey School Board Ordered to End Racial Segregation

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