A suit involving 170 Negro students was filled last week in the federal district court against the Durham Board of Education…

Press Release
May 3, 1960

Cite this item

A suit involving 170 Negro students was filled last week in the federal district court against the Durham Board of Education… 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
- 962a569f-bc92-ee11-be37-00224827e97b

Cite this item

Press Releases, Loose Pages. A suit involving 170 Negro students was filled last week in the federal district court against the Durham Board of Education…, 1960. 962a569f-bc92-ee11-be37-00224827e97b. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/9e144f67-230d-4fd6-9edf-076dfa4a3322/a-suit-involving-170-negro-students-was-filled-last-week-in-the-federal-district-court-against-the-durham-board-of-education. Accessed July 31, 2025.

Copied!

    PRESS RELEASE®@ & 

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

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

May 3, 1960 

NEW YORK. -- A suit involving 170 Negro students was filed last 

week in the federal district court against the Durham Board of Educa- 

tion, This is the largest number of plaintiffs in a single legal 

action brought against a school system since the Supreme Court 1954 

decree outlawing segregation in public education. 

The Durham Board of Education is accused of using the North 

Carolina Pupil Placement laws to maintain and operate segregated 

schools by assignment on the basis of race. The North Carolina Pupil 

Placement statutes give local school officials the authority to 

assign school children on the basis of various vague factors. 

The suit charges the school board with making assignments on the 

basis of 2 school zones--one for white and another for Negro students. 

It also accuses school officials of operating 2 segregated school 

systems. 

The school board has not applied the state pupil placement 

statutes as a means of abolishing state-imposed racial distinctions, 

the court was told in the complaint filed here today. Nor have the 

school authorities advanced a "genuine method" for desegregating the 

city's public schools, the complaint charged. 

The complaint was filed on behalf of 170 Negro children by NAACP 

Legal Defense and Educational Fund attorneys. It asked the court to 

issue a decree enjoining the school board officials from assigning 

the students to any school other than the one to which they would 

be assigned if they were white. It also asked the court to direct 

the scheol officials to cease operating segregated schools and to 

presen* a complete desegregation plan within a time set by the court. 

The action today resulted from refusal of the school board to 

grant requests of 217 Negro students who sought reassignment from 

all-Negro schcols to schools nearer their homes. 



=O5 

At the hearing at which 170 students applied for change of 

assignment, 85 personally appeared. Those who did not personally 

appear were represented by counsel. The board rejected those who did 

not appear because they were not present. It rejected the others 

without any explanation. 

Originally 225 sought reassignment before the 1959-60 school 

term. Eight were reassigned and the other 217 were required to cor- 

tinue attendance at the all-Negro schools. 

Attorneys for the Negroes are Lincoln C. Jenkins of Columbia 

South Carolina and Matthew J. Perry of Spartanburg, South Carolina, 

Thurgood Marshall and Jack Greenberg of the NAACP Legal Defense Fur.” 

tle-f in New York City.

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.

A suit involving 170 Negro students was filled last week in the federal district court against the Durham Board of Education…

Collection

Creator

Taxonomy

Identifier

Cite this item

Copyright notice

Additional info

You may also be interested in