Reno v. Bossier Parish School Board Brief for Appellant

    PressRelease fp ae Ia 

May 6, 1971 
For Immediate Release 

New York, N.Y. --- Jack Greenberg, Director-Counsel of 
the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), called 
today (May 6) for nearly doubling the support of the Legal — 

Defense Fund in its efforts to bridge the gap between black and 
white, rich and poor. 

Speaking at a press conference called in the Fund's offices 
to release the organization's 1970 Annual Report, Greenberg said 
that the country appears to have paused in the divisive struggles 
which have been tearing it apart for the past five years, but the 
Paus¢stems perhaps more from weariness than diminution of 

injustice. "We must take advantage of the pause to build institutions 
of justice and broaden freedoms, so that the struggles of the past 
five years will not intensify in the future," he said. 

He noted that whife LDF has made historic progress in the 
courts -- especially in the last year -- against inequities in 
education, housing, consumer fraud, job discrimination, criminal 
justice, etc., a ot campaign requiring $2,000,000 over and 
above LDF's $3, ,000jpius budget for 1970, would be needed to 
transform court victories into realities for the millions of 
Americans who still suffer because they are black or poor. 

More specifically, Greenberg noted that even though the 
Supreme Court has now laid down clear guidelines on Southern school 
desegregation -- including the use of busing as an alternative 
preferable to segregated schools -- there are no assurances that the 
federal government will assume its share of the responsibility for 
implementing the court's decision. 

He said that LDF was now proceeding with some 200 school 
Cases in the hopes of doubling the number of Southern school 
children attending desegregated classes by next fall (now about 
39%) . 

NAACP 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-Couns: 



GREENBERG REMARKS 
PAGE TWO 

Greenberg also noted the irony of the massive lay-offs 

and demotions being suffered by black principals and teachers 

throughout the South as school districts realize economies from 

school desegregation and pledged his organization's full support 

in urging that reductions in staff, or hiring be done solely on 

merit. 

On employment, Greenberg praised the Supreme Court decisions 

in two LDF cases: Griggs v. Duke Power Company, which has outlawed 

the use of employment tests which bear no relation to ability to 

do the job, and Phillips v. Martin Marietta -- the first sex 

discrimination case related to employment ever decided by the 

Supreme Court -- which said that women could not be refused jobs 

because they have pre-school youngsters unless the same standard 

was applied to men in a similar situation. 

He claimed that both victories would require enforcement 

and that LDF was prepared to supply it and that LDF would attack 

other discriminatory employment practices as well. 

Speaking on the LDF's prison reform campaign, Greenberg 

noted that the organization has brought more than a dozen suits 

against prisons across the country in an effort to assure humane 

treatment for convicts and untried suspects too poor to produce 

bail. He mentioned two recent victories, one in Toledo, Ohio, 

where a District Court judge likened the treatment received by 

inmates of the Lucas County Jail to "a refined sort (of punishment) 

much more comparable to the Chinese water torture than to such 

crudities as breaking on the wheel;" and the other in Little 

Rock, Arkansas, where a judge ordered the closing of the Pulaski 

County Jail unless conditions were imporved.