Following the opening of the 1960-61 school term last week in most of the southern and border states…

    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 

September 15,1960 

NEW YORK, N.Y. - - - Following the opening of the 1960-61 school term last 

week in most of the southern and border states, significant legal progress in 

public school desegregation is reported in several quarters. 

With an estimated 767 school districts in twelve states opening with some 

degree of integration, it is the first time since the 1954 Supreme. Court decision 

outlawing segregation in public education that the southern schools opened without 

a single reported incident of violence. 

It is reported that fourteen new districts in seven southern states enrolled 

Negro children in white elementary schools for the first time. This does not 

include Houston, Texas which has the largest segregated school system in the 

country, and where several Negro children were enrolled for the first time. 

All districts remained segregated in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi 

and South Carolina. 

Thurgood Marshall, Director-Counsel of the N.A.A.C.P. Legal Defense 

and Educational Fund, pointed out that the highlight of this year's legal victories 

in the organizations's continued efforts to speed up school desegregation was 

reflected in the refusal of the Supreme Court two weeks ago to grant delays 

requested in three separate cases to authorities in New Orleans, Houston and 

Delaware 

Mr. Marshall stated; 

"The refusal of the Supreme Court to grant the requests is significant 

because it indicates that a point arrived at which litigating must stop and 

bona fide desegregation must ommence. The law is clear that the courts will 

not ountenance litigation merely for the sake of delay." 



The ruling in the Houston case is of particular significance, Mr. Marshall 

explained. Until the time of the decision Houston was the largest segregated 

district in the country. The Court rejected a plan presented by the Houston 

Board as a "sham" and "palpable fraud", ruling that where school boards do not 

present plans courts will institue desegregation plans of their own and demand 

compliance with the Constitution, 

The New Orleans case came before the Supreme Court as a result of an 

order by a United States District Court to put into effect a year-by-year stair-step 

integration plan in September, starting with the first grade. The school 

authorities appealed the order, but a United. States Appeals Court refused to 

interfere. Upon request, the District Court gave the school board until 

November 14 to effectuate the plan. 

The state Attorney General then asked the United States Supreme Court 

permission to put off integration. Legal Defense attorneys for the Negro children 

also petitioned the Supreme Court. They asked that the November stay order be 

vacated and that integration begin immediately. The Court refused to postpone 

desegregation beyond the November 14 date set by the District Court. 

In Delaware the Court of Appeals reversed a District Court ruling which 

gave all of the school districts south of Wilmington twelve years to desegregate 

and demanded that complete desegregation be in effect by 1961. The Court also 

ordered that the named plaintiffs in the case be admitted immediately. The State 

Board asked the United States Supreme Court for a postponement of these orders, 

which was denied. 

Mr. Marshall revealed that this past summer was the busiest Legal 

Defense Fund attorneys ever experienced. Forty school cases alone were filed 

in thirteen states and the Supreme Court. Many briefs were written and filed in 

defense of students arrested in the sit-in demonstrations and other segregation 

cases. He said a separate report will soon be made on the sit-in protest cases. 

Education cases filed were in Alabama 1; Arkansas]; Delaware]; Florida 3; 

Georgia 2; Louisiana 6; Maryland 1; North Carolina 7; South Carolina 1; Tenneszee 

3; Texas S and Virginia 9. 



"However impressive the legal victories may appear,"Mr. Marshall said, 

"the fact remains that -- six years later -- we still have only token compliance 

with the Supreme Court order of ‘with all deliberate speed. * In comparison 

to the overall picture, only a handful of Negro children are being educated 

in accordance with the law of the land." 

——o0.—