Negro Students Get Injunction Against LA. School Bias Law

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

ARTHUR B. SPINGARN op THURGOOD MARSHALL 
President Director and Counsel 

ROY WILKINS ROBERT L. CARTER 
Secretary Assistant Counsel 

ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS ARNOLD de MILLE 
Treasurer Pross Relations 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

NEGRO STUDENTS GET INJUNCTION 
AGAINST LA, SCHOOL BIAS LAW February 5, 1957 

BATON ROUGE, LA.--Negro students attending mixed classes in four 

Louisiana state colleges were granted temporary restraining orders by 

the federal court last week forbidding school officials from enforcing 

a state statute and school board regulation which would exclude them 

from further attending the tax-supported institutions. 

The restraining orders were issued by the U. S. District Court 

for Eastern Louisiana in three separate complaints filed in behalf of 

13 Negro students and brought against the Louisiana State Board of 

Education and the officials of Louisiana State University, McNeese 

State College, Southeastern Louisiana College and Southwestern 

Louisiana Institute. 

The injunctions were issued without notice against the college 

officials pending hearings on the complaints. Hearings are tenta- 

tively scheduled for February 8. 

The actions sought temporary restraining orders and preliminary 

and permanent injunctions to restrain the enforcement of the recently 

enacted state statute which provides that no person shall be regis- 

tered at any publicly financed institution of higher learning without 

filing a certificate of "eligibility" and "good moral character," Tho 

certificate must be signed by the Superintendent of Education of the 

Parish, county or municipality in which the student graduated from 

high school and by the principal of the high school from which he 

graduated. To register a student who does not possess these certifi- 

cates is a crime punishable by fine and imprisonment. 

The state statute also provides that a permanent teacher in the 

Stete-wan—be-removed from office for "performing any act toward brinz- 

ing about integration of the races in any public institution of higher 

learning of the State of Louisiana." 



Last October the State Board of Education adopted a resolution 

which stated that "the presidents and administrative officers of the 

colleges be advised that it is the opinion of the board that they 

should secure such certificates from all students beginning with the 

opening of the second semester of the 1956-57 session." 

NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund attorneys for the Negro 

students advised the court that the students who graduated from segre- 

gated public high schools applied to the principals of the schools for 

the necessary certificates, but were advised that signing of the cer- 

tificates would result in the loss of their Jobs, When the students 

applied to the Superintendents of Education in their communities, they 

were refused certification because no certificate had been received 

from the high school principals. 

Students who graduated from Catholic high schools, however, were 

given certificates of eligibility, but school superintendents refused 

to sign them. 

All the students were notified by college officials that it would 

be impossible for them to register for the second semester if they did 

not file the certificates on or about February 1. 

The complaints allege that Louisiana state laws deny Negro stu- 

dents “equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the lth Amendment 

of the U. S. Constitution" because, as a prerequisite to attending 

state colleges, they require Negroes to secure certificates of eligi- 

bility from public officials who, if they furnished them for Negroes, 

are subject to dismissal. Public officials may, however, sign certif- 

icates for white students without such penalties, the NAACP Legal 

Defense Fund attorneys said. 

"The plaintiffs have already established their qualifications for 

admission and continuation in the public-supported irs titutions as 

students," the complaints state. The requirement that they furnish a 

certificate of eligibility is contrary to the die process clause of 

the 1th Amendment. 

The Louisiana state legislature recently passed laws which call 

for (1) the exclusive use of separate school facilities by white and 

Negro children; (2) white teachers shall teach only white children; 

(3) suspend compulsory school attendance laws in racially integrated 

schools; (1) employers must furnish separate facilities for white and 

Negro employees; (5) prohibit interracial social and athletic activi- 

ties; (6) the provisions for separate praks and recreational 



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facilities for members of the Negro and white races, and (7) the pro- 

vision for separate accommodations for white and colored passengers 

in intrastate travel. 

In pleading for the restraining orders, the attorneys for the 

students pointed out that the students have no plain, adequate or com- 

plete remedy to redress these wrongs other than by the suits for 

injunctions. 

"Any other remedy would be attended by such uncertainties and 

delays as to deny substantive relief, would involve a multiplicity of 

suits and cause further irreparable injury, damage and inconvenience 

to plaintiffs and those similarly situated," 

The three suits call for: 

a. A temporary restreining order and judgment enjoining 
college officials from refusing the students! regis- 
tration and registration of all other Negro students 
for the forthcoming semester and thereafter, 

b. An immediate statutory three-judge court be convened 
to hear whether preliminary and permanent injunctions 
should be issued. 

c. Hearings be held on whether preliminary and permanent 
injunctions should be issued enjoining the college 
officials and their agents from refusing Negro stu- 
dents' registration and registration of all other 
Negroes similarly situated for the forthcoming semes= 
ter at the four colleges, and for whatever other 
relief the Court may "deem proper in the circumstances," 

Attorneys filing for the students are Thurgood Marshall, Robert 

L. Carter, and Jack Greenberg, all of New York, and A. P. Tureaud of 

New Orleans, La, 

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