LDF Wins Supreme Court Order for Feb. 1 School Integration

Press Release
January 17, 1970

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- 59e169f1-b992-ee11-be37-00224827e97b

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Press Releases, Volume 6. LDF Wins Supreme Court Order for Feb. 1 School Integration, 1970. 59e169f1-b992-ee11-be37-00224827e97b. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/c602bf15-646e-410b-afa5-e83e1643acc5/ldf-wins-supreme-court-order-for-feb-1-school-integration. Accessed November 23, 2025.

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    ar 

President 

Hon. Francis E. Rivers 
PRESS RELEASE Director-Counsel 

egal fefense und Jack Greenberg 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND, INC. pir Sl ct 
10 Columbus Circle, New York, N.Y. 10019 » JUdson 6-8397 oe ele 

FOR RELEASE 
SATURDAY 
January 17, 1970 

LDF WINS SUPREME COURT ORDER 
FOR FEB.1 SCHOOL INTEGRATION 

WASHINGTON, D.C.---"No waiting until next September" was the reaction 
of LDF attorneys to this week's Supreme Court ruling ordering public 
school desegregation in five hard core southern states. 

Responding to a petition by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educa- 
tional Fund, Inc. (LDF) involving 11 school districts, the High Court 
reversed a decision by the U.S, Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit 
and ordered pupil integration by February 1, 1970 instead of the 
following September. 

Directly affected are 14 school districts in Alabama, Florida, 

Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi. 

LDF Associate Counsel James M. Nabrit III, who supervised the 
staff work, said: 

“We understand today's Supreme Court opinion to mean that it is 
no longer proper to wait until next September to carry out desegre- 
gation, and school districts must act during this school year to 
effect integration. 

"The LDF will take prompt action in the lower courts to insure 
that the Supreme Court's mandate is carried out in our eleven school 
@istricts involved in today's order and will take similar action in 
a@ large number of our 217 school cases in the South." 

*The latest Supreme Court action, a follow-up to its October 29 
speed-up ruling in another LDF action, came from a petition filed on 
December 19, 1969 involving 10 school cases from Jackson, Marshall 
County and Holly Springs, Mississippi. 

In addition were cases from Jefferson County, Bessemer, and 
Mobile County, Alabama; Burke, Bibb County, and Houston County, 
Georgia, 

Bay County and Alachua County in Florida were also among the 

school districts named. 

A team of 25 attorneys pulled the case together in one week's 
time under Mr. Nabrit's direction. 

Members of the winning legal team are: LDF Director-Counsel Jack 
Greenberg, Associate Counsel James M. Nabrit III, First Assistant 
Counsel Norman C. Amaker, Assistant Counsels Melvyn Zarr, Michael 
Davidson, William Robinson, Jonathan Shapiro, Norman J. Chachkin, and 
Drew Days--all of the LDF New York headquarters. 

Other attorneys involved are LDF cooperating lawyers Oscar W. 
Adams, Jr. and U.W. Clemon of Birmingham, Ala.; David H. Hood, Jr. of 
Bessemer, Ala; Vernon Z. Crawford and Frankie Fields of Mobile, Ala; 
Reuben V. Anderson, Fred L. Banks, Jr., Melvyn Leventhal of Jackson, 
Miss.; Louis R. Lucas of Memphis, Tenn.; John H. Ruffin, Jr. of 
Augusta, Ga.; Thomas M. Jackson of Macon, Ga.; Theodore R. Bowers of 
Panama City, Fla.; Earl M. Johnson and Reese Marshall of Jacksonville. 

Fla. 

John L. Maxey II and Stanley L. Taylor of the North Mississippi 
Rural Legal Services Program in Holly Springs, Mississippi, also 

joined the legal team. 

=30-

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LDF Wins Supreme Court Order for Feb. 1 School Integration

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