Greenberg Statement on Intent to Follow Supreme Court Miss. School Ruling with Additional Desegregation Suits

    eS 
President 

Hon. Francis E. 

PRESS RELEASE Director-Counsel 
egal ‘efense und Jack Greenber; 

Director, Public Relations NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND, INC. Jesse DeVore, Jr. 10 Columbus Circle, New York, N.Y. 10019 * JUdson 6-8397 NIGHT NUMBER 212-749-8487 

Statement by Jack Greenberg, Director-Counsel, 
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., 
10 Columbus Circle, New York, New York, 
Friday, October 31, 1969, 11:00 a.m. 

Staff attorneys who are responsible for more than 200 separate 

southern integration cases across the South conferred here yesterday 

and concluded that the LDF should follow up the Supreme Court's 

Mississippi school ruling immediately. 

Accordingly, we will file motions in 75 to 100 pending school 

cases at the district court level. We will ask for immediate 

integration. We will not wait for the close of the school year or 

even until the end of the semester. Every southern state will be 

affected. 

Another of our 25 cases are on appeal from southern district 

courts to the appeals court level. We will also move for immediate 

integration in these. 

We have 25 New York based attorneys and 250 cooperating lawyers 

across the South. Although they have caseload responsibilities in 

other areas of our program, our entire LDF legal and field educa- 

tional staff will place special emphasis on breaking the back of 

southern school resistance. 

The President's statement yesterday in which he acknowledged 

that the Court had spoken decisively and in which he said that the 

Administration desires to help with "problems" arising from the 

ruling is, of course, welcome. More welcome, however, would be-- 

and we hope that there soon will be forthcoming--a statement to the 

effect that the law will be promptly and vigorously enforced and 

that the full resources of the Department of Justice will be turned 

to implementation. 

Otherwise, the burden will fall upon Negro children, parents, 

and the LDF. Our capacity, of course, is limited by the availability 

of manpower and funds, particularly in an Administration dedicated 

to law and order. 

The implementation of unambiguous Supreme Court rulings should 

be the first priority of government. 

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Statement by Jack Greenberg -2-+ October 31, 1969 

This ruling has several particularly noteworthy aspects: 

1. It ends segregated schools after a suit is filed without 

lengthy court proceedings. 

2. It lifts the burden from southern school administrators by 

establishing a clear rule; they no longer have the option to delay 

school desegregation, and segregationists therefore have no incentive 

to try to force them to keep segregating. 

3. The decision gives the LDF and the Department of Justice a 

means of dealing with District Courts that refuse to enforce deseg- 

regation by involving the Courts of Appeals in playing a greater 

role of supervision in the desegregation process. 

Pad It makes clear, once and for all, that this country is 

unquestionably on the road to integration and that no momentary 

political expediency will turn it around. 

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