The Desegregation of Schools

Brown v Board of Education

Prior to 1954, President Harry Truman stated publicly that he disagreed with the discrimination faced by black people. From 1952 onwards, cases for desegregation were brought to the Supreme Court.

Turning point

1954 was a turning point in civil rights campaigns.
Campaigning began to have some successes. This was largely due to the work of the NAACP which was formed in 1909.
The group worked on civil rights campaigns by lobbying politicians, boycotting segregated services and using publicity to draw sympathy and support for their movement.
They had extremely talented activists such as the lawyer Thurgood Marshall. In 1950 he successfully managed to get the Supreme Court to rule against segregation in universities and railroad dining cars.

Brown v Board of Education

Oliver Brown, a minister for Topeka, Kansas wanted his daughter Linda Brown to attend a white school. Linda Brown was black.
She was 7 years old and had to walk 20 blocks to get to her segregated school even though there was a school for white people a few blocks from her home.
The NAACP helped her father to bring a legal case against the education board who refused to allow her to go to the white school.

The case against the Board of Education

Thurgood Marshall and Chief Justice Earl Warren presented their case to the Supreme Court. Chief Justice Earl Warren stated publicly that even if the facilities were ‘separate but equal’, the very fact that black children were kept separate was psychologically harmful to them.
The Supreme Court declared that segregation contradicted the 14th Amendment and the American Constitution.
- This was a phenomenal success for the Civil Rights Campaign.

Resistance to the Desegregation of Schools

The Supreme Court did not give a specific date that segregation in schools had to be abolished by, and unsurprisingly, many education boards were reluctant to do this.

Reluctance to desegregate

Some schools which were not in the deep Southern States started to desegregate in areas such as Washington DC, Delaware and Maryland.
Many schools continued to refuse to implement the ruling and by 1956, in 6 Southern States, not a single black child attended a white school.

Organised opposition

White Citizen’s Councils were quickly formed through the South to try to defend white schools against desegregation.
Membership numbers for White Citizen's Councils and the KKK rose to a few hundred thousand.
In some deep Southern States such as Virginia white ‘massive resistance’, campaigns urged schools to close rather than accept desegregation.
Despite white resistance, Brown v Board of Education inspired further campaigns from black people.

Why did the Supreme Court support desegregation?

Many members of the Supreme Court were Democrats who personally disliked segregation and Jim Crow Laws.
There was an emerging idea in the 1950s that racism could be overcome if different races integrated.

Chief Justice Earl Warren

The work of Chief Justice Earl Warren was also a crucial element in Brown's victory. He used his political connections to get others to support desegregation, including fellow Justices.
- He did this despite warnings from President Eisenhower, who did not share his views on integrated schools.

The Little Rock Nine

Despite the Supreme Court ruling to desegregate schools, society was reluctant to change. This can be seen in the case of the Little Rock Nine.

Events at Little Rock

At the start of term in September 1957, nine black pupils tried to attend a school for white children in Little Rock, Arkansas.
The Governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus, ordered the National Guard (soldiers) to be sent into school to prevent the nine students from entering in a bid to try and get the white racists to vote for him in the upcoming election.
With the threat of mobs and lawlessness erupting, President Eisenhower ordered 1,000 troops from the 101st Airborne Division to escort the children into the school.

Faubus' Re-election

Faubus closed schools rather than end segregation in schools.
His actions saw him get re-elected 4 times which showed that despite the Supreme Court ruling that segregation in schools was unconstitutional, society was not willing to do the same.
- By 1960, out of a total of 2 million black school children in the State of Arkansas, only 2,600 went to the same school as white children.

The impact of the Little Rock Nine

The Civil Rights campaigners realised that not only did they need the support of the government, but they also needed the support of white people in order to bring about change.
The event did get good media coverage though. Other schools ended segregation in a bid to stop them encountering the same negative publicity and violence seen in Little Rock.

1‘Free at Last’ 1865-77

1.1The Thirteenth Amendment

1.1.1The Civil War & The Thirteenth Amendment

1.1.2The Impact of the Civil War

1.1.3Economic, Political & Social Position of Ex-Slaves

1.1.4Political Settlement & Andrew Johnson

1.2Radical Reconstruction, 1867-77

1.2.1The Fourteenth Amendment

1.2.2The Fifteenth Amendment & The Civil Rights Act

1.3The Backlash

1.3.1White Supremacy Groups

1.3.2The End of Reconstruction 1887

2The Triumph of ‘Jim Crow’ 1883-c1890

2.1Jim Crow Laws & Civil Rights Cases

2.1.1Jim Crow Laws

2.1.2Voting Rights

2.1.3Scientific Racism

2.1.4Civil Rights Cases

2.2Resistance and Migration

2.2.1The Northern States & Black Resistance

2.2.2Early Migration

2.2.3The Great Migration

2.2.4Race Riots

2.2.5Migration Case Study: Harlem

3The New Deal and Race Relations, 1933–41

3.1Failure to Address Black Grievances

3.1.1The Democrat Party & the Anti-Lynching Bill

3.2The New Deal

3.2.1The New Deal

3.2.2The Alphabet Agencies

3.2.3The PWA, WPA & the NYA

3.2.4Benefits

3.2.5Impact of the New Deal & Eleanor Roosevelt

3.2.6Gone With the Wind

3.3The Second World War

3.3.1The Experience of War

3.3.2The Home Front

3.3.3The White Flight

3.3.4Restrictive Covenants

4‘I have a dream’, 1954–68

4.1Civil Rights Activities, 1954–63

4.1.1The Desegregation of Schools

4.1.2The Montgomery Bus Boycott

4.1.3SCLC & Birmingham

4.1.4SNCC

4.1.5CORE

4.2Civil Rights 1964-68

4.2.1Civil Rights Act 1964 & Voting Act 1965

4.2.2Ghettos & Poverty

4.2.31966 - 1968

4.3Malcolm X & The Black Panthers

4.3.1The Nation of Islam & Malcolm X

4.3.2Divisions in the Civil Rights Movement

4.3.3The Black Panthers

4.4Literature, Film & Television

4.4.1Racial Attitudes in Literature from 1850-2009

4.4.2Racial Attitudes in Film from 1850-2009

4.4.3Racial Attitudes in Television from 1850-2009

5Obama's Campaign for the Presidency, 2004–09

5.1The Late 20th Century

5.1.1Migration Back to the South in the 20th Century

5.1.2The Status of Black People 1968-2009

5.2Barack Obama & his Political Career

5.2.1Barack Obama's Life

5.2.2Senator for Illinois

5.2.3Running as Presidential Candidate

5.3Reasons for Obama's Victory

5.3.1Reasons for Vicotry

5.3.2The Significance of Obama's Victory

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