Brown V Board Revisited

Today I've read quite a few articles by the usual talking heads regarding the recent Supreme Court decision, the worst of which charged the betrayal of Thurgood Marshall. While I don't claim to know what Thurgood Marshall would have decided on this case, I do wish to revisit the topic because thus far, all the talking heads have been outright wrong in their characterization of the return of Plessy V. Furguson in the wake of the recent decision. The reason for this is the complete misunderstanding of the Brown V. Board decision, which none of the talking heads I've read have even bothered to quote. I will direct the reader to the text of the decision here. Let's take a look at the decision so that we understand just exactly what the point of the decision was and was not.

These cases come to us from the States of Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, and Delaware. They are premised on different facts and different local conditions, but a common legal question justifies their consideration together in this consolidated opinion.

In each of the cases, minors of the Negro race, through their legal representatives, seek the aid of the courts in obtaining admission to the public schools of their community on a nonsegregated basis.

Note that the case here dealt with a challenge to the states in question having legally separated schools for students soley on the basis of race and regardless of the geographic location of the student in question. In other words, a middle class black student who may be far away from the "black" school would end up at the black school (not that such a thing was common).

In each instance, they had been denied admission to schools attended by white children under laws requiring or permitting segregation according to race. This segregation was alleged to deprive the plaintiffs of the equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment. In each of the cases other than the Delaware case, a three-judge federal district court denied relief to the plaintiffs on the so-called "separate but equal" doctrine announced by this Court in Plessy v. Fergson, 163 U.S. 537. Under that doctrine, equality of treatment is accorded when the races are provided substantially equal facilities, even though these facilities be separate. In the Delaware case, the Supreme Court of Delaware adhered to that doctrine, but ordered that the plaintiffs be admitted to the white schools because of their superiority to the Negro schools...

We come then to the question presented: Does segregation of children in public schools solely on the basis of race, even though the physical facilities and other "tangible" factors may be equal, deprive the children of the minority group of equal educational opportunities? We believe that it does.

Again, the question is whether legal segregation of students, that is forced separation of various races of students, deprive students of equal educational opportunities. And you'll note that they asked not if white students are "deprived" but whether "minority" students are deprived. In other words, the court believed that white students were doing just fine in their educational settings.

In Sweatt v. Painter, supra, in finding that a segregated law school for Negroes could not provide them equal educational opportunities, this Court relied in large part on "those qualities which are incapable of objective measurement but which make for greatness in a law school." In McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, supra, the Court, in requiring that a Negro admitted to a white graduate school be treated like all other students, again resorted to intangible considerations: ". . . his ability to study, to engage in discussions and exchange views with other students, and, in general, to learn his profession."

Again, you find that the issue is whether the "negro" can fully cooperate in the functions of school just as a "model" white student could. Clearly if a school is segregated, then the student cannot fully cooperate and therefore does not have equal access to the same educational experiences that is afforded to white students.

To separate them from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone.

Here we have the infamous "Negroes feel inferior by being separated from white students" statement. Clearly the court did not feel that white students were feeling inferior by being separated because of their race. They didn't think that white students were feeling inferiority complexes about their communities either. Here's the proof:

Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a detrimental effect upon the colored children. The impact is greater when it has the sanction of the law, for the policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as denoting the inferiority of the negro group.A sense of inferiority affects the motivation of a child to learn. Segregation with the sanction of law, therefore, has a tendency to [retard] the educational and mental development of negro children and to deprive them of some of the benefits they would receive in a racial[ly] integrated school system.



Again, we have the implied inferiorization of "Negro" students made possible by laws creating segregated educational institutions.

We conclude that, in the field of public education, the doctrine of "separate but equal" has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore, we hold that the plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions have been brought are, by reason of the segregation complained of, deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. This disposition makes unnecessary any discussion whether such segregation also violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment...

We have now announced that such segregation is a denial of the equal protection of the laws.



Again, the issue at hand was equal protection under the 14th amendment. Not diversity. Not anything else. Equal protection. Legally sending black students to black schools due simply to their race was a denial of due process and equal protection. That also meant that sending white students to a school simply because they are white is ALSO a denial of equal protection. The ruling cut both ways. It is simply the fact that everyone was focused on the poor downtrodden Negro, to see it until now. The thing is that the whole "diversity" thing got attached to Brown as if THAT was the point of the decision. It was not and anyone who says so has either not read the decision or does not understand what it meant.

What the hand wringers are actually concerned about is the Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education case which established bussing as a legal means of integrating school systems. What this recent decision does is deal with the following specific point of the Swann case:

(2) One-race schools. While the existence of a small number of one-race, or virtually one-race, schools does not in itself denote a system that still practices segregation by law, the court should scrutinize such schools and require the school authorities to satisfy the court that the racial composition does not result from present or past discriminatory action on their part. Pp. 25-26.

An optional majority-to-minority transfer provision has long been recognized as a useful part of a desegregation plan, and to be effective such arrangement must provide the transferring student free transportation and available space in the school to which he desires to move. Pp. 26-27.

You will note that the "majority" student must "desire" to move. The case recently decided was clearly about students (and parents) who did NOT desire to be transported. Again it is clear that once a student is forced to attend a school SOLEY on the basis of their race, that the act is unconstitutional. Period. That is clear from the original Brown decision.

Also of importance in the Swann decision is:

8. Neither school authorities nor district courts are constitutionally required to make year-by-year adjustments of the racial composition of student bodies once a unitary system has been achieved. Pp. 31-32.

What does a "unitary system" mean? It means that the school system and resources are equitably allocated. Once that is done there is no constitutional requirement to intervene.

The result of this decision and the Brown II and III decisions was that people became focused on how many black bodies were in which schools and any school that had too many black bodies was deemed segregated. Failure to understand that the patterns of residency is what fuels so called "segregation" is lost on most people. Simply put you go to school near to where you live. There is no legal bar to any black student going to any public school. Therefore there is no return of Plessy V. Ferguson. What we have is actually a return to the fundamental issue that needed to be addressed: the proper funding of school systems regardless of geographic location. The problem with majority black schools is not that there are a majority of black students there, it is that the usual economic situation is that which results in a poorer educational experience. The hand wringers are busy seeing that each and every instance of majority black school systems (and it is black folk business they are always meddling in) as a result of past segregation or current redlining. Yes it is definitely the case that much of the housing patterns in the US are a result of past discrimination, BUT, it should be equally clear that busing students here there and everywhere has not done squat to change those living patterns. It is a matter of fact that the majority of black people such as those in Queens, NY, are quite fine choosing to live around other black people just like the Asians like to live in Flushing. If white parents want their kids to go to school with black kids, let them move into black neighborhoods and send their kids to the local school. Black parents have been doing that for decades. It's called moving into a "good school district" and every parent knows the game. You need to have the bucks to play that game. There's that problem again: Bucks.

So when you hear and read these talking head people (mostly so called "liberals") digging up Thurgood Marshall and the spectre of Plessy, know that they have absolutely no clue. None. And on a side note, ask how many of them went to an HBCU? expect a very very very low number.

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