1. Desegregation Goes North:
Getting Around Brown
Stephen Menendian
Senior Legal Research Associate,
The Kirwan Institute For the Study of Race and Ethnicity
The Ohio State University 1
February 3, 2011

2. Brown v. Board of
Education (1954)
2

3. Brown
► Plaintiffsargued that segregated schools are
not ‘equal’ and cannot be made ‘equal,’ in
violation of the EPC of the 14A.
► Plaintiffs conceded that the Negro and white
schools have been equalized or are being
equalized, with respect to buildings,
curricula, qualifications and salaries of
teachers, and other ‘tangible’ factors.
3

4. To separate them from others of similar age and qualification
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 to ever be undone.
‘Segregation of white and colored children in public schools
has a detrimental effect upon colored children. The
impact is greater when it has the sanction of law; for the
policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as
denoting the inferiority of the negro group
We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine
of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate educational
facilities are inherently unequal.
4

5. A Brief History of Desegregation:
Massive Resistance
► Although an enormous moral victory, the
Brown decision did not dismantle
segregative practices nor produce an
integrated society.
► Instead, the decision provoked massive
resistance, and a full decade passed with
virtually no progress in desegregating
schools.
The Crisis in Little Rock, 1958

6. A Brief History of Desegregation:
Courts Get Serious
► In Green v. County School Board (1968),
the Court defined what desegregation
required, the elimination of segregation
‘root and branch.’
► In Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenberg (1971),
the Court ruled that lower courts could
order busing to achieve desegregated
student assignments.

7. Four Phases of Desegregation
► Massive resistance
 Cooper v. Aaron (1958)
► Courts get serious
 Griffin (1964), Green (1968) and Swann (1971)
► Desegregation moves north
 Keyes (1973) and P enick (1979)
► Drawing a line at the school district border
 M illiken (1974) and Jenkins (1995)

8. Segregation in the North
► Inthe South, segregation and Jim Crow
were an expression of the values of the
society, and was enforced by statute.
► Those values were also present in the north,
except that segregation was more a matter
of practice and custom than legislation.
8

9. A Brief History of Desegregation:
Desegregation Moves North
► In Keyes v. School Dist. No. 1 (1973), the
Court extended school desegregation
obligations to systems outside of the South
that had employed discriminatory policies.
► Furthermore, this is true whether school
districts or officials contributed either in the
creation or “maintenance” of segregated
schooling. Inaction as well as action could
be a basis for liability.

10. A Brief History of Desegregation:
Desegregation Moves North
► In Penick v. Columbus Board of Education (1977),
judge Robert Duncan ruled that the Columbus Board
of Education knowingly kept white and black
students apart by creating school boundaries that
sent black students to predominantly black schools
and white students to predominantly white schools,
and had failed to use its authority to alleviate
existing racial imbalances.
► The United States Supreme Court affirmed.
Distinguished Jurist
Robert M. Duncan

11. Measuring Segregation
► Residential
dissimilarity index for (African
American – White) segregation 1910 to
2000
► School
dissimilarity index for (African
American – White) segregation 1970-2000
► Spatial
patterns of African American – White
segregation in Columbus

12. Residential Dissimilarity Index 1910-2000
(African American - White Segregation)
90.0
81.4
80.0 76.1
74.3 73.0
70.0
67.2
62.8 63.1
58.1
60.0
50.0
43.2
40.0
30.9
30.0
1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
Dissimilarity Index (African American - White Segregation)

13. Housing Segregation and School
Segregation are Linked
► Thereis a reciprocal relationship between
residential segregation and school
segregation.
► Thesegregation of folks across
neighborhoods and districts results in
segregated schools.
13

14. School Dissimilarity Index 1970, 1990, 2000
(African American - White Segregation)
90.0
82.6
80.0
81.6 69.0
70.0
66.8
60.0
50.0
53.4
40.0
30.0
20.0
23.2
10.0
1970 1990 2000
All Districts in Columbus Region Columbus Public School District

15. W
N
E
African American Population
S in Franklin County by Census Tract 1970
Prepared by:
Kirwan Institute for the
Study of Race & Ethnicity
Date: 10/13/05
Source: Census, NCDB
Legend:
Columbus Public
School District
Highways
% African American
0 - 5%
5 - 10%
10 to 25%
25 to 50%
50 to 100%

16. W
N
E
African American Population
S in Franklin County by Census Tract 1980
Prepared by:
Kirwan Institute for the
Study of Race & Ethnicity
Date: 10/13/05
Source: Census, NCDB
Legend:
Columbus Public
School District
Highways
% African American
0 - 5%
5 - 10%
10 to 25%
25 to 50%
50 to 100%

17. W
N
E
African American Population
S in Franklin County by Census Tract 1990
Prepared by:
Kirwan Institute for the
Study of Race & Ethnicity
Date: 10/13/05
Source: Census, NCDB
Legend:
Columbus Public
School District
Highways
% African American
0 - 5%
5 - 10%
10 to 25%
25 to 50%
50 to 100% 17

18. W
N
E
African American Population
S in Franklin County by Census Tract 2000
Prepared by:
Kirwan Institute for the
Study of Race & Ethnicity
Date: 10/13/05
Source: Census, NCDB
Legend:
Columbus Public
School District
Highways
% African American
0 - 5%
5 - 10%
10 to 25%
25 to 50%
50 to 100%

19. The Rise of Suburbia:
But not accessible to everyone
19
In the suburb-shaping years (1930-1960),
less than one-percent of all African Americans were able to
obtain a mortgage.

20. The Fair Housing Act of 1968
• The last ‘plank’ in the Civil Rights movement.
– Signed into law a week after the assassination of
MLK
• Prohibits discrimination in the sale or rental of
residential housing.
– Exempted single family dwellings that were not sold
using a realtor
• Duty of all executive and administrative
agencies to ‘affirmatively further’ fair housing.

21. Milliken v. Bradley (1974)
► Maya federal court order desegregation
across district lines?
 Multi-district desegregation
21

22. Before the boundaries of separate and
autonomous school districts may be set aside by
consolidating the separate units for remedial
purposes or by imposing a cross-district remedy,
it must first be shown that there has been a
constitutional violation within one district
that produces a significant segregative effect
in another district.
Specifically, it must be shown that the racially
discriminatory acts of the state or local school districts, or
of a single school district have been a substantial cause of
inderdistrict segregation. Without an interdistrict
violation and an interdistrict effect, there is no
constitutional wrong calling for an interdistrict remedy.
22

23. Metropolitan treatment of metropolitan problems is
commonplace. If this were a sewage problem or a water
problem, or an energy problem, there can be no doubt that
Michigan would stay well within the federal constitutional
bounds if it sought a metropolitan remedy.
When we rule against the metropolitan area remedy we take a step back that
will likely put the problems of the blacks and our society back to the period
that antedated the ‘separate but equal’ regime of Plessy v. Ferguson.
The reason is simple. The inner core of Detroit is now rather solidly black;
and the blacks, we know, in many instances are likely to be poorer, just as
were the Chicanos in San Antonio School District v. Rodriguez. By that
decision, the poorer districts must pay their own way. Today’s decision, given
Rodriguez, means that there is no violation of the Equal Protection Clause
though schools are segregated by race and though the black schools are not
only ‘separate’, but ‘inferior.’
23

24. There is so far as the school cases go no constitutional difference
between de facto and de jure segregation. Each school board
performs state action for the Fourteenth Amendment purposes
when it draws the lines that confine it to a given area, when it
builds schools at particular sites, or when it allocates students.
The creation of the school districts in Metropolitan Detroit either maintained
existing segregation or caused additional segregation. Restrictive covenants
maintained by state action or inaction build black ghettos. It is state action
when public funds are dispensed by housing agencies to build racial ghettos.
Where a community is racially mixed and school authorities segregate
schools, or assign black teachers to black schools or close schools in fringe
areas and build new schools in black areas and in more distant white areas,
the State creates and nurtures a segregated school system, just as did those
States involved in Brown when they maintained dual school systems.
All of these conditions and more were found by the District Court to exist. 24

25. Milliken accelerated white flight
Suburbs
Suburbs
Central Suburbs
City
Jurisdictional
fragmentation
accelerated as
well Suburbs

26. Milliken increased segregation
School
Lower
Segregation &
Educational
Concentrated
Outcomes
Poverty
Racial and Increased
Economic Flight
Neighborhood of Affluent
Segregation Families
26

27. A Brief History of Desegregation:
Courts Dissolve Deseg Orders
► The 1990s ushered in another significant
shift Between 1991 and 1995 (see
Jenkins), the Supreme Court invited school
districts to bring proceedings to terminate
desegregation obligations.
► Even though severe racial disparities and
racial isolation remained, this marked the
beginning of the end of court supervision
and the return local control of schools.

28. Resegregation Trends

29. Resegregation Trends
► U.S. public schools are now more than a decade into rapid
resegregation:
 Almost 1 in 6 black and Latino students are hyper-segregated, and
attend schools in which the student body is 99-100% minority.
 Nearly 40% of black and Latino students attend ‘intensely
segregated schools,’ in which 90-100% of the students are
minority.
 Whites are the most isolated group of students. The typical white
student attends a school that is 80% white, which is much higher
than their share of overall public school enrollment.

30. White Student Enrollment -
Columbus

31. Black Student Enrollment

32. ► Sprawl: Between 1950 and 1990, the number of
municipalities in metropolitan areas grew from 193
to 9,600.
► Segregation: Typical white resident resides in a
neighborhood that is 80% white. A typical Black
person lives in a neighborhood that is 33% white.
► Concentrated Poverty: 3 of 4 persons living in
concentrated poverty are Black or Latino even
though more whites are poor.
32

33. Cross-Domain Impacts of Opportunity
Segregation
Segregation impacts a number of life-opportunities
Impacts on Health
School Segregation
Educational Achievement
Exposure to crime
Transportation limitations and
other inequitable public services
Neighborhood Job segregation
Segregation
Racial stigma, other
psychological impacts
community power, civic 33
participation and individual
assets 33
Adapted from figure by Barbara Reskin at: http://faculty.washington.edu/reskin/

34. Education
Barriers-Segregation
50 years after the
Brown Decision,
America’s schools
have re-
segregated into
affluent White
districts and poor
under-funded
African American
and Hispanic
districts
34

35. Which community would you choose?
35

36. ► School
Composition
layered over
census tract data
in Montclair, NJ
► Mapsillustrate
how residential
segregation can
manifests in
schools
36

37. ► Magnet school
policy counteracts
effects of
neighborhood
segregation
37

38. DeRolph Decisions
► Fourtimes the Ohio Supreme Court has
held that the current school funding formula
is unconstitutional.
 In particular, the Court found that the state
overlies on local property taxes.
 In 1997, the district funding for schools was
about 56.2%, and the state provided 43.8%.
38

39. Williams-Bolar Case
► Kelley Williams-Bolar, an Akron, Ohio,
woman was convicted with the felony crime
of falsifying documents to get her children
into a high-performing district and jailed for
9 days.
39