home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- <text id=92TT0776>
- <title>
- Apr. 13, 1992: American Notes:Desegregation
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1992
- Apr. 13, 1992 Campus of the Future
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- NATION, Page 31
- American Notes
- DESEGREGATION
- Leaving It Up To the Locals
- </hdr><body>
- <p> Since the 1960s, when federal judges ordered the desegregation
- of hundreds of school systems, one key question has gone
- unanswered: at what point had a system done enough to mix black
- and white children in the classroom to satisfy the courts?
- </p>
- <p> Last week the Supreme Court edged closer to an answer: it
- ruled that in many instances, local school districts can
- determine the means for achieving classroom racial balance. The
- case involved the public schools of De Kalb County, Ga., which
- were ordered to desegregate in 1969. After that, large numbers
- of black families moved into the southern part of the county and
- sent their children to neighborhood schools. Result: more than
- half of the 33,752 black students attended 90% black schools,
- while more than a fourth of the 34,692 white pupils were in
- schools that were 90% white.
- </p>
- <p> Three years ago, a federal appeals court called for a
- major desegregation effort. But the Supreme Court overturned
- that order on the ground that the schools' racial makeup
- reflects "demographic shifts" the school board could not
- control. In cases in which segregation is not the result of
- actions by local officials, wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy,
- courts cannot force schools to assign students by race. The
- ruling might encourage other school districts to seek a halt to
- court-ordered integration also.
- </p>
-
- </body></article>
- </text>
-
-