A Mississippi school district has been ordered to desegregate its schools after what the Justice Department called a five-decade-long legal battle.
The Cleveland School District, about two hours northwest of Jackson, was told that it must consolidate its schools in order to provide real desegregation for students in the city of about 12,000.
Residents first filed suit against the Bolivar County of Education in July 1965, according to an opinion handed down on Friday.
Holy crap! They fought allowing black students into their schools for fifty years?
Gee I wonder how long it will be before they let them use their drinking fountains?
I remember Texas in the 50's and earlier, and their forced to be segregated, The school system had blacks only schools, whites only schools, Latino/Hispanic only schools, and Asian only schools. It was so pathetic.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure Donaldass T Rump Drumpf Stump, the short-fingered vulgarian will decide all about water fountains when he is elected in a yooge never seen before tremendous landslide victory in November OR
ReplyDelete...unless the reasonably sane among us are registered, ID'd, and ready to VOTE for the Democratic presidential nominee come hell or high water!
dowl
There will be a chrome plated fountain for minorities and gold plated for whites, brought to you by Trump industries. It's good for minorities to be among their own, per george Wallace. Any one remember that silver tongued harbinger of joy?
ReplyDeleteSchool segregation is very much alive and well in Mississippi.
ReplyDeleteIn the late 1960's-early 1970's, when the DOJ decided to get serious about enforcing Brown v. Board of Education, just about every community in Mississippi responded by forming "Christian academies" -- private schools, meeting mostly in churches, all-white.
Today, in Mississippi, segregated schools are still the norm. The white kids attend the local "Christian academy" while the black kids are in the public schools.
The community described in this article is Cleveland, MS, in Bolivar County, the heart of the MS Delta. The Delta begins in the lobby of the Peabody Hotel, Memphis, TN, and ends on Catfish Row, Vicksburg, MS. It has been rightly described as "the most Southern place on earth." My father was born and reared in Shaw, MS, next door to Cleveland. I have cousins in Cleveland and return to The Delta annually, mainly for hunting in the swamps along the Mississippi River.
I am from Wilkinson County, MS, which is home to two towns, Centreville and Woodville (the county seat). In Centreville is the Centreville Christian Academy while Woodville is home to Wilkinson County Christian Academy. These two schools are all white while the public schools are 99.5% black. In Cleveland -- actually in Bolivar County -- the white kids attend Bayou Academy.
If you check out the websites of these "Christian academies," you will see an occasional black kid -- on the athletic teams. Check out the websites of the public schools in Wilkinson County and you will find not one white face -- they all attend the "Christian academy."
This pattern is common throughout Mississippi. MS is the worst although AL, GA, LA, TN, SC, NC, FL, and VA have their share of "Christian academies."
The schools in this article are two public schools in Cleveland that are a bit unusual in that there is something of a mix of black and white kids -- I'm not certain but I have heard the ratio is 60/65% black to 30% white, the rest Hispanic and Asian.
There are still plenty of segregated proms in the south. This is not surprising.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up in Alabama I remember those days where there were always two drinking fountains. One had a signg saying "Colored" and the other a sign saying "Whites". As a child we didn't dare drink out of the "Colored" fountain because we thought it meant we would catch their germs. Sad isn't it? The south and being forced to go to an evangelical school my entire life (where Palin spoke at a few years ago by the way) turned me into a flaming progressive. Even as a child I knew inside that the mindset I was being indoctrinated into was wrong. Yes, I also got a lot of whippings by asking my parents too many questions about the drinking fountains and why do we have easter bunnies and eggs on easter because what did it have to do with Jesus being risen from the dead. They couldn't answer so it was just easier to shut me up with a spanking.
ReplyDeleteA perfect example of how the law doesn't automatically end a wrong, it only allows for legal processes to seek justice.
ReplyDeleteWhat jumps out to me in that photo is the ugly racist hatred written all over the face of the ignorant young woman behind the black student.
ReplyDeleteI saw this on television and felt profound sadness for all those who walked and did what they could to end segregation, jim crow laws, etc.
ReplyDeleteThis shouldn't be, not in this day and age.
The black school is in top ratings academically and now will integrate with a white school that's doing poorly.
ReplyDelete