The Struggle for Equal Terms in the 1960s and Engaging Historical Evidence March 6, 2004

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Today’s Plans
The Struggle I: The Battle for Integration
Sharing Artifacts
On Evidence
The Struggle II: The Blowouts
Towards Public History Projects

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Before Integration in California

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California schools must be “open for the admission of all White children … the education of children of African descent, and Indian children, shall be provided for in separate schools.”
-California education code, 1870

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Ward v Flood
“though separated from the other, [students of different races should be] educated on equal terms with [each] other, and both at common public expense.”
--California Supreme Court, 1874

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Education Code 1667, 1880
“Every school … must be open for the admission of all children between six and twenty-one years of age residing in the district; … Trustees shall have the power to exclude children of filthy of vicious habits, or children suffering form contagious or infectious diseases.”

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Segregation for Some, 1921
The governing body of the school district shall have power to exclude children of filthy or vicious habits, or children suffering from contagious or infectious diseases, and also to establish separate schools for Indian children and for children of Chinese, Japanese or Mongolian parentage.
Education Code 1662

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Before Segregation???
in LA

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Roosevelt HS 1936
28% American
26% Jewish
24% Mexican
7% Russian
6% Japanese
9% Italian, Armenian, and other ethnic

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Moments of Social Equality
Roosevelt in the 1930s
Students elected a Japanese student body president and an African American female vice president

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Notions of (In)Equality
“Nothing is so unequal as the equal treatment of unequals.”
-----Los Angeles Supervisor, 1920s
“The doctrine that ‘all men are born free and equal’ applies to man’s political equality … In no way can this idea of equality be applied to intellectual endowment.”
-----Principal of ‘Mexican School’, 1920s

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“We build on a biological foundation. We cannot make a black child white, a deaf child hear, a blind baby see, nor can we create a genius from a child whose ancestors endowed him with a defective brain. Within the limits of heredity, we can do much.”
William Cooper, CA Supt of Public Instruction, 1927

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Intelligence Tests as Sorting Tools
60% of Mexican American children in CA score in ‘nonacademic’ range in 1928.
At Belvedere Jr HS, with 50% Mexican American population, 55% of all students scored below 90.
At Lafeyette Jr HS, over half of all Mexican American students channeled into non-academic track.

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Contradictions in the System
“Students in the 7th grade of the Lincoln School [serving Mexican Americans] were superior scholarly to the same grade in the Roosevelt School [serving White students] and to any group of 7th graders in either of the schools in the past.”
Mendez v Westminster, 1946

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Tracking in Multi-Racial Schools
“What would make you think that anyone who is sick in bed would want anyone as black as you to take care of them?”
---Response of Guidance Counselor at Belvedere Intermediate when Hope Mendoza Schechter asked to switch from home economics to academic track to pursue nursing.

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Challenging Segregation

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Mendez’s Precedents
The record before us shows … that the technical facilities and physical conveniences offered … the efficiency of teachers … and the curricular are identical and in some respects superior.

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“A paramount requisite in the American system of public education is social equality. It must be open to all children of unified school association regardless of lineage.”

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Brown and footnote 11
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.

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Los Angeles:
From Color Blind to ???

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Seeing Color, Seeing Segregation
What would have to be done to make Los Angeles schools completely segregated? A single bus could haul away all the white students in Fremont, Jefferson, Jordan, Manual, and Riis high Schools.
John Caughey, 1967 (CP 357)

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Crawford v. LAUSD--1971/1976
Judge Gitelson --”the Los Angeles school board “knowingly, affirmatively and in bad faith…segregated, de jure, its students” and had drawn school boundaries “so as to create or perpetuate segregated schools.”
California Supreme Court--public school students could be involuntarily bused away from their neighborhood schools to "desegregate" racially imbalanced schools, even if that imbalance was caused by residential patterns and not school authorities.

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BUSTOP--1976
Valley activists rise up
A housewife, Bobbi Fiedler, formed Bustop in Encino, where a white teacher was about to be replaced by a black teacher.
In months, 30,000 members throughout the city. Critics said Bustop was fueled by racism--charges its leaders denied.
The grass-roots group helped propel Fiedler into public office in a stunning defeat of school board President Robert Docter, who favored busing. She went on to Congress.

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Magnet Schools & PWT--the 1980s
looking for “volunteers”
The first magnet school opened in 1979, as part of “voluntary” court-ordered desegregation under Crawford.
1995 the District had a total of 132 magnet schools serving approximately 42,000 students with a waiting list of approximately 30,000 students
only 5% of the student population in the District actually attend magnet schools
PWT--provides transportation for students voluntarily attending schools other than resident schools.

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While the Focus Lay on Crawford …

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Serrano v. Priest -- 1971; 1976
“rich schools; poor schools”
facts:
Baldwin Park Unified School District spent $577.49 per child
Pasadena Unified School District spent $840.19 per child
Beverly Hills Unified School District spent $1,231.72 per child”
ruling:
violates the equal protection clause of the California constitution
state must equalize funding.

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Proposition 13 -- 1978
"taxpayer revolt"
California voters passed by 65% to 35%
reduced local property tax revenues by approximately $6.1 billion (53 percent)
made raising taxes more difficult
state tax increases requires 2/3 vote of the legislature
local taxes requires 2/3 vote of local citizen

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What is an Integrated School
and Why Should we Care???

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Ethnic Representation of California Teachers/Students

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5 90-100% or 0-10% White
4 80-89, 11-20% White
3 70 -79, 21-30% White
2 60-69, 31-39% White
1 40-59 White

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5 One group 90%
4 One group 75-89%
3 One group 50-74%
2 No majority
1 3 groups with 15%+ or 4 groups with at least 10%