Davis v. East Baton Rouge Parish School Board, Civ. A. No. 1662.

• Decision Date: 21 August 1975
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 1662.
• Citation: 398 F. Supp. 1013
• Parties: Clifford Eugene DAVIS, Jr., a minor, by his father and next friend, Clifford Eugene Davis, Sr., etc., et al. v. EAST BATON ROUGE PARISH SCHOOL BOARD, a corporation, and Lloyd Funchess, as Superintendent of Public Schools in East Baton Rouge Parish.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Louisiana

398 F. Supp. 1013

Clifford Eugene DAVIS, Jr., a minor, by his father and next friend, Clifford Eugene Davis, Sr., etc., et al. v. EAST BATON ROUGE PARISH SCHOOL BOARD, a corporation, and Lloyd Funchess, as Superintendent of Public Schools in East Baton Rouge Parish.

Civ. A. No. 1662.

United States District Court, M. D. Louisiana.

August 21, 1975.

Robert C. Williams, Williams & Eames, Baton Rouge, La., Murphy W. Bell, Baton Rouge, La., for plaintiffs-intervenors.

John F. Ward, Jr., Baton Rouge, La., for East Baton Rouge Parish School Board.

E. GORDON WEST, District Judge:

This suit, seeking to desegregate the East Baton Rouge Parish school system, was originally filed on February 29, 1956, almost 20 years ago. Over the years, many hearings have been held and many orders have been issued by this Court in an effort to bring the operation of this school system within the requirements of the United States Constitution as it understood those requirements to be.

The East Baton Rouge Parish School Board has, in each instance, been totally cooperative and has at all times made a good faith effort to comply with the orders issued. Indeed, it has in fact always complied with the orders of this Court. Today, no student in the East Baton Rouge Parish school system is denied either the right or the opportunity to attend an integrated school. In accordance with sound educational principles, the neighborhood school system has, as much as possible, been preserved. This Court, in all of its hearings in connection with the operation of nine separate public school systems, including the East Baton Rouge Parish system, has never heard a single qualified educator state that the neighborhood concept for school attendance is not a sound educational concept. Indeed, the almost unanimous opinion of those who have testified before this Court is that if we are truly interested in the educational welfare of the children involved, the neghborhood concept, at least as far as initial assignment is concerned, should be preserved at all cost. The East Baton Rouge Parish School Board has consistently endeavored to preserve and apply this concept in assigning students to the many schools in its system. Because of purely voluntary housing patterns throughout the Parish of East Baton Rouge, this has, of course, resulted in some schools having an initial assignment of all black students and some having an initial assignment of all white students. Out of the total of 108 schools in the system, 20 are all black and 2 are all white. All other schools have racially mixed student bodies to varying degrees.

It seems to have become a custom for some lawyers to file a motion in this case each year before school starts seeking what they broadly refer to as "Supplemental Relief." It is such a motion that is presently before the Court.

After this rather vague motion was filed, conferences were held with counsel for all parties present. All aspects of the East Baton Rouge Parish school operations were discussed, and the Court tried diligently to ascertain exactly what the attorney who filed the motion was seeking. The only concrete thing that emerged from these conferences as far as the Court could determine was that there were really no "plaintiffs" involved; that the attorney was appearing as an "intervenor"; that no parents of children in the system were appearing to voice any complaints; and that the only thing sought by the attorney-intervenor was "more integration." The Court was unable to elicit any constructive suggestions from the attorney-intervenor, and it was obvious that the requested "more integration" was being sought solely for sociological reasons rather than for the purpose of improved educational opportunity for children. On the basis of these conferences, the Court would have been justified in simply denying the motion for "supplemental relief." However, out of an abundance of caution, and in an effort to obtain the opinion of experts completely detached from the East Baton Rouge Parish school system, the Court appointed the Louisiana Educational Laboratory (LEL) to act as a court-appointed expert to investigate the entire operation of the East Baton Rouge Parish school system and to advise and the assist the Court in determining what action, if any, was needed to bring the East Baton Rouge Parish school system into compliance with the prior desegregation orders of this Court and with present constitutional requirements. At a cost of $27,949.89, borne by the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board, the LEL made an intensive study of the entire school system and filed two comprehensive reports with the Court, a preliminary report dated December 23, 1974, and a final report dated May 1, 1975. These reports have been made a part of the record.

Following receipt of the first report, and after conferences with counsel, the Court issued an order dated February 26, 1975, whereby it ordered certain recommendations of the LEL implemented. These recommendations related to the appointment of blacks to the School Board staff at the decision making and planning levels; further implementation of majority to minority transfer provisions including provisions for furnishing transportation to transferees; re-constituting the Bi-Racial Committee; reexamination of distribution of teachers on basis of race and experience; and re-examination of attendance zones. Evidence since that time has shown that this order has been fully complied with.

Following receipt and distribution of the final report of May 1, 1975, an evidentiary hearing was held. At that hearing the only witnesses called by the "attorney-intervenor" were Dr. Lionel O. Pellegrin, the LEL staff member who authored the reports; Dr. John Moland, Jr., a teacher and researcher at Southern University; and Mr. Ed Steimel, of the Public Affairs Research Council (PAR). No plaintiffs were called, and no complainants were presented in court. The sum total of the evidence adduced from these witnesses was (1) students in the Baton Rouge school system are not being denied access to any public school because of race; (2) all students in the East Baton Rouge Parish school system are being offered equal and high quality education; and (3) further forced mixing of the races in the various schools would not in any way improve the quality of education being offered students in the East Baton Rouge Parish schools. This in essence, was the testimony offered by the "attorney-intervenor" in support of his request for "supplemental relief." All witnesses testified that as a general rule, assignment on the neighborhood school basis produces the best educational opportunity because it produces greater interplay between students, parents, and teachers, and it creates more stability in the school system. Dr. Moland stated that in his opinion, while the neighborhood concept does not always enhance desegregation because of the fact that white students tend to move out when the ratio of blacks to whites becomes too large, placing a few white students in a predominantly black school does not improve the educational quality of the school. He concluded that such a move is purely sociological and does not necessarily enhance the educational opportunity available to students. This was one of the plaintiff's witnesses. Mr. Ed Steimel, the only other witness called by the intervenor, based his testimony primarily on the recent report of Dr. James S. Coleman, the University of Chicago sociologist who originally supported the concept of massive bussing to achieve forced racial balance in public schools. But he, in his most recent report, concludes that "You can't create integration by court edict" alone. Based largely on Dr. Coleman's report, Mr. Steimel concluded that it is far better from an educational standpoint to keep schools either all black, or with a majority of white students. He concluded that experience has shown that black students learn better when their school is all black than they do where there is only a token number of whites mixed in. This was the testimony of another one of plaintiff's witnesses. This observation, allegedly supported by Dr. Coleman's report, is important when considering the validity of attendance zones established by the School Board. The evidence in this case makes it abundantly clear that there is no forced segregation of the races in the East Baton Rouge Parish school system, and that every student has the opportunity to attend an integrated school, with transportation furnished, if he wishes to do so. Whatever segregation exists, as it does in a few all black and all white schools in the system, exists by deliberate choice and because of legitimate, voluntary neighborhood patterns. To force a few white students to attend a few all black schools, or to force a few black students to attend the two all white schools, solely for the purpose of being able to say that 100 per cent...