Horton v. Lawrence County Board of Education, 71-1581.

• Decision Date: 19 October 1971
• Docket Number: No. 71-1581.,71-1581.
• Citation: 449 F.2d 793
• Parties: Patricia Ann HORTON, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The LAWRENCE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

449 F.2d 793 (1971)

Patricia Ann HORTON, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The LAWRENCE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 71-1581.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

October 19, 1971.

U. W. Clemon, Birmingham, Ala., Norman Chachkin, New York City, Adams, Baker & Clemon, Birmingham, Ala., James Nabrit, III, Jack Greenberg, New York City, for plaintiffs-appellants.

Gene H. Lentz, Decatur, Ala., for defendants-appellees.

Before THORNBERRY, MORGAN and CLARK, Circuit Judges.

LEWIS R. MORGAN, Circuit Judge:

In this appeal appellants seek to recover back pay for a demoted black school principal and reasonable attorneys' fees arising out of a suit to integrate the public school system of Lawrence County, Alabama. Since we hold that additional findings are necessary on both issues, we remand for consideration on the merits by the district judge.

Appellants, representing the black citizens of Lawrence County, filed an action to integrate the county's public schools on July 9, 1966. Initially, a freedom-of-choice plan was put into effect by the district court, but on December 11, 1969, appellants filed a motion to require the Lawrence County Board of Education (hereafter Board) to establish a unitary school system in compliance with the then recent decisions of Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, Virginia, 1968, 391 U.S. 430, 88 S.Ct. 1689, 20 L.Ed.2d 716, and Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education, 1969, 396 U.S. 19, 90 S.Ct. 29, 24 L.Ed.2d 19. In this motion appellants included a request for reasonable attorneys' fees.

The district court held a hearing, and on June 12th and August 13th of 1970, entered orders which made no mention of attorneys' fees, but which ostensibly established a unitary school system by pairing schools in entities called single administrative units. However, with the beginning of school in the fall of 1970 it became apparent that the Board had effectively circumvented the court's desegregation plan by consistently pairing an all-white school and a traditionally black school of identical grade structure together in the same administrative unit, and then allowing the students within each unit to choose which of the two schools they would attend. Predictably, the white students chose one school and the black students elected another, resulting in a dual school system similar to the old freedom-of-choice plans struck down by Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, supra, and Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education, supra.

The Board also admittedly failed to employ nondiscriminatory criteria in selecting the staff members who, due to the reorganization of the school system, had to be demoted to lower paying positions.

In response to this turn of events, appellants filed motions demanding that the dual school system be abolished; that the school superintendent be held in contempt for failing to obey the court's orders; and that several black staff members be awarded back pay for the discriminatory demotions. On December 29, 1970, the district court rendered a decision which granted most of the back pay demands (with the exception of a claim to be noted later), and required the Board to immediately dismantle its dual school system, 320 F.Supp. 790. The court declined to hold the superintendent in contempt, but it did state that the defendant school officials had employed a "subterfuge for perpetuating a dual school system" and that "defendants have totally defaulted in the representation made by them to ...