Martin v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of Ed.
Decision Date | 10 August 1979 |
Docket Number | No. C-C-78-220.,C-C-78-220. |
Citation | 475 F. Supp. 1318 |
Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of North Carolina |
Parties | George MARTIN et al., Plaintiffs, v. CHARLOTTE-MECKLENBURG BOARD OF EDUCATION, Defendant, and Carrie L. Graves et al., Intervening Defendants. |
Whiteford S. Blakeney, Blakeney, Alexander & Machen, Charlotte, N. C., for plaintiffs.
William W. Sturges and Hugh B. Campbell, Jr., Weinstein, Sturges, Odom, Bigger, Jonas & Campbell, P.A., Charlotte, N. C., for defendant Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education.
Julius LeVonne Chambers, Chambers, Stein, Ferguson & Becton, Charlotte, N. C., for added and intervening defendants.
Plaintiffs, a group of parents and children, brought this suit against the Charlotte-Mecklenburg, North Carolina, Board of Education, seeking an order prohibiting the Board from assigning pupils pursuant to the Board's 1978 pupil assignment plan. Under that plan, 2,050 white and 2,775 black children (out of approximately 78,000) were reassigned. One reason for many of these transfers was to prevent re-segregation of certain schools. Plaintiffs allege that race was the significant element, or at least a major element, in those assignments; that racial discrimination had ceased with the adoption and implementation of the pupil assignment plan of 1974; and that race could not be lawfully considered for any purpose thereafter.
The pupil assignment plan under attack was adopted pursuant to orders of this court originally affirmed by Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg, 402 U.S. 1, 91 S.Ct. 1267, 28 L.Ed.2d 554 (1971) and orders later based upon that decision, and in accordance with independent policy decisions by the School Board itself that it would maintain and operate a desegregated school system. In arriving at those decisions the School Board expressly considered numerous policy matters including quality education for all students (the "main goal"); desegregated schools as a necessary part of that goal; grade structures and specialized schools appropriate to educational needs; the lack of planning among the "feeder areas" of the system; the need for coordination with other community planning agencies; the problems of those schools whose student bodies are almost all economically deprived; parental preferences; student safety; the desire to recognize "neighborhood" in school assignments when possible; the most economical use of school property and facilities, including transportation; and the Board's educational policy that regardless of what previous Boards might have done, and independent of court orders, this Board considered it educationally desirable to have the races represented in the various schools in the proportions produced by the 1978 plan.
Carrie Graves and others sought permission to intervene and were allowed to intervene as defendants on behalf of themselves and a class of black pupils attending or eligible to attend the Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools. They are represented by the attorneys who represented Swann and the other plaintiffs in the original Swann case. They oppose the contentions of plaintiffs here.
This is the third suit filed by the same lawyers seeking to nullify Swann. The first such case, Moore, et al. v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, was filed February 27, 1970, attacking the court's rulings in Swann because North Carolina had a "no bussing" law. A few weeks later a three-judge court held unconstitutional the North Carolina statute prohibiting "bussing" and assignment of pupils by race. On April 20, 1971, contemporaneously with its principal Swann decision, the United States Supreme Court held North Carolina's "antibussing law" unconstitutional, North Carolina State Board of Education v. Swann, et al., 402 U.S. 43, 91 S.Ct. 1284, 28 L.Ed.2d 586, and dismissed the Moore case, Moore, et al. v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, et al., 402 U.S. 47, 91 S.Ct. 1292, 28 L.Ed.2d 590 (April 20, 1971). The second case, Cuthbertson, et al. v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, was filed on March 29, 1973, and was dismissed by order dated July 30, 1975. It was appealed to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which dismissed without opinion on March 18, 1976 (535 F.2d 1249). On October 4, 1976, the Supreme Court denied petition for certiorari. 429 U.S. 831, 97 S.Ct. 92, 50 L.Ed.2d 95. The factual contentions in that case were much the same as those in the case at bar, and the issues are much the same as those decided in the original Swann case. Res judicata, laches and collateral estoppel are pleaded, perhaps with merit, by the intervening defendants.
However, since these plaintiffs today contend that any consideration of race in pupil assignment in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools is unlawful under Bakke, supra, and under Pasadena City Board of Education v. Spangler, 427 U.S. 424, 96 S.Ct. 2697, 49 L.Ed.2d 599 (1976), it becomes the duty of the court to consider plaintiffs' claims in light of Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, 74 S.Ct. 686, 98 L.Ed. 873 (1954), Swann, Pasadena and Bakke. There is no way to do this without a factual survey of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools and how they got where they are, and why the Board considers race, among other factors, in pupil assignment.
For that purpose, two hearings were conducted and much research was done. The first hearing was a preliminary conference with counsel, and the second was a two-day evidentiary hearing. Few plaintiffs appeared; no plaintiff testified; plaintiffs offered no live evidence but offered and relied upon a few written exhibits and admissions from the pleadings. Defendant School Board and the intervening "Swann" defendants (Carrie Graves and others) offered exhibits and lengthy testimony. I have also re-examined and considered the hundreds of pages of findings of fact and orders from the original Swann case, most of which are reported in the Federal Supplement and Supreme Court reports.
From that survey and from Brown, Swann, Pasadena and Bakke, I have concluded that the challenged actions of the School Board are thoroughly within constitutional limits and...
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