McLaurin v. Columbia Municipal Sep. School District

• Decision Date: 24 May 1973
• Docket Number: No. 71-3022.,71-3022.
• Citation: 478 F.2d 348
• Parties: Willie McLAURIN et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The COLUMBIA MUNICIPAL SEPARATE SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

478 F.2d 348 (1973)

Willie McLAURIN et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The COLUMBIA MUNICIPAL SEPARATE SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 71-3022.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

April 11, 1973.

Rehearing and Rehearing Granted May 24, 1973.

Nausead Stewart, Fred L. Banks, Jr., Melvyn R. Leventhal, Jackson, Miss., for plaintiffs-appellants.

Maurice Dantin, Columbia, Miss., for defendants-appellees.

Before GOLDBERG, DYER and SIMPSON, Circuit Judges.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Granted May 24, 1973.

SIMPSON, Circuit Judge:

This Court's en banc decision in Singleton v. Jackson Municipal Separate School District, 1970, 419 F.2d 1211, cert. denied, 1970, 396 U.S. 1032, 90 S. Ct. 612, 24 L.Ed.2d 530, prescribed detailed procedures for the effectuation of staff reductions resulting from the judicially-ordered desegregation of formerly dual public educational systems:

"If there is to be a reduction in the number of principals, teachers, teacher-aides, or other professional staff employed by the school district which will result in a dismissal or demotion of any such staff members, the staff member to be dismissed or demoted must be selected on the basis of objective and reasonable non-discriminatory standards from among all the staff of the school district. In addition if there is any such dismissal or demotion, no staff vacancy may be filled through recruitment of a person of a race, color, or national origin different from that of the individual dismissed or demoted, until each displaced staff member who is qualified has had an opportunity to fill the vacancy and has failed to accept an offer to do so.

Prior to such a reduction, the school board will develop or require the development of nonracial objective criteria to be used in selecting the staff member who is to be dismissed or demoted. These criteria shall be available for public inspection and shall be retained by the school district. The school district also shall record and preserve the evaluation of staff members under the criteria. Such evaluation shall be made available upon request to the dismissed or demoted employee.

"Demotion" as used above includes any reassignment (1) under which the staff member receives less pay or has less responsibility than under the assignment he held previously, (2) which requires a lesser degree of skill than did the assignment he held previously, or (3) under which the staff member is asked to teach a subject or grade other than one for which he is certified or for which he has had substantial experience within a reasonably current period. In general and depending upon the subject matter involved, five years is such a reasonable period." 419 F.2d at 1218.

The district court ruled that the failure of the Columbia, Mississippi, Municipal Separate School District to renew the teaching contracts of five black staff members for the 1970-1971 academic year was not required to be evaluated pursuant to the Singleton procedures governing staff reductions. Accordingly, he rejected the claims for reinstatement lodged by four of the five teachers and dismissed all claims for awards of back pay. We believe that the district judge misconstrued the scope of our Singleton decision as applied to the facts of this case and therefore reverse the judgment rendered below with directions to grant the relief requested.

THE DESEGREGATION LITIGATION

Desegregation of the Columbia Municipal Separate School District was accomplished by means of a lawsuit instituted by the United States. That action was consolidated with 24 other Mississippi school desegregation cases in the Hinds County School Board litigation which received concentrated attention from this Court in 1969.

In United States v. Hinds County School Board, 5 Cir., July 3, 1969, 417 F.2d 852, cert. denied, 1970, 396 U.S. 1032, 90 S.Ct. 612, 24 L.Ed.2d 531, we held that freedom-of-choice public school desegregation plans were no longer constitutionally adequate. We directed the defendant school districts to implement workable desegregation plans by the start of the 1969-1970 school year. On August 28, 1969, upon the motion of the United States Department of Justice and the recommendation of the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, we suspended the July 3, 1969, order and postponed the date for the submission of new plans until December 1, 1969.

On October 29, 1969, sub nomine Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education, 396 U.S. 19, 90 S.Ct. 29, 24 L.Ed. 2d 19, the Supreme Court held that we had erred in delaying the implementation of our July 3, 1969 order. The Supreme Court vacated our order of August 28, 1969, and directed that the defendant school districts were to operate unitary educational systems effective immediately.

This Court, on November 7, 1969, directed the defendant school districts to implement permanent desegregation plans devised by the Office of Education, Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, no later than December 31, 1969. United States v. Hinds County School Board, 5 Cir., 1969, 423 F.2d 1264, cert. denied, 1970, 396 U.S. 1032, 90 S.Ct. 612, 24 L.Ed.2d 531.

COMPLIANCE ON THE PART OF THE COLUMBIA DISTRICT

The Columbia Municipal Separate School District responded to our November 7, 1969, order by moving classes, with their teachers, intact from one building to another for the second semester of the 1969-1970 school year. As a result, black teachers in the employ of the District continued to instruct their all-black classes and white teachers continued to instruct their all-white classes. The only difference was that the school buildings were no longer racially segregated. The situation lasted until the end of the 1969-70 academic year. A true merger of the faculties and student bodies was not effectuated until the start of the 1970-1971 school year.

THE REDUCTION IN THE INSTRUCTIONAL STAFF

On March 26, 1970, the five plaintiffs in this action W. S. McLaurin, Mrs. Alberta Collins, Shirley Johnson, Mrs. Rose Johnson, and Joe Reddix, all instructional personnel in the school system, were given notice that their contracts would not be renewed for the 1970-1971 school year. The notices failed to state specific reasons for the non-renewals and requests for explanations proved unavailing.

During the 1969-1970 school year, the Columbia Municipal Separate School District employed 129 teachers; that figure was reduced to 116 teachers for the following year.¹ For the 1970-1971 academic year, the District employed twelve new teachers, all but one of them white. None of the five plaintiffs was offered an opportunity to fill any of the apparent vacancies. It is undisputed that at the time the plaintiffs were notified that their contracts were not to be renewed, no objective criteria for the selection of teachers to be demoted or dismissed had been adopted by the District. In addition, no systematic comparisons of the five plaintiffs with the District's other faculty members were made prior to the non-renewals of the contracts and the District's evaluations of the plaintiffs were formulated only after suit was brought in the district court.

PROCEEDINGS IN THE DISTRICT COURT

On August 4, 1970, the plaintiffs filed their complaint in the district court and alleged jurisdiction under the First, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution; Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Sec. 601, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000d; and 42 U.S.C. Secs. 1981 and 1983. They sought temporary and permanent injunctive relief in the form of teaching contracts for the 1970-1971 school year, back pay awards, and counsel and litigation costs and fees. The complaint² alleged the following Singleton violations:

"Upon information and belief defendants have violated the above cited order: (1) plaintiffs and members of the plaintiff class are as qualified or more qualified than many of the white teachers who have obtained contracts for the 1970-1971 school year; (2) defendants have failed and refused to consider the qualifications of all teachers in the defendant school districts as a basis for determining which teachers were to be dismissed prior to the dismissal of plaintiffs and members of the plaintiff class; (3) defendants will hire and have hired white teachers with qualifications and experience equivalent to or inferior to that possessed by plaintiffs and members of the plaintiff class; (4) defendants have recruited and employed teachers new to the system for alleged vacancies without first considering the qualifications of plaintiffs and members of the plaintiff class; (5) defendants have failed to develop objective criteria to be used in selecting staff members to be dismissed or demoted."

The Columbia Municipal Separate School District answered by denying that it had committed the Singleton violations enumerated in the complaint. After extensive discovery was had, a two day trial before the district judge began on July 15, 1971. In an opinion dated August 24, 1971, the trial judge found against the plaintiffs (with the exception of Mrs. Rose Johnson, whose non-renewal was directed to be reconsidered on the basis that she had been evaluated for her performance at a grade level other than the one for which she was certified) for the following reasons:

1. The Singleton criteria were not applicable to this case, thereby rendering non-compliance with those criteria irrelevant.

2. Each plaintiff (except for Mrs. Johnson) was dismissed for legitimate cause based upon his or her performance while employed by the District.

3. None of the five plaintiffs was entitled to awards of back pay because they had permitted their suit to remain dormant until well into the second semester of the 1970-1971 school year.

THE APPLICABILITY OF THE SINGLETON CRITERIA

The district court addressed itself to the applicability of the Singleton standards as follows:

"One of the plaintiffs\' allegations is that the board, in the

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