Estes v. Metropolitan Branches of Dallas Naacp Curry v. Metropolitan Branches of Dallas Naacp Brinegar v. Metropolitan Branches of Dallas Naacp 78 283

• Decision Date: 21 January 1980
• Docket Number: No. 78-253,No.78-282,78-253,78-282
• Citation: 444 U.S. 437,62 L.Ed.2d 626,100 S.Ct. 716
• Parties: Nolan ESTES et al., petitioners, v. METROPOLITAN BRANCHES OF DALLAS NAACP et al., Donald E. CURRY et al., petitioners, v. METROPOLITAN BRANCHES OF DALLAS NAACP et al., Ralph F. BRINEGAR et al., petitioners, v. METROPOLITAN BRANCHES OF DALLAS NAACP et al No.and 78-283
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

444 U.S. 437

100 S.Ct. 716

62 L.Ed.2d 626

Nolan ESTES et al., petitioners,

v METROPOLITAN BRANCHES OF DALLAS NAACP et al., Donald E. CURRY et al., petitioners,

v. METROPOLITAN BRANCHES OF DALLAS NAACP et al., Ralph

F. BRINEGAR et al., petitioners,

v. METROPOLITAN BRANCHES OF DALLAS NAACP et al

No. 78-253

No.78-282

No.and 78-283

Supreme Court of the United States

January 21, 1980

On Writs of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

PER CURIAM.

The writs of certiorari are dismissed as improvidently granted.

Mr. Justice POWELL, with whom Mr. Justice STEWART and Mr. Justice REHNQUIST join, dissenting.

The Court today dismisses the writs previously granted in this litigation and thereby reinstates the ruling of the Court of Appeals. The suit now will be returned to the District Court for elaboration of that court's conclusions on the feasibility of extensive busing to achieve racial balance in the Dallas public schools. The Court of Appeals directed the trial court to supplement the record with formal studies of the anticipated times and distances of likely bus routes, and to make additional findings on desegregation in the city's high schools.

Although the remand is narrow, aimed solely at the sufficiency of the record on which the District Court based its desegregation order, I do not think it is justified. After studying the schools of the Dallas Independent School District through the many years of this litigation, the trial judge drew on his familiarity with Dallas and its schools, and on the advice of many community groups, to fashion an effective and fair desegregation order. The Court of Appeals failed to accord proper deference to the District Court's conscientious execution of this delicate task.

In addition, this case presents a long-needed opportunity to re-examine the considerations relevant to framing a remedy in a desegregation suit. It is increasingly evident that use of the busing remedy to achieve racial balance can conflict with the goals of equal educational opportunity and quality schools. In all too many cities, well-intentioned court decrees have had the primary effect of stimulating resegregation. The experience in Dallas during this litigation presents a striking illustration of this problem. If the District Court orders substantial additional busing, as the Court of Appeals ap- parently thinks it should, recent history suggests that the Dallas school district will be well on the road to the "separate but equal" conditions mistakenly approved in Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537, 16 S.Ct. 1138, 41 L.Ed. 256 (1896). Such an outcome is no less real or less regrettable when caused by courts with benign motives. The promise of Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, 74 S.Ct. 686, 98 L.Ed. 873 (1954), cannot be fulfilled by continued imposition of self-defeating remedies.

I

The Dallas Independent School District (School District) has been in desegregation litigation since 1955, although the present case is not part of the original suit. During this quarter of a century, the School District has grown into the eighth largest school district in the country, covering 351 square miles and spanning 35 miles at its widest point. Since the present action first was tried in 1971, the student population of the district has changed dramatically. Total enrollment has dropped from 163,000 to 133,000, while the racial distribution of students has shifted from 69% Anglo in 1971 to 33.5% Anglo, 49.1% black, and 16.3% Mexican-American in 1979. There were 112,000 Anglo students in the School District in 1970; there are now fewer than 45,000.

This suit was brought by several parents, acting on behalf of their children, against the superintendent and the Board of Trustees of the School District (Board). Other parents groups have intervened in the suit.¹ In the summer of 1971, the District Court found that "elements" of a segregated school system "still remain" in the Dallas schools. Tasby v. Estes, 342 F.Supp. 945, 947 (ND Tex.1971). The court imposed a number of remedies, including the busing of approx- imately 15,000 students. The original plaintiffs appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit for more extensive reassignment and transportation of pupils. That court declared that "nothing less than the elimination of predominantly one-race schools is constitutionally required. . . ." Tasby v. Estes, 517 F.2d 92, 103, cert. denied, 423 U.S. 939, 96 S.Ct. 299, 46 L.Ed.2d 271 (1975). Finding that the District Court's decree failed to satisfy this standard, the Court of Appeals remanded for the formulation of a new desegregation plan.

In a month-long trial on remand, the District Court considered in detail six plans submitted by the various parties and a court-appointed expert. It heard nearly 50 witnesses, including numerous experts, and produced a trial transcript of some 4,000 pages. The court also conferred with concerned community groups, the most prominent of which was the Educational Task Force of the Dallas Alliance (Alliance), a multiracial, nonpartisan organization.² In a thorough opinion, Tasby v. Estes, 412 F.Supp. 1192 (ND Tex.1976), the District Court found that the decline in Anglo enrollment between 1971 and 1976 was not the result of actions taken by the Board. In fact, the court noted the Board's continuing "good faith" efforts to establish a unitary school system. Id., at 1207. See Pasadena City Bd. of Education v. Spangler, 427 U.S. 424, 435-436, 96 S.Ct. 2697, 2704-2705, 49 L.Ed.2d 599 (1976). The court's duty, it asserted, was to adopt a plan that would "realistically and effectively" achieve desegregation in light of demographic changes in the School District. 412 F.Supp. at 1207.

With careful attention to the special characteristics and history of the School District, the District Court promulgated a progressive and comprehensive plan that drew heavily on the proposals of the Alliance.³ For purposes of student assignment, the plan divides the School District into six subdistricts. In integrated areas within each subdistrict, present student assignments are retained wherever possible. In other areas, children in grades K-3 remain in neighborhood schools; those in grades 4-8 are assigned to central schools in each subdistrict; and high school students are assigned to schools in their own subdistricts on the basis of geographical attendance zones. The plan provides for a number of "magnet high schools" that offer enriched educational programs.⁴ The pupil assignment plan is supplemented by majority-to-minority transfers upon request.⁵

This case now focuses on student assignment and busing.⁶ Each of the six plans considered by the District Court provided for substantial busing.⁷ Although the court did not estimate the number of pupils to be bused under its decree, the Alliance proposal which paralleled the court's plan anticipated the busing of some 20,000 students. The court concluded that the racial composition of the student population in each subdistrict "will approximate the racial makeup of the [district] as a whole, with the exception of [East] Oak Cliff," a black neighborhood. Id., at 1204.

Respondents argue that the District Court's plan leaves 62 schools, about one-third of the 176 schools in the district, with "one-race" student bodies (defined as those where more than 75% of the students are of one race).⁸ Fifty-two of these schools would be predominantly black, nine Anglo, and one Mexican-American. A majority of these one-race schools result from the District Court's refusal to bus very young children.⁹ This Court has recognized that concern for the health and welfare of younger children may dictate their exclusion from student transportation plans, see Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of Education, 402 U.S. 1, 31, 91 S.Ct. 1267, 1283, 28 L.Ed.2d 554 (1971), and respondents do not dispute that feature of the District Court order. In addition, several high schools have one-race student bodies because the District Court declined to order the busing of high school students. It noted that "of approximately 1,000 Anglos ordered to be transported to formerly all-black high schools under this Court's 1971 student assignment plan, fewer than 50 Anglo students attend those schools today." 412 F.Supp., at 1205. The court also concluded that the establishment of magnet high schools was the "most realistic, feasible, and effective method for eliminating the remaining vestiges of a dual [school] system on the 9-12 level. . . ." Ibid.

Viewed on a geographic basis, the order left 28 "predominantly black" schools in East Oak Cliff, which is bounded by the Trinity River bottom on one side and by Interstate 35 on the other. The court found that the "practicalities of time and distance" prevent the effective integration of the schools in this neighborhood through busing. Id., at 1204. In contrast, the Seagoville subdistrict remains predominantly white. Seagoville, however, is "geographically isolated" from the rest of the city, Tasby v. Estes, 572 F.2d 1010, 1013 (CA5 1978), and its school population represents less than 2% of the School District's student body.

The Court of Appeals was not impressed by the District Court's carefully structured plan. It concentrated almost exclusively on the "large number of one-race schools" remaining in Dallas. Id., at 1012.

"We cannot properly review any student assignment plan that leaves many schools in a system one race without specific findings by the district court as to the feasibility of [student assignment] techniques. . . . There are no adequate time-and-distance studies in the record in this case. Consequently, we have no means of determining whether the natural boundaries and traffic considerations preclude either the pairing and clustering of schools or the use of transportation to eliminate the large number of one-race schools still existing." Id., at 1014.

The Court of Appeals remand...