A state statute authorized creation of a new school district for
Scotland Neck, N.C. a city that was part of the larger Halifax
County school district, then in the process of dismantling a dual
school system. The District Court in this litigation instituted by
the United States enjoined implementation of the statute as
creating a refuge for white students and promoting school
segregation in the county. The Court of Appeals reversed, ruling
that the statute's impact on dismantling the county dual system was
minimal, and that it should not be regarded as an alternative
desegregation plan for the county, since it was enacted by the
legislature, and not by the school board.
Held: Whether the action affecting dismantling of a
dual school system is initiated by the legislature or by the school
board is immaterial,
North Carolina Board of Education v.
Swann, 402 U. S. 43; the
criterion is whether the dismantling is furthered or hindered by
carving a new school district from the larger district having the
dual school system, and a proposal that would impede the
dismantling process may be enjoined.
Wright v. Council of City
of Emporia, ante p.
407 U. S. 451. Pp.
407 U. S.
488-491.
442 F.2d 575, reversed.
STEWART, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which
DOUGLAS, BRENNAN, WHITE, and MARSHALL, JJ., joined. BURGER, C.J.,
filed an opinion concurring in the result, in which BLACKMUN,
POWELL, and REHNQUIST, JJ., joined,
post, p.
407 U. S.
491.
Page 407 U. S. 485
MR. JUSTICE STEWART delivered the opinion of the Court.
The petitioners in these consolidated cases challenge the
implementation of a North Carolina statute authorizing the creation
of a new school district for Scotland Neck, a city which at the
time of the statute's enactment was part of a larger school
district then in the process of dismantling a dual school system.
In a judgment entered the same day as its judgment in
Council
of City of Emporia v. Wright, 442 F.2d 570, a decision which
we reverse today,
ante, p.
407 U. S. 451, the
Court of Appeals held that the District Court erred in enjoining
the creation of the new school district.
Scotland Neck is a community of about 3,000 persons, located in
the southeastern portion of Halifax County, North Carolina. Since
1936, the city has been a part of the Halifax County Administrative
Unit, a school district comprising the entire county with the
exception of two towns located in the northern section. In the
1968-1969 school year, 10,655 students attended schools in this
system, of whom 77% were Negro, 22% white, and 1% American
Indian.
The schools of Halifax County were completely segregated by race
until 1965. In that year, the school board adopted a freedom of
choice plan that produced very
Page 407 U. S. 486
little actual desegregation. In the 1967-1968 school year, all
of the white students in the county attended the four traditionally
all-white schools, while 97% of the Negro students attended the 14
traditionally all-Negro schools. The school busing system, used by
90% of the students, was segregated by race, and faculty
desegregation was minimal.
In 1968, the United States Department of Justice entered into
negotiations with the Halifax County School Board to bring the
county's school system into compliance with federal law. An
agreement was reached whereby the school board undertook to provide
some desegregation in the fall of 1968, and to effect a completely
unitary system in the 1969-1970 school year. The State Department
of Public Instruction, acting on a request from the county board,
recommended a detailed plan (the Interim Plan) for the unitary
system that would have put some white students in every school in
the county, and that would have left a white majority in only one
school.
In January, 1969, after the Interim Plan had been submitted to
the county school board but before any action had been taken upon
it, a bill was introduced in the state legislature to authorize the
creation of a new school district bounded by the city limits of
Scotland Neck, upon approval by a majority of the city's voters.
[
Footnote 1] The bill was
enacted on March 3, 1969, as Chapter 31 of the 1969 Session Laws of
North Carolina. The citizens of Scotland Neck approved the new
school
Page 407 U. S. 487
district in a referendum a month later, [
Footnote 2] and the new district began taking steps
toward beginning a separate school system in the fall of 1969.
The effect of Chapter 31 was to carve out of the Halifax school
district a new unit with 695 students, of whom 399 (57%) were white
and 296 (43%) were Negro. Under a transfer plan devised by the
newly appointed Scotland Neck City Board of Education, 360 students
(350 white and 10 Negro) residing outside the city limits applied
to transfer into the Scotland Neck schools, while 44 students (all
Negro) applied to transfer out of the city system to a nearby
school in the Halifax County system. The new district planned to
use the facilities of the formerly all-white Scotland Neck High
School, including one building located outside the city limits that
would be leased from the county.
The United States filed this lawsuit in June 1969 against both
city and county officials, seeking desegregation of the existing
Halifax County schools. [
Footnote
3] The complaint asked for preliminary and permanent
injunctions against the implementation of Chapter 31. Various Negro
children, parents, and teachers, the petitioners in No. 7187, were
permitted to intervene as plaintiffs.
After a three-day hearing before two district judges on both
this case and a similar case involving two newly created school
districts in neighboring Warren County,
Page 407 U. S. 488
the District Court preliminarily enjoined the implementation of
Chapter 31, finding that "the Act in its application creates a
refuge for white student, and promotes segregated schools in
Halifax County," and further that
"[t]he Act impedes and defeats the Halifax County Board of
Education from implementing its plan to completely desegregate all
of the public schools in Halifax County by the opening of the
school year 1969-70. [
Footnote
4]"
After further hearings, the District Court, on May 23, 1970,
found Chapter 31 unconstitutional and permanently enjoined its
enforcement.
314 F. Supp.
65. The Court of Appeals reversed, 442 F.2d 575, and we granted
certiorari. 404 U.S. 821.
The Court of Appeals did not believe that the separation of
Scotland Neck from the Halifax County system should be viewed as an
alternative plan for desegregating the county system, because
the
"severance was not part of a desegregation plan proposed by the
school board, but was instead an action by the Legislature
redefining the boundaries of local governmental units."
442 F.2d at 583. This suggests that an action of a state
legislature affecting the desegregation of a dual system stands on
a footing different from an action of a school board. But in
North Carolina Board of Education v. Swann, 402 U. S.
43, decided after the decision of the Court of Appeals
in this case, we held that,
"if a state-imposed limitation on a school authority's
discretion operates to inhibit or obstruct . . . the
disestablishing of a dual school system, it must fall; state policy
must give way when it operates to hinder vindication of federal
constitutional guarantees."
Id. at
402 U. S. 45.
The fact that the creation of the Scotland Neck school district was
authorized by a special act of the state legislature,
Page 407 U. S. 489
rather than by the school board or city authorities, thus has no
constitutional significance.
We have today held that any attempt by state or local officials
to carve out a new school district from an existing district that
is in the process of dismantling a dual school system
"must be judged according to whether it hinders or furthers the
process of school desegregation. If the proposal would impede the
dismantling of a dual system, then a district court, in the
exercise of its remedial discretion, may enjoin it from being
carried out."
Wright v. Council of City of Emporia, supra, at
407 U. S. 460.
The District Court in this case concluded that Chapter 31
"was enacted with the effect of creating a refuge for white
students of the Halifax County School system, and interferes with
the desegregation of the Halifax County School system. . . ."
314 F. Supp. at 78. The Court of Appeals, however, did not
regard the separation of Scotland Neck as creating a refuge for
white students seeking to escape desegregation, and it held
that
"the effect of the separation of the Scotland Neck schools and
students on the desegregation of the remainder of the Halifax
County system is minimal and insufficient to invalidate Chapter
31."
442 F.2d at 582. Our review of the record leads us to conclude
that the District Court's determination was the only proper
inference to be drawn from the facts of this litigation, and we
thus reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
The major impact of Chapter 31 would fall on the southeastern
portion of Halifax County, designated as District I in the Interim
Plan for unitary schools proposed by the State Department of Public
Instruction. The projected enrollment in the schools of this
district under the Interim Plan was 2,948 students, of whom 78%
were Negro. If Chapter 31 were implemented, the Scotland Neck
schools would be 57%
Page 407 U. S. 490
white, while the schools remaining in District I would be 89%
Negro. The traditional racial identities of the schools in the area
would be maintained; the formerly all-white Scotland Neck school
would retain a white majority, while the formerly all-Negro Brawley
school, a high school located just outside Scotland Neck, would be
91% Negro.
In
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education,
402 U. S. 1, we said
that district judges or school authorities "should make every
effort to achieve the greatest possible degree of actual
desegregation," and that, in formulating a plan to remedy
state-enforced school segregation, there should be "a presumption
against schools that are substantially disproportionate in their
racial composition."
Id. at
402 U. S. 26. And
we have said today, in
Wright v. Council of City of Emporia,
supra, at
407 U. S. 463,
that
"desegregation is not achieved by splitting a single school
system operating 'white schools' and 'Negro schools' into two new
systems, each operating unitary schools within its borders, where
one of the two new systems, is, in fact, 'white' and the other is,
in fact, 'Negro.'"
In this litigation, the disparity in the racial composition of
the Scotland Neck schools and the schools remaining in District I
of the Halifax County system would be "substantial" by any standard
of measurement. And the enthusiastic response among whites residing
outside Scotland Neck to the school board's proposed transfer plan
confirmed what the figures suggest: the Scotland Neck school was to
be the "white school" of the area, while the other District I
schools would remain "Negro schools." Given these facts, we cannot
but conclude that the implementation of Chapter 31 would have the
effect of impeding the disestablishment of the dual school system
that existed in Halifax County.
The primary argument made by the respondents in
Page 407 U. S. 491
support of Chapter 31 is that the separation of the Scotland
Neck schools from those of Halifax County was necessary to avoid
"white flight" by Scotland Neck residents into private schools that
would follow complete dismantling of the dual school system.
Supplemental affidavits were submitted to the Court of Appeals
documenting the degree to which the system has undergone a loss of
students since the unitary school plan took effect in the fall of
1970. [
Footnote 5] But while
this development may be cause for deep concern to the respondents,
it cannot, as the Court of Appeals recognized, be accepted as a
reason for achieving anything less than complete uprooting of the
dual public school system.
See Monroe v. Board of
Commissioners, 391 U. S. 450,
391 U. S.
459.
Reversed.
* Together with No. 7187,
Cotton et al. v. Scotland Neck
City Board of Education et al., also on certiorari to the same
court.
[
Footnote 1]
An earlier bill had been introduced in the 1965 session of the
legislature, which would have created a separate school district
for Scotland Neck and the four surrounding townships, an area with
a three-to-one Negro majority. It was contemplated that the new
district would operate under a freedom of choice plan similar to
that existing in the county at the the time. The bill was defeated
in the State Senate.
[
Footnote 2]
The vote in the referendum was 813 to 332 in favor of the new
school district. Of Scotland Neck's 1,382 registered voters, 360
were Negro.
[
Footnote 3]
After the preliminary injunction was issued in this case, the
District Court dismissed the Halifax County Board of Education from
that part of the case dealing with Scotland Neck's efforts to
implement a separate school system. On May 19, 1970, the court
ordered the county school board to implement, beginning in the fall
of 1970, the Interim Plan proposed by the State Department of
Public Instruction, with certain modifications proposed by the
school board.
[
Footnote 4]
The opinion of the District Court on the issuance of the
preliminary injunction is unreported.
[
Footnote 5]
The figures supplied to the Court of Appeals were updated by an
affidavit submitted to this Court, showing the total enrollment in
the Halifax County schools at the start of the 1971-1972 school
year to have been 9,094, of whom 14% were white.
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURGER, with whom MR. JUSTICE BLACKMUN, MR.
JUSTICE POWELL, and MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, concurring in the
result.
I agree that the creation of a separate school system in
Scotland Neck would tend to undermine desegregation efforts in
Halifax County, and I thus join in the result reached by the Court.
However, since I dissented from the Court's decision in
Wright
v. Council of City of Emporia, ante p.
407 U. S. 471,
I feel constrained to set forth briefly the reasons why I
distinguish the cases.
First, the operation of a separate school system in Scotland
Neck would preclude meaningful desegregation in the southeastern
portion of Halifax County. If Scotland Neck were permitted to
operate separate schools, more than 2,200 of the nearly 3,000
students in this sector would attend virtually all-Negro schools
located just
Page 407 U. S. 492
outside of the corporate limits of Scotland Neck. The schools
located within Scotland Neck would be predominantly white. Further
shifts could reasonably be anticipated. In a very real sense, the
children residing in this relatively small area would continue to
attend "Negro schools" and "white schools." The effect of the
withdrawal would thus be dramatically different from the effect
which could be anticipated in Emporia.
Second, Scotland Neck's action cannot be seen as the fulfillment
of its destiny as an independent governmental entity. Scotland Neck
had been a part of the county-wide school system for many years;
special legislation had to be pushed through the North Carolina
General Assembly to enable Scotland Neck to operate its own school
system. The movement toward the creation of a separate school
system in Scotland Neck was prompted solely by the likelihood of
desegregation in the county, not by any change in the political
status of the municipality. Scotland Neck was and is a part of
Halifax County. The city of Emporia, by contrast, is totally
independent from Greensville County; Emporia's only ties to the
county are contractual. When Emporia became a city, a status
derived pursuant to longstanding statutory procedures, it took on
the legal responsibility of providing for the education of its
children, and was no longer entitled to avail itself of the county
school facilities.
Third, the District Court found, and it is undisputed, that the
Scotland Neck severance was substantially motivated by the desire
to create a predominantly white system more acceptable to the white
parents of Scotland Neck. In other words, the new system was
designed to minimize the number of Negro children attending school
with the white children residing in Scotland Neck. No similar
finding was made by the District Court in Emporia, and the record
shows that Emporia's decision was not based on the projected racial
composition of the proposed new system.