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In 1960, schools in New Orleans faced a crisis over desegregation. Desegregation was a policy that introduced black students into all-white schools, as ordered by the Supreme Court ruling in ''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'' in 1954. Public schools that were segregated were ruled to be unconstitutional. (Traditionally, the black schools were underfunded compared to the all-white schools and the resources had not been equal.) There had been significant backlash in the New Orleans community towards desegregating, and the New Orleans school board tried everything they could to postpone the mandatory desegregation from the federal government. On November 14, 1960 two New Orleans elementary schools were desegregated. The two schools selected to desegregate were the McDonogh 19 and William Frantz Elementary schools. Both schools were located in the Lower Ninth Ward, a predominantly low-income neighborhood in New Orleans.〔Brown, Nikki. "New Orleans School Crisis." In KnowLA Encyclopedia of Louisiana, edited by David Johnson. Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, 2010–. Article published March 31, 2011. http://www.knowla.org/entry/723/.〕 By the end of the day on November 14, there were few white children left at McDonogh 19 Elementary and it became apparent to the community that there was a white boycott occurring at both schools. A black student involved in the desegregation, Ruby Bridges, has become a popular figure. Her three black classmates Leona Tate, Tessie Prevost, and Gail Etienne also attended the previously all-white schools and faced public humiliation, taunts, and racial slurs as they walked to school daily. A race riot broke out on November 16th, 1960 in front of the Orleans Parish school board meeting. There were numerous death threats against the black children and the presence of Federal Marshals was required for Ruby Bridges for her attendance at Frantz Elementary. Between January and May 1961, Ruby Bridges was the only student at Frantz elementary, due to the white boycott of the school.It took ten more years for the New Orleans public schools to fully integrate. In September 1962, the Catholic Schools of Orleans Parish were also integrated. ==History: events leading to the integration of New Orleans Public Schools== Under the 1896 ''Plessy v. Ferguson'' Supreme Court ruling, public schools for both white and African American students were required to support "separate but equal" school facilities. In New Orleans and the rest of the country, this was not the reality; many black public schools were not held to the same standards as white public schools. Suffering from overcrowded and outdated schools, the black community demanded that the ''Plessy'' ruling be upheld and enforced. Within this community was a man named Mr. Wilbert Aubert. Wilbert Aubert along with Mrs. Leontine Luke called for a meeting of the Ninth Ward Civic and Improvement League held November 6, 1951 at the Macarty School for black students. After years of protesting for equal schools and not having their requests met, the Ninth Ward Civic and Improvement League created an initiative to file a lawsuit against the Orleans Parish School Board (OPSB).〔Wieder, Alan. Race and education: narrative essays, oral histories, and documentary photography. New York: Peter Lang, 1997.〕 Aubert took action against the OPSB with the aid of A.P. Tureaud, the chief legal counsel of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). In ''Rosana Aubert v. Orleans Parish School Board'', they sought better conditions within the African American schools. After two years of waiting on a decision, U.S. District Judge Herbert William Christenberry allowed the case to proceed. It was at this time that the NAACP wanted to take further action and tackle segregation as a whole. On September 5, 1952, Tureaud filed a new suit, ''Bush v. Orleans Parish School Board'', with 21 sets of students as plaintiffs including Earl Benjamin Bush. This case called into question whether segregation was constitutional, and if so, called for equal and fair conditions in African American schools. It was the 1954 Kansas case, ''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', however, that called for nationwide desegregation of all public schools. Following the original ''Brown'' decision, the Supreme Court in ''Brown II'' (1955) called for integration to take place with "all deliberate speed"—a phrase interpreted differently by each sides. Supporters of desegregation thought that this meant schools should be desegregated immediately, while people in support of school segregation believed that this meant there was leniency in the time-frame for segregation.〔 Despite progressive feelings in New Orleans toward desegregating the city, feelings toward the school system took a different turn. After ''Brown'', only five colored students, all female, transferred. Despite Judge Wright’s ruling on February 15, 1956, ordering the OPSB to create an integration plan for all public schools, Senator William Rainach and the Louisiana State Legislature ordered all public schools to maintain segregation laws. The legislature also passed a bill allowing them to declare public schools as either white or colored. Fighting along with the Louisiana State Legislature against integration was the OPSB and board member Emile Wagner. Gerald Rault, assisted by white supremacist Leander Perez, was the legal counsel in the case against integration of public schools. Making it all the way to the Supreme Court, Rault and Perez’s case was dismissed and Wright’s ruling was upheld. The state legislature continued to ignore the integration order, while the NAACP demanded Judge Wright to enforce his ruling. In response to the state legislature’s resistance and the NAACP’s request, on July 15, 1959 Judge Wright gave the OPSB a deadline of March 1, 1960; it was on this date that they would be required to integrate public schools.〔 Judge Wright took action and created his own plan when the school board failed to meet the March 1 deadline as well as the extended deadline of March 16. The deadline for Judge Wright’s desegregation plan was the September 1960 when all public schools opened for the year; his plan allowed children to transfer schools and for their parents to choose any of the former white or African American schools closest to their homes. While white supremacists raged over Wright’s decision, organizations such as Save Our Schools and the Committee for Public Education called for the integration plan to be pushed forward. The plan would only apply to the first grade, which carried the highest percentage of African American students. Once again Wright made an agreement with the legislature to delay this plan until November 14th. The board was convinced that if they delayed the plan until after the start of the school year, none of the students would transfer after already getting comfortable at the school they were attending. This would also delay enough time for the board and legislature to create a plan that would create a law allowing them to decide where a child can and cannot attend school. When it came time to allow students to apply to transfer schools, the school board made it as difficult as possible. With very specific criteria such as availability of transportation and intelligence testing, it was almost impossible for black students to transfer schools. This proved to be true when only five black girls fit the criteria for transferring. To further delay the integration of the schools once again, Superintendent Redmond ordered the principals of the two integrated public schools to close their schools Monday, November 14. This would give Governor Jimmie Davis and the State Legislature time to propose 30 bills that would make integration illegal, even though Wright had already declared most of them unconstitutional. Less than 24 hours later the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled all 30 bills unconstitutional. On November 14, the school system had officially desegregated.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「New Orleans school crisis of 1960」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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