Integration of Schools
At the time of the 1954 decision, laws in 17 southern and border states and the District of Columbia required that elementary schools be segregated. Four other states—Arizona, Kansas, New Mexico, and Wyoming—had laws permitting segregated schools. Although discrimination existed in the other states of the Union, it was not sanctioned by law.
The struggle over desegregation now centered upon the school question. By the end of 1957 nine of the 17 states and the District of Columbia had begun integration of their school systems. Another five states had some integrated schools by 1961. Forced integration led to much violence. The most notable instance was the defiance in 1957 of federal orders by Governor Orval Faubus of Arkansas, who called out the Arkansas National Guard to prevent integration in Little Rock. President Eisenhower responded by sending federal troops to enforce the court order for integration.
In 1958 Virginia closed nine schools in four counties rather than have them integrated, but Virginia and federal courts ruled these moves illegal. In 1960 desegregation began in Louisiana; some whites boycotted the integrated New Orleans public schools at first triumphantly, later with diminishing effectiveness.
Public Transportation and Accommodations The fight over education overshadowed efforts to achieve integration in other areas, but moves against segregation in public transportation did gain wide notice. In 1955–56, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., led African Americans in Montgomery, Ala., in a boycott against the municipal bus system after Rosa Parks, an African American woman, refused to give up her seat to a white man and move to the segregated section of a bus. The boycott was brought to a successful conclusion when, on Nov. 13, 1956, the Supreme Court struck down the laws of Alabama and the ordinances of Montgomery that required segregation on buses.
Mixed groups of whites and African Americans, called Freedom Riders, in May, 1961, undertook a campaign to force integration in bus terminals and challenge segregation in local interstate travel facilities. The buses were attacked by mobs in Anniston, Ala., where one bus was destroyed by a firebomb. There were riots in Birmingham and Montgomery when African Americans attempted to use facilities previously reserved for whites.
The struggle over desegregation now centered upon the school question. By the end of 1957 nine of the 17 states and the District of Columbia had begun integration of their school systems. Another five states had some integrated schools by 1961. Forced integration led to much violence. The most notable instance was the defiance in 1957 of federal orders by Governor Orval Faubus of Arkansas, who called out the Arkansas National Guard to prevent integration in Little Rock. President Eisenhower responded by sending federal troops to enforce the court order for integration.
In 1958 Virginia closed nine schools in four counties rather than have them integrated, but Virginia and federal courts ruled these moves illegal. In 1960 desegregation began in Louisiana; some whites boycotted the integrated New Orleans public schools at first triumphantly, later with diminishing effectiveness.
Public Transportation and Accommodations The fight over education overshadowed efforts to achieve integration in other areas, but moves against segregation in public transportation did gain wide notice. In 1955–56, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., led African Americans in Montgomery, Ala., in a boycott against the municipal bus system after Rosa Parks, an African American woman, refused to give up her seat to a white man and move to the segregated section of a bus. The boycott was brought to a successful conclusion when, on Nov. 13, 1956, the Supreme Court struck down the laws of Alabama and the ordinances of Montgomery that required segregation on buses.
Mixed groups of whites and African Americans, called Freedom Riders, in May, 1961, undertook a campaign to force integration in bus terminals and challenge segregation in local interstate travel facilities. The buses were attacked by mobs in Anniston, Ala., where one bus was destroyed by a firebomb. There were riots in Birmingham and Montgomery when African Americans attempted to use facilities previously reserved for whites.