ustxtxb_obs_1956_08_15_50_00003-00000_000.pdf

Bii-Racial Desegregation Report students made progressively higher scores than Negro students. This, the committee decided, was due principally to the fact that Negro schools difference in their intelligence, their are not on a par’ with white schools. innate mental ability to learn. It was predicted “that in time, with “It is further the finding of this adequate teachers for colored stucommittee that as between white and dents being employed, the difference colored children at the conclusion of in knowledge levels among students of their first grade in school there is such the same age and class as between the a slight difference between their corntwo races will largely disappear.” parative knowledge levels as to be as readily attributed to fallacies in the I N STUDYING teaching tests as to their actual knowledge rastaffs of Negro and white schools in tio. However, as the children of the Galveston, the committee found that two races have in the past progressed “on the average the members of the through their respective segregated present colored teaching staff are not schools, the difference between the as well qualified as the members of average knowledge levels of the two the white teaching staff. While many races has become readily discernible colored teachers are fully as able as and more pronounced with each the best white teachers, and in ability grade.” surpass some of the white teachers, It was emphasized by thee committee the fact remains that there is a greater that the findings were based on the proportion of improperly qualified and average and that “there are many colinefficient colored teachers than there ored students who surpass the average are white teachers.” white students and equal the better The committee found that this dif white students.” ference in qualifications and efficiency As the students progressed through of colored and white tern :hers . was not school, the tests showed that the white the result of “inherent racial differ GALVESTON Thinking citizens, particularly school board members, may want to read the report on educational desegregation in the Galveston Public Schools issued by a special bi-racial committee. The committee, which was comprised of 17 white and nine Negro people from all walks of life, concluded that all Galveston schools should be desegregated beginning with the 1956-57 school year. The desegregation of teachers as well as students was recommended. In considering the matter of “comparative knowledge levels” in white and colored students, the committee asserted : “It is imperative that the distinction between. intelligence and knowledge be observed. Intelligence, as used in this report, means the innate mental ability to learn. Knowledge, on the other hand, as used in this report, means an accumulated learning …. It is the finding of the majority of this committee that as between children of the white and Negro races. there is no demonstrated Letters Urged To the Editor: I wish to urge all of your readers to write immediately to Senator Lyndon B. Johnson … and Speaker Sam Rayburn … urging them to have the Dallas Democratic convention reconvened. Letters should point out that if the attempted Dixiecrat-Republican steal of the September state Democratic convention is successful, the responsibility will rest with those who opposed removal of the State Executive Committee during the Dallas convention …. BERNICE CARTER 7623 Belgard, Houston 21 ‘A Dam Fool’ To the Editor : I was a resident of Oklahoma in the early part of this century. Oklahoma was a territory, with Guthrie the capital. The usual petty lawyers and hangers-on pc4itioned the President to appoint a man governor \(as I which the President did. The majority of the citizens of Oklahoma at that time were Indians who were wards of the government and were receiving a monthly annuity. As soon as this governor went into office, these shysters took over and proceeded to skin the Indians of their money. A young Osage Indian, who was a graduate of Carlyle College and had been a Rough Rider with Teddy Roosevelt in Cuba, gathered the evidence, along with affidavits, and called on the President at the White House. After the usual greetings exchanged by two old buddies, Teddy listened to his story, looked at the affidavits, and then removed the Governor from office by telegraph. When the boys in Guthrie found out, they sent a telegram to Teddy which stated that the Governor was not a bad fellow, he had just made an error, and to please reconsider. The President at once replied by telegram: “Ex-Governor Hoffman of Oklahoma is either a Dam Rascal or a Darn Fool, and in either case he is not fit to be governor.” It seems to me that this incident would apply to Texas. Price Daniel was the Attorney General when the veterans’ land bill was written up, assisted in the drafting of the bill, and was Attorney General for some time after its passage. If he did not know what was going on he was \(in my E. D. WICKES 930 Ashland, Houston Exceptions To the Editor: I wish to take your paper especially because of the splendid work you did in exposing the veterans’ land scandal. Thomas Jefferson said that a man who read the newspapers was more ignorant than one who didn’t, because the man who read the paper had his head full of lies and one who didn’t only had an empty head. I feel that your readers are exceptions to this rule, which, unfortunately, is as applicable today as in Thomas Jefferson’s day. MRS. RUTH BERRY ASHE 3233 Elser St., Houston 22 Can’t Stand It To the Editor : On July 28 I had three very definite reasons for not supporting Price Daniel for governor, namely: 1.He is a captive candidate and would make a captive governor. 2.He is a disloyal Democrat and FRANKLY SPEAKING MARSHALL All may change, but right now it seems the Great Moderator from Texas is enjoying the inevitable fate of the constant straddler. Governor Stevenson is yet the candidate who insists on talking sense to his listeners. Sometimes sense does not comport with the pure expediency that passes under the term, “moderation.” To say in a party platform merely that the final pronouncements of the U.S. Supreme Court become the law of the land and must be supported should cause little disturbance, but the backers of moderation would consider such a most immoderate innovation. Ah ! the art of semantics ! Our General President started the ball rolling with “progressively moderate” or “moderately progressive,” one forgets which. His fellow Cardiac eagerly disloyalty is something I cannot stand in any person. 3.The senatorial succession : Our Senator is quitting in the middle of his term. It will cost the Texas taxpayers a half million dollars to hold a special election to fill out his unexpired term. Then all kinds of fast curves and shenanigans can be thrown by the Governor and the Senator with regard to the time of resigning and the calling of a special election …. Now to avoid all the above contingencies, I think the most logical, the most practical thing to do is to elect good old Judge Yarborough as our next governor and let the Senator serve out his unexpired term in peace. Sunday, July 29, after reading the returns from Duval County, I developed a fourth reason for not supporting the senator …. M. BRYSON Lytle Not in Dailies To the Editor: We enjoy your paper very much. It’s full of news and information not found in the dailies of Texas. Keep up the good work. JACK C. BLACKBURN LaMarque took it from there, but alas ! the Butler of pantry fame has not said he hopes the word “moderation” will not appear in the platform of the Democratic Party. Will Texans take this lying down? As well strike out the word “excelsior” from the banner of an Alpine climber \(although I never knew what eration, or the South will rise again. Meanwhile, our Tennessee coon hunter used a scatter barrel and peppered various king-makers in a delicate area. Doris Fleeson contends that the withdrawal of Estes has reduced “our won” Johnson-Rayburn axis to trouble-makers instead of kingmakers. She even says: gressional conservatives would prefer the pliant Mr. Eisenhower to a strongly liberal Democratic president.” FRANKLIN JONES ences” but actually stems from “the segregated education system which this report is concerned. While most of the colored teachers hold the same college degrees as their white counterparts, their degrees were not awarded most colored teachers have been by th same or comparable colleges. On the contrary, the degrees held by awarded by ‘colored colleges’ whose entrance and graduation standards, and teaching standards, are in no degree comparable to those of similar `white’ colleges. “Thus, it has come about that the unqualified and inefficient colored teachers of today are the colored students of a preceding generation who were in turn taught by unqualified and inefficient colored teachers in the substandard Negro schools. The colored students of today who are taught by unqualified and inefficient colored teachers would make the unqualified and inefficient colored teachers of future colored generations if segregation were maintained,” the committee reported. The committee recommended “that close administrative study be given to the teaching qualifications of every teacher without reference to race ; and that regardless of race, those people who in the opinion of the administrative staff do not have proper qualifications be replaced by teachers, regardless of race, who do have proper qualifications ; that both white and colored and that teachers’ assignments be based entirely on ability to teach a given subject to children of a given class, without special regard to the race of the teacher or the class.” T HE COMMITTEE reported that Negro children are not to be expected to engage in a mass exo.dus to “white” schools but rather will continue to attend schools where members of their race are preponderant. The committee said “personal morality is an individual attribute not to be gauged by averages ; among white students of advanced school age there are all gradations of personal morality …” No trouble is anticipated in athletics. “A possible occasional inconvenience” is expected about accomodations, but, says the report, “experience has taught that among athletes racial discriminations readily give way in favor of athletic excellence.” In its conclusions as to general policy, the committee explained that “if the principle of educational desegregation be wrong, it is a matter for courts and lawmakers and not for the school administrators, or for a committee such as this …. This committee is convinced that reasonably prompt action in accomplishing desegregation is advisable.” The ,committee brought out that the desegregation question is as controversial in Galveston as in most other parts of Texas, explaining : “There are those in Galveston, reared in the traditions of educational segregation, who regard desegregation with distaste simply because it is a departure from tradition. There are others tvho have no special concern with the racial traditions involved, or with the educational aspects of desegregation as such, but who resent the process as being symbolic to them of the Supreme Court’s asserted invasion of -states’ rights. Indeed, there were members serving on this committee who shared one or both of these views …. “This committee proceeded, as the school board must proceed, in recognition of the fact that educational desegregation is here. The only question that remains is whether we shall accept its principle in good spirit and execute it in good faith for the knefit of the school children involved, or comply with it only in form, holding grudgingly to the status quo, making the affected children pawns in a game of political and social ideology. The answer will be obvious to all men of will.” BOB BRAY THE TEXAS OBSERVER Page 3 . August 15, 1956 The Problem: A Vicious Circle Of Inferior Schooling A Moderate Party Platform?