Desegregating Atlanta’s Public Schools

http://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/crdl/id:ugabma_wsbn_58666

Brown v Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954) is one of, if not THE most pivotal case regarding education in this country’s history!! This case took on the institution of segregation in regards to public education and challenged the idea of separate but equal in the classroom. Until this historical, landmark decision (on May 17,1954) was handed down overturning the decision in Plessy v Ferguson from 1896 segregation in schools was completely legal and many states had laws in place which established separate schools for African American students and white students. Chief Justice Earl Warren’s court’s decision was a unanimous 9–0 decision, which said, “Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.”

Brown v Board of Education of Topeka was foundational in the Civil Rights movement in that it gave African Americans hope that “separate but equal” would soon be outlawed in all aspects of their lives.

By May of 1961 there were some 300 transfer applications given to African American students interested in transferring out of their high-schools; of those about 132 students went forward with the application process and had applications on file with the Board of Education in the Atlanta Public Schools district. Out of those 132 applicants 10 students were selected to integrate the Atlanta Public School district and on August 30, 1961, nine students – Thomas Franklin Welch, Madelyn Patricia Nix, Willie Jean Black, Donita Gaines, Arthur Simmons, Lawrence Jefferson, Mary James McMullen, Martha Ann Holmes and Rosalyn Walton – became the first African American students to attend several of Atlanta Public Schools all-white high schools.

Though the US Supreme Court handed down the monumental decision in 1954 it took 7 years for the first schools to become integrated in the Atlanta Public Schools district….

What was the delay?