The Appeal. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. ;) 1889-19??, 1923-02-17
PROTEST CLOSING
OF new ORLEANS
COLORED SCHOOL
School Board Sends Children to
Other Buildings Already
OvercrOwded
new BUILDING TOO GOOD
White Daily Says Action Is
Grave Injustice to Colored
Citizenry


National Association for the Ad-
vancement of Colored People has
been fighting the closing of local
high school, erected for the use of
colored students upon ground previ-
ously occupied by an old and dilapi-
dated structure which had been torn
down to make room for the new
building. Two mass meetings in
dorsed by the fraternal, benevolent,
labor, religious and civic bodies of
New Orleans were held the same
night, to protest against the closing
of the Bayou Road School and the
consequent lack of school facilities
for many New Orleans colored high
school children.
Nevertheless the New Orleans
school board on January 27, decided
to close the school and to place all
other colored schools on double time.
This action brought about the follow
ing editorial in the New Orleans
Times-Picayune of February 2, 1923:
"A GRAVE INJUSTICE
"The Orleans parish school board
at a recent meeting voted to keep the
newly completed Joseph A. Craig
School closed for the remainder of
the school year. At the same time
majority of it's members initiated
movement looking to some sort of
Reorganization" system of education
for colored people and indicating an
inclination to deny to colored chill
dren use of the new school building,
which was built expressly for their
education. The boards action is
glaringly unfair and unjust, in this
opinion. We urge it's
reversal. We ask the fair-minded
white citizens of New Orleans to con-
slider the facts of the case and to join
in the effort to insure a just and
equitable handling of situation
which, in our judgment, is being
grossly mishandfed.
Structure to Fine.
"Here are the facts as we under
stand them. The new school replaces
the old Bayou Road School, continu-
ally used for the education of celored
children for some forty years-and
so used without protest. The old
structure became so dilapidated, so
overcrowded that the school board
finally decided to replace it with a
new and modern and adequate build
ing. Througout the present school
year many colored children have
gone unschooled, patiently awaiting
the completion Of the new building.
handsome proportions, neighborhood
objections began to be raised against
its devotion to colored education.
Wisely and properly the board re-
sisted that pressure for time. Its
constancy to its original purpose was
shown when the new school was re-
named in honor Of a colored man who
had served the cause of education
many years ago. Only little while
ago it reafimed its position. ~
"The sudden reversal occurred just
as the building was ready for use.
Closing Of the school leaves the
colored children in a district heavily
populated with colored people with
out school facilities. Their, transfer
to other schools is talked about. That
is a practical impossibility, not only
because the distances to be Travelled
are too great in many instances, but
because the other schools are already
overcrowded. The boards action
amounts, in effect, to denial of
schooling to hundreds of colored
children even while the building
erected for their use stands idle.
No Justification.
There lis not even the color Of
justification that might be pleaded if
white children in the district needed
this new school for their own use.
Superintendent Qwinn has reported
that the white schools in the district,
Tar from being overtaxed. have ac-
commodations for more children than
now are enrolled. at therefore ap-
pears to be impossible" he concludes,
"to use this building as an elemen-
tary school for white children"
1t is, we submit, utterly unfair to,
deny Ito colored children school.
built expressly for their use, upon a
site dedicated to their education with
out protest for forty years. So.
fagrant an injustice ought to pro-
woke vigorous protest from all fair
minded folk. Permitted to stand, it
will constitute grave reflection
mon community which prides IT.
self upon its fair treatment Of ITS
colored citizenry and its care for the
elementary education Of the colored