Court Opinion

ID: 9456133
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 19:43:01.195583+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:51.543763
License: Public Domain

DUFFY, Senior Circuit Judge
(dissenting) .
The opinion herein makes reference to the first appeal in this case wherein this Court affirmed the preliminary injunction issued by the District Court. However, no mention is made that our decision in the first appeal was by a divided court.
In my previous dissenting opinion, I invited attention to the fact that pri- or to the filing of the instant suit, complaint had been made to the Superintendent of Public Instruction for the State of Illinois which contained charges of segregation of Negro teachers and pupils in School District 151. Those charges were similar to the charges filed in the case at bar.
After hearing evidence, the Superintendent of Public Instruction rendered a decision in which he found “ * * * a consideration of all evidence does not show that any child or teacher is segregated in or excluded from a particular school solely by reason of their race as charged in the petition.”
I also pointed out that a similar complaint was made to the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW), but that after an investigation by officials of that Agency, HEW informed the School Board it could see no pattern of wilful discrimination.
In a memorandum by the investigating officials which was addressed to the Assistant Commissioner in the Office of Education of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, it was stated “There is no evidence of gerrymandering of the Coolidge-Kennedy boundaries as these zones are the same as they were when the school was predominantly White * * *. This situation seems to be a classical de facto segregation situation in which there are no elements of racial discrimination which come within the purview of Title VI. * * *”
On the previous appeal, the School District, in my opinion, properly complained that on July 8, 1968, the District Court adopted, without any change, the twenty-six pages of Findings and Conclusions, and a six-page Order submitted by the Government.
On the second hearing on the question of a permanent injunction, the trial court continued to display the same attitude, and on May 15, 1969, the District Court again without changing a word, accepted the Government’s seventy-three proposed Findings of Fact; the Government’s thirty-three proposed Conclusions of Law, and the Government’s proposed Order, in all some ninety-seven pages. There is no justification for such a procedure which has been strongly criticized by many courts. See United States v. El Paso Natural Gas Company, 376 U.S. 651, 656-657, 84 S.Ct. 1044, 12 L.Ed.2d 12 (1964). This practice would seem to indicate that in this case, the Government could do no wrong.
The School District also objects to the many instances of cross examination of its witnesses by the District Judge which, it claims, was often done in a caustic and unfair manner.
In 1948, the City of Phoenix was a predominantly White community and the student enrollment at the Coolidge School was approximately 70% White. However, within the next eight years, due to an influx of Negroes who came to reside in Phoenix, the housing pattern was altered so that Phoenix became an almost exclusively Negro community. Reflecting this change, the enrollment of the Coolidge School at the start of the 1956-57 school year was approximately 99% Negro.
There is no evidence in the record that during the eight-year period starting in 1948, the School Board did anything to change the racial composition in the Coolidge School. Certainly, it cannot be denied that the attendance bound*1153aries for Coolidge in 1956 were identical with those which existed in 1948.
One thing is obvious and beyond dispute, and that is that the failure to change school boundaries in 1964 could not, and did not play any part in Coolidge becoming a 99% Negro school during the period from 1948 to 1956.
Bell v. School City of Gary, 324 F.2d 209 (7 Cir., 1963) established the law in this Circuit pertaining to so-called de facto segregation. It is quite apparent that my two colleagues in this ease are not happy with our holding in Gary. They seek to avoid applying the principles announced in that case by saying that Bell v. Gary “ * * * and its progeny, including Deal v. Cincinnati Board of Education, 369 F.2d 55 (6th Cir., 1966), cert. den. 389 U.S. 847, 88 S.Ct. 39, 19 L.Ed.2d 114 (1967), are not controlling here, where the segregation has been found to be de jure, * *
I emphatically disagree. We clearly held in Gary that no affirmative constitutional duty existed to change innocently arrived at school attendance districts by the mere fact that shifts in population had increased or decreased the percentage of Negro and White populations. That is the situation in the case now before us.
I feel it imperative to again point out that a petition for certiorari in the Gary case was denied. (377 U.S. 924, 84 S.Ct. 1223, 12 L.Ed.2d 216 (1964)). Further, our opinion in Gary was followed by the Tenth Circuit in Downs v. Board of Education of Kansas City, 336 F.2d 988 (10 Cir., 1965). A petition for certiorari in that case was denied. (380 U.S. 914, 85 S.Ct. 898, 13 L.Ed.2d 800 (1965)). Our decision in Gary was also followed by the Sixth Circuit in Deal v. Cincinnati Board of Education, 369 F.2d 55 (6 Cir., 1966). Again, certiorari was denied. (389 U.S. 847, 88 S.Ct. 39, 19 L.Ed.2d 114 (1967)).
I also deem it appropriate and indeed necessary to again note that when the Bill which later became the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was before the House of Representatives, it gave the Attorney General wide authority to file suits in any part of the country in order .to force integration. However, the United States Senate adopted an amendment which was included in the Bill which became law and which provided “Nothing herein shall empower any official or court of the United States to issue any order seeking to achieve a racial balance in any school by requiring the transportation of pupils or students from one school to another or one school district to another in order to achieve such racial balance. * * *”
In the Senate debate, Senator Humphrey who was in charge of the Bill, stated (110 Congressional Record, p. 12714) that the provision “ * * * merely quotes the substance of a recent court decision which I have with me and which I desire to include in the Record today, the so-called Gary case.” [Referring to Bell v. Gary, supra].
Thus, the principles which we announced in our Gary decision have been before the Supreme Court on three separate occasions. In each case a review of those principles we announced in Gary was denied. Furthermore, the Congress must have had our decision in mind when it passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
In my previous opinion on the first appeal, I pointed out the many important factors in Gary which are also present in the instant case. Among other conditions cited were — In 1961-1962 certain areas in Gary contained twelve schools where 99% to 100% of the students were Negroes. I stated “Here, all schools were integrated with at least one Negro teacher as was the case in Gary. Here, the safety factors were almost identical with those in Gary, such as many railroad tracks, main highways without sidewalks, drainage ditches, etc.” Also applicable on this appeal from the permanent injunction is my previous statement “In my view, the District Court’s order requiring defendants to adopt Plan C and bus approximately 790 Negro and White children to achieve a *1154certain ‘racial make-up of each school’ ignores not only our decision in Gary, but also ignores the Congressional intent in passing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the prohibition contained in Tit. 42, Section 2000 C-6, U.S.C.” Furthermore, I do not believe the record before us justifies a finding of purposeful discrimination.
It was, of course, the duty of the trial judge to maintain throughout the trial an atmosphere of impartiality. Defendants strongly urge that there was a flagrant abuse of this obligation by the trial court, and that there was clearly a pre-judgment of the merits of the case.
The Government offers several excuses for the trial court’s “occasional sarcasm”, “caustic lash” and “judicial exasperation with defendants.”
The Government urges that it was a long, tiring non jury trial. However, the trial court’s attitude was evident from the beginning of the trial. In fact, the opening statements by defendants’ attorneys were repeatedly interrupted by the trial judge.
The District Court did not hesitate to order the busing of Phoenix (Kennedy School) K-2 children who are very young. However, my brothers on this panel announce in the majority opinion that they are not disposed to compel transfer of Phoenix (Kennedy School) K-2 pupils unless their parents so desire. They say — “In our opinion, the parents of these small children are best suited to determine whether it is more beneficial to the children to be close to home or bused to other schools.” I agree with this statement. My only complaint is that it does not go far enough.
The majority opinion makes light of the increased cost of busing which is necessary under the plan approved by the District Court. The opinion states: “The increased busing cost problems urged upon us are unpersuasive in the District which is but 4y2 miles square and additional cost expected under the order is $15,000.”
During the first full year under the upper grade center ordered by the District Court, the school district was required to borrow $510,000 as compared to the total amount of $260,000 borrowed the previous year.
Furthermore, the busing costs last year were not met by the transportation tax levies, despite the fact that the School Board doubled the tax levy to 8 cents, the maximum permissible without a voter referendum. There was a deficit in the transportation fund at the end of last year of $16,500 which required the issuance of tax anticipation warrants against the transportation levy.
The plan adopted and the order of the District Court seem to ignore the desperate financial condition of School District 151. Illinois law provides that general obligation bonds, when approved by the voters, can be issued up to only 5% of the assessed valuation. Ever since this litigation was commenced, School District 151 has been and is about at the limit of its bonding power.
When Plan C was approved by the District Court’s decision on the petition for a preliminary injunction, it meant that approximately 790 Negro and White children would have to be bused to achieve certain “racial makeup of each school.”
Under the District Court’s order on the Petition for a Permanent Injunction, the Government argued the busing of 55% of the total student body of the District is incidental to the establishment of unitary schools in the system. I disagree. The plan was actually drawn to overcome the effects of residential or de facto segregation and to integrate the student bodies of each of the six schools in School District 151. There was an arbitrary assignment of. black students who resided in the City of Phoenix to each of the other schools in the District.
*1155An illustration of the extremés included in the District Court’s order as to busing is the requirement therein that “■>;• * * Buses shall be routed so as to eliminate or consolidate those different lines which serve primarily white or primarily negro students. * * * ”
It is apparent that the trial judge did not attempt to distinguish between “White” and “Negro” schools established under the compulsion of state laws and those established by the operation of residential housing patterns. It would seem to have been the view of the trial judge that predominantly White and predominantly Negro schools are impermissible under the Constitution whatever the cause. I consider very appropriate a statement made by Chief Justice Burger in a concurring opinion in Northcross et al. v. Board of Education of Memphis, Tennessee, 397 U.S. 232, 90 S.Ct. 891, 25 L.Ed.2d 246 (1970) (38 L. W. 4220), wherein he stated “ * * * however, we ought to resolve some of the basic practical problems when they are appropriately presented including whether, as a constitutional matter, any particular racial balance must be achieved in the schools; to what extent school districts and zones may or must be altered as a constitutional matter; to what extent transportation may or must be provided to achieve the ends sought by prior holdings of the Court.”
It is quite true as the School District argues, that the inevitable effect of non-integrated residential patterns, whatever the reasons for their existence, have been to produce corresponding school attendance patterns without any need for official action. I think it follows that the existence of a predominantly Negro school in a bi-racial school district is of no probative value in showing any official acts of discrimination. In my opinion, there was no justification for the defendants being required to shoulder the Government’s burden of proof.
I would reverse.