ACSBlog: The Blog of the American Constitution Society

by Amy Stuart Wells, Teachers College, Columbia University        

The hundreds of social science studies cited in the Amicus briefs filed in support of the school districts in the Louisville (Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education) and Seattle (Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District) voluntary integration cases before the Supreme Court vindicate the wisdom of the Court 52 years ago. Ruling in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, the Supreme Court of 1954 argued that “whatever may have been the extent of psychological knowledge at the time of Plessy v. Ferguson,” the finding of negative impact of segregation is “amply supported by modern authority.” Here is where the Court inserted its famous footnote 11, which cited not only the important research of Kenneth B. Clark, but also six other studies on the effects of racial segregation, including Gunner Mrydal’s An American Dilemma.

            If the seven studies cited in footnote 11 of the Brown decision constituted ample support by “modern authority” for the 1954 Supreme Court to reject the doctrine of Plessy and find that the well established system of de jure racial segregation unconstitutional, then the Court should at least consider the 2006 version of “modern authority” on segregation when deciding if these two school districts can voluntarily create racially integrated schools.       

            Indeed, today, the central issues before the Court are both profoundly different and remarkably similar to what they were half a century ago, but the “authority” of social scientists points the Court in the same direction – namely, we have overwhelming evidence that racial integration is beneficial to individual students of all racial/ethnic backgrounds and is critical to our society as a whole in terms of social cohesion and global competition. We also know from this systematic research the multiple harms of racial segregation and the concentrated poverty that often accompanies it for children of all races, but especially for African American and Latino students.

The plaintiffs argue that the legal issues in these cases are distinct from Brown, which considered the constitutionality of de jure segregation and not the ability of districts to deny students seats in particular schools of choice in the name of racial balancing. In an ironic legal and historical twist, these white plaintiffs argue that their 14^th Amendment rights have been violated by school districts polices that use race as one factor enrolling students in schools of choice in an effort to maintain some racial balance and stability across their public schools.

But the school districts and their many supporters in both the legal and social science communities reply that although these Louisville and Seattle cases are not addressing remedies for de jure segregation (although such segregation and it legacies are very much a part of Louisville’s history), they echo the central argument of the Brown decision – the value of racial integration in public education in a society that was both racially diverse and increasingly reliant on formal education to prepare future citizens and workers. On this issue, 1954 Supreme Court was prophetic, capturing the essence of the danger of not just the apartheid public policies of de jure segregation but also on-going racial inequality and its impact on African Americans. As the Court noted in Brown, education “is required in the performance of our most basic public responsibilities… it is the foundation of good citizenship… a principal instrument in awakening the child to cultural values, in preparing him for later professional training, and in helping him to adjust normally to his environment.”

Furthermore, the Court ruled, the harms of racial segregation on African American students, already articulated in prior rulings on higher education, had more to do with the intangible factors embodied in predominantly white educational institutions, including the prestige of the institution and its relationship to powerful social networks and life opportunities. Lack of access to such factors, the Court stated, affected African American students’ ability “to study, to engage in discussions and exchange views and other students and in general to learn his profession.” Such considerations, the Court argued, “apply with added force to children in grade and high schools.”

Since this landmark ruling, social scientists have proven the Court to be correct. Furthermore, this research has also shown important benefits of integration for white students and for the society as a whole.

In a society in which de facto segregation in housing, schools, places of worship, and even the workplace is both reinforced by public policies and perpetuated in a de-jure-like manner and with similar outcomes, the efforts of locally controlled school districts to overcome such racial barriers should be applauded. The social science evidence to support these efforts is nearly 100 times greater than it was in 1954 when the Supreme Court was swayed by a much smaller body of research. We can only hope that the present Supreme Court Justices are duly impressed with the preponderance of the research evidence on the side of the districts -- and on the side of the future hope for a racially diverse and increasingly global society.