Misplaced Pages

#132867

115-397: Conceived by Boston activists Ruth Batson and Betty Johnson, and Brookline School Committee Chair Dr. Leon Trilling , METCO launched in 1966 as a coalition of seven school districts, placing 220 students. The Massachusetts Racial Imbalance Act (RIA) of 1966, amended in 1974, is the legal basis for voluntary interdistrict transfers for the purpose of desegregation (such as METCO). Funding

230-539: A 14-year-old African American from Chicago, visited his relatives in Money, Mississippi , for the summer. He allegedly had an interaction with a white woman, Carolyn Bryant, in a small grocery store that violated the norms of Mississippi culture, and Bryant's husband Roy and his half-brother J. W. Milam brutally murdered young Emmett Till. They beat and mutilated him before shooting him in the head and sinking his body in the  Tallahatchie River . Three days later, Till's body

345-473: A backlash for his involvement with white actress Kim Novak . Davis briefly married a black dancer in 1958 to protect himself from mob violence. In 1958, officers in Virginia entered the home of Mildred and Richard Loving and dragged them out of bed for living together as an interracial couple, on the basis that "any white person intermarry with a colored person"— or vice versa—each party "shall be guilty of

460-605: A bus boycott was considered and rejected. But when Rosa Parks was arrested in December, Jo Ann Gibson Robinson of the Montgomery Women's Political Council put the bus boycott protest in motion. Late that night, she, John Cannon (chairman of the Business Department at Alabama State University ) and others mimeographed and distributed thousands of leaflets calling for a boycott. The eventual success of

575-473: A combined strategy of direct action , nonviolence , nonviolent resistance , and many events described as civil disobedience , giving rise to the civil rights movement of 1954 to 1968. A. Philip Randolph had planned a march on Washington, D.C., in 1941 to support demands for elimination of employment discrimination in the defense industry ; he called off the march when the Roosevelt administration met

690-488: A felony" and face prison terms of five years. Invigorated by the victory of Brown and frustrated by the lack of immediate practical effect, private citizens increasingly rejected gradualist, legalistic approaches as the primary tool to bring about desegregation . They were faced with " massive resistance " in the South by proponents of racial segregation and voter suppression . In defiance, African-American activists adopted

805-635: A march from Selma to Montgomery . The movement was led by Martin Luther King Jr. , James Bevel , and others, and press coverage of police violence using fire hoses and dogs against students attempting to walk to City Hall to talk with the mayor during the Birmingham campaign increased its public support. Discrimination was often supported by courts, including by the Supreme Court in its 1896 decision Plessy v. Ferguson , which upheld

920-578: A neighborhood a character or property or occupancy, members of any race or nationality, or any individual whose presence will be clearly detrimental to property values in a neighborhood." The result was the development of all-black ghettos in the North and West, where much housing was older, as well as South. The first anti-miscegenation law was passed by the Maryland General Assembly in 1691, criminalizing interracial marriage . In

1035-571: A network of chapters as the NAACP did. It offered training and leadership assistance for local efforts to fight segregation. The headquarters organization raised funds, mostly from Northern sources, to support such campaigns. It made nonviolence both its central tenet and its primary method of confronting racism. In 1959, Septima Clarke , Bernice Robinson, and Esau Jenkins , with the help of Myles Horton 's Highlander Folk School in Tennessee , began

1150-465: A plethora of aspects of life. Within employment, economic opportunities for blacks were routed to the lowest status and restrictive in potential mobility. Within the housing market, stronger discriminatory measures were used in correlation to the influx, resulting in a mix of "targeted violence, restrictive covenants , redlining and racial steering ". The Great Migration resulted in many African Americans becoming urbanized, and they began to realign from

1265-447: A resolution supporting METCO upon the condition that Boston not contribute financially. The consequence is that receiving districts must make up the gap in costs. Alumni of the program have frequently written and spoken about the adverse effects of long bus rides; being considered "other" compared to the white, resident students; racial microaggressions, slurs, and assaults; and lack of teachers of color to serve as role models. Alumni of

SECTION 10

#1732798271133

1380-589: A speech in Charleston, Illinois in 1858, Abraham Lincoln stated, "I am not, nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people". By the late 1800s, 38 US states had anti-miscegenation statutes. By 1924, the ban on interracial marriage was still in force in 29 states. While interracial marriage had been legal in California since 1948, in 1957 actor Sammy Davis Jr. faced

1495-457: A tuition assessment set by receiving districts. Over time, the financial system evolved from one where receiving districts set tuition rates, to a "grant" system where a standard per-pupil grant of $ 3,925 (FY2017) is provided to receiving districts, almost all of which is used to fund METCO direct services with no money available for indirect general educational expenses. The Boston School Committee does not pay METCO financial expenses, having passed

1610-505: A watershed historical moment without Mamie finding the strength to make her private grief a public matter." The visceral response to his mother's decision to have an open-casket funeral mobilized the black community throughout the U.S. The murder and resulting trial ended up markedly impacting the views of several young black activists. Joyce Ladner referred to such activists as the "Emmett Till generation." One hundred days after Emmett Till's murder, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on

1725-761: Is almost entirely provided by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts . Over the years, the academic and social outcomes of the program have been praised, while the increasing gap between cost and funding, and the negative experiences reported by students of color have been the subject of criticism. As defined by the original METCO Grant, the purpose of the program is "to expand educational opportunities, increase diversity, and reduce racial isolation by permitting students in Boston and Springfield to attend public schools in other communities that have agreed to participate. The program provides students of participating school districts

1840-481: Is evidence that METCO boosts academic success for Boston resident students. Students in the METCO program consistently graduate from high school at the same rate as their suburban classmates (nearly 100%), compared to around 65% of Boston Public Schools students. Around 88% of METCO students enroll in post-secondary education, equaling the graduation rates of receiving districts, above the state average of 81%, and far above

1955-497: The 15th Amendment (1870) that gave black males the right to vote (only males could vote in the U.S. at the time). From 1865 to 1877, the United States underwent a turbulent Reconstruction era during which the federal government tried to establish free labor and the civil rights of freedmen in the South after the end of slavery. Many whites resisted the social changes, leading to the formation of insurgent movements such as

2070-709: The American Civil War , eight serving presidents had owned slaves , almost four million black people remained enslaved in the South , generally only white men with property could vote, and the Naturalization Act of 1790 limited U.S. citizenship to whites . Following the Civil War, three constitutional amendments were passed, including the 13th Amendment (1865) that ended slavery; the 14th Amendment (1869) that gave black people citizenship, adding their total for Congressional apportionment ; and

2185-807: The Girls Latin School in 1939. She attended the Nursery Training School of Boston, which was associated with Boston University . She later received a Master of Education degree from Boston University in 1976. Inspired by her mother's interest in civil rights, Batson became the chairman of the Public Education Sub-Committee of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1953. In April 1957, she became

2300-803: The Ku Klux Klan (KKK), whose members attacked black and white Republicans in order to maintain white supremacy . In 1871, President Ulysses S. Grant , the U.S. Army, and U.S. Attorney General Amos T. Akerman , initiated a campaign to repress the KKK under the Enforcement Acts . Some states were reluctant to enforce the federal measures of the act. In addition, by the early 1870s, other white supremacist and insurgent paramilitary groups arose that violently opposed African-American legal equality and suffrage, intimidating and suppressing black voters, and assassinating Republican officeholders. However, if

2415-827: The March on Washington in 1963, moderates in the movement worked with the United States Congress to achieve the passage of several significant pieces of federal legislation that authorized oversight and enforcement of civil rights laws. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 banned all discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin, including in schools, employment, and public accommodations . The Voting Rights Act of 1965 restored and protected voting rights for minorities and authorized oversight of registration and elections in areas with historic under-representation of minority voters. The Fair Housing Act of 1968 forbade property owners from discriminating in

SECTION 20

#1732798271133

2530-655: The Tuskegee Institute , to dine at the White House , making him the first African American to attend an official dinner there. "The invitation was roundly criticized by southern politicians and newspapers." Washington persuaded the president to appoint more blacks to federal posts in the South and to try to boost African-American leadership in state Republican organizations. However, these actions were resisted by both white Democrats and white Republicans as an unwanted federal intrusion into state politics. During

2645-545: The civil rights of all Americans. After the American Civil War and subsequent abolition of slavery in the southern states in 1865, the three Reconstruction Amendments to the United States Constitution had granted emancipation and constitutional rights of citizenship to all African Americans, the majority of whom had recently been enslaved. For a short period of time, African-American men voted and held political office, but as time went on Blacks in

2760-425: The 1950s and 1960s, the nonviolent protesting of the civil rights movement caused definite tension, which gained national attention. In order to prepare for protests physically and psychologically, demonstrators received training in nonviolence. According to former civil rights activist Bruce Hartford, there are two main components of nonviolence training. There is the philosophical method, which involves understanding

2875-462: The 2010–2011 school year, 75.2% of METCO pupils were African American, 3.4% were Asian, 16.8% were Hispanic, and the remaining 5% were classified as multi-race or "other." The demographics of Boston's school district in 2003 were 35% African-American, 41% Hispanic, 13% White and 8% Asian. As of 2010–2011, 33 of the 37 receiving districts remained "racially isolated" (over 70% white) while 4 receiving districts are "racially balanced" (50–70% white). There

2990-402: The Boston area participate in METCO, typically those districts that are more affluent (and can subsidize the program). Ruth Batson Ruth Marion Batson (née Watson ; 1921–2003) was an American civil rights activist and outspoken advocate of equal education. She spoke out about the desegregation of Boston Public Schools. She served as Chairman of the Public Education Sub-Committee of

3105-402: The Boston average of 58%. Grades and standardized test score data are more mixed. During most of its history, METCO did not use a lottery, and the demographic profile of METCO students does not match the profile of minorities in Boston. Without a randomized admission process (including tracking outcomes for those not selected), selection bias effects may account for most outcome differences with

3220-429: The Boston school population. It has been reported both qualitatively and quantitatively that most families enrolled in METCO districts weigh the opportunity for an excellent education as far more important than decreasing racial isolation, although they acknowledge that as an important side factor. When METCO was initiated in 1966, receiving districts received a state grant covering transportation costs for students, and

3335-533: The METCO Directors Association, for mutual support and professional development. Some communities have active resident groups to provide funding and social support to Boston students. METCO was developed during a period of activism by Black parents, primarily mothers, in Boston to achieve educational equity through school desegregation . In 1963, the Boston branch of the NAACP demanded that

3450-601: The METCO initiative to Ruth Batson, then the director of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination . She agreed to support the program as associate director alongside Joseph Killory, who took a leave from the Massachusetts Department of Education to serve as executive director. METCO filed for non-profit status in 1966 with Trilling as the chair of the board of directors. Among those also serving on

3565-434: The METCO program include politician John Barros, singer Michael Bivins , professional basketball player Bruce Brown , journalist Audie Cornish , politician Tito Jackson , politician Kim Janey , filmmaker Mike Mascoll, politician Marilyn Mosby , author Danzy Senna , and TEDx speaker Kandice Sumner. Boston and Springfield are the two districts that send students to receiving communities. A subset of school districts in

METCO - Misplaced Pages Continue

3680-707: The Montgomery Improvement Association, joined with other church leaders who had led similar boycott efforts, such as C. K. Steele of Tallahassee and T. J. Jemison of Baton Rouge, and other activists such as Fred Shuttlesworth , Ella Baker , A. Philip Randolph , Bayard Rustin and Stanley Levison , to form the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). The SCLC, with its headquarters in Atlanta , Georgia , did not attempt to create

3795-516: The Montgomery bus boycott to demand a bus system in which passengers would be treated equally. The organization was led by Jo Ann Robinson, a member of the Women's Political Council who had been waiting for the opportunity to boycott the bus system. Following Rosa Parks' arrest, Jo Ann Robinson mimeographed 52,500 leaflets calling for a boycott. They were distributed around the city and helped gather

3910-496: The NAACP and the national civil rights movement obtained federal court orders to integrate the prestigious Little Rock Central High School in September, 1957. The Nine faced intense harassment and threats of violence from white parents and students, as well as organized white supremacy groups. The enraged opposition emphasized miscegenation as the threat to white society. Arkansas Governor , Orval Faubus , claiming his only goal

4025-739: The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1953. Later, she served as the executive director of the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO). Ruth Marion Watson was born August 3, 1921, in Roxbury , Massachusetts , to Jamaican immigrants, Joel R. Watson and Cassandra D. Buchanan. She attended the Everett School in Dorchester, Massachusetts . Batson graduated from

4140-528: The Nine were teased and ridiculed every day. In the city compromise efforts all failed and political tensions continued to fester. A year later in September 1958 the Supreme Court ruled that all the city's high schools had to be integrated immediately. Governor Faubus and the legislature responded by immediately shutting down all the public high schools in the city for the entire 1958–1959 school year, despite

4255-647: The RCNL, Howard led campaigns to expose brutality by the Mississippi state highway patrol and to encourage blacks to make deposits in the black-owned Tri-State Bank of Nashville which, in turn, gave loans to civil rights activists who were victims of a "credit squeeze" by the White Citizens' Councils . After Claudette Colvin was arrested for not giving up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus in March 1955,

4370-855: The Republican to the Democratic Party, especially because of opportunities under the New Deal of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration during the Great Depression in the 1930s. Substantially under pressure from African-American supporters who began the March on Washington Movement , President Roosevelt issued the first federal order banning discrimination and created the Fair Employment Practice Committee . After both World Wars, black veterans of

4485-748: The School Committee of Boston Public Schools acknowledge de facto segregation and commit to a series of reforms. The demands were presented by the chair of the Education Committee of the NAACP, activist Ruth Batson. A series of protests gained publicity; they included sit-ins, boycotts, and a self-funded desegregation program within the city called Operation Exodus. However, the Boston Public Schools continued to either deny that racial disparities existed, or to deny responsibility for them. The state of Massachusetts, on

4600-503: The South were increasingly deprived of civil rights, often under racist Jim Crow laws , and were subjected to discrimination and sustained violence by White supremacists . African Americans who moved to the North to enhance their prospects in the Great Migration also faced barriers in employment and housing. Over the following century, various efforts were made by African Americans to secure their legal and civil rights, such as

4715-430: The South." From 1910 to 1970, blacks sought better lives by migrating north and west out of the South. A total of nearly seven million blacks left the South in what was known as the Great Migration , most during and after World War II. So many people migrated that the demographics of some previously black-majority states changed to a white majority (in combination with other developments). The rapid influx of blacks altered

METCO - Misplaced Pages Continue

4830-679: The age of 82. She died in her sleep at her Beacon Hill home. In 1989 Batson received an honorary Doctorate of Pedagogy from Northeastern University . In 1993, she received an honorary degree from the University of Massachusetts Boston. She was a member of the board of visitors of Boston University's School of Medicine; trustees, Boston City Hospital ; member, Corporation of the Massachusetts General Hospital and former member of its board of trustees; and board member of Roxbury Community College Foundation. She

4945-467: The annual Hampton Negro Conference in Virginia, said that "...the lines along most of the avenues of wage-earning are more rigidly drawn in the North than in the South. There seems to be an apparent effort throughout the North, especially in the cities to debar the colored worker from all the avenues of higher remunerative labor, which makes it more difficult to improve his economic condition even than in

5060-401: The application process for families, changing from a waiting list reported to be 12,000 students long to an online lottery system. As of 2015 there are approximately 3,300 students enrolled in the program, the majority of whom come from the city of Boston (about 150 come from the city of Springfield). As of 2001, approximately 4,300 students have graduated from the program since its founding. In

5175-791: The appointment of African American David Jones to the school board in 1953, convinced numerous white and black citizens that Greensboro was heading in a progressive direction. Integration in Greensboro occurred rather peacefully compared to the process in Southern states such as Alabama, Arkansas , and Virginia where " massive resistance " was practiced by top officials and throughout the states. In Virginia, some counties closed their public schools rather than integrate, and many white Christian private schools were founded to accommodate students who used to go to public schools. Even in Greensboro, much local resistance to desegregation continued, and in 1969,

5290-431: The attention of civil rights leaders. After the city rejected many of its suggested reforms, the NAACP, led by E. D. Nixon , pushed for full desegregation of public buses. With the support of most of Montgomery's 50,000 African Americans, the boycott lasted for 381 days, until the local ordinance segregating African Americans and whites on public buses was repealed. Ninety percent of African Americans in Montgomery partook in

5405-467: The boycott made its spokesman Martin Luther King Jr. , a nationally known figure. It also inspired other bus boycotts, such as the successful Tallahassee, Florida boycott of 1956–57. This movement also sparked the 1956 Sugar Bowl riots in Atlanta which later became a major organizing center of the civil rights movement, with Martin Luther King Jr. In 1957, King and Ralph Abernathy , the leaders of

5520-550: The boycotts, which reduced bus revenue significantly, as they comprised the majority of the riders. This movement also sparked riots leading up to the 1956 Sugar Bowl . In November 1956, the United States Supreme Court upheld a district court ruling in the case of Browder v. Gayle and ordered Montgomery's buses desegregated, ending the boycott. Local leaders established the Montgomery Improvement Association to focus their efforts. Martin Luther King Jr.

5635-399: The bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Parks later informed Till's mother that her decision to stay in her seat was guided by the image she still vividly recalled of Till's brutalized remains. The glass topped casket that was used for Till's Chicago funeral was found in a cemetery garage in 2009. Till had been reburied in a different casket after being exhumed in 2005. Till's family decided to donate

5750-457: The case known as Brown II , the Court ordered segregation to be phased out over time, "with all deliberate speed". Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954) did not overturn Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). Plessy v. Ferguson was segregation in transportation modes. Brown v. Board of Education dealt with segregation in education. Brown v. Board of Education did set in motion

5865-773: The chairwoman of the New England Regional Conference of the NAACP, where she worked as a civil rights lobbyist. In the early 1960s, she challenged the Boston School Committee, charging that Boston Public Schools were largely segregated. Batson highlighted that schools with majority black student populations often had poor quality facilities when compared to the facilities at schools with majority white student enrollment. She accused school administrators with ignoring "a basic American concept that equal opportunity should be available to all people regardless of race, color, or creed." Batson

SECTION 50

#1732798271133

5980-506: The city of Anniston, Alabama , two black ministers were brutally beaten for attempting to integrate the public library. Though there was resistance and violence, the integration of libraries was generally quicker than the integration of other public institutions. The situation for blacks outside the South was somewhat better (in most states they could vote and have their children educated, though they still faced discrimination in housing and jobs). In 1900 Reverend Matthew Anderson, speaking at

6095-827: The civil rights movement's peak in the mid-1960s, and still faced discrimination in jobs, housing, education and politics. A wave of riots and protests in Black communities in the 1960s, including in Los Angeles in 1965 , in Newark in 1967 , and in Chicago in 1968 following King's assassination lessened support from the White middle class. By the early 21st century, though " affirmative action " programs had expanded opportunities for Black and other minorities, Black income levels and life expectancy remained lower than that of Whites. Before

6210-580: The civil rights movements of 1865–1896 and of 1896–1954 . The movement was characterized by nonviolent mass protests and civil disobedience following highly publicized events such as the lynching of Emmett Till in 1955. These included economic boycotts such as the Montgomery bus boycott , " sit-ins " in Greensboro and Nashville , a series of protests during the Birmingham campaign , and

6325-622: The constitutionality of those state laws that required racial segregation in public facilities in its 1896 decision Plessy v. Ferguson , legitimizing them through the " separate but equal " doctrine. Segregation, which began with slavery, continued with Jim Crow laws, with signs used to show blacks where they could legally walk, talk, drink, rest, or eat. For those places that were racially mixed, non-whites had to wait until all white customers were served first. Elected in 1912, President Woodrow Wilson gave in to demands by Southern members of his cabinet and ordered segregation of workplaces throughout

6440-497: The consultation and education program (1970–1975), director of the school desegregation research project (1975–1981), coordinator of the clinical task force, and associate professor at the School of Medicine's Division of Psychiatry. In 1941, aged 19, Watson married John C. Batson. They had three daughters together: Cassandra Way, Susan Batson , and Dorothy Owusu. John C. Batson died in 1971. Ruth Batson died on October 28, 2003, at

6555-528: The country, which was most commonly employed against African Americans . The movement had origins in the Reconstruction era during the late 19th century, and had modern roots in the 1940s. After years of direct actions and grassroots protests, the movement made its largest legislative and judicial gains during the 1960s. The movement's major nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience campaigns eventually secured new protections in federal law for

6670-517: The court majority opinion that Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a detrimental effect upon the colored children. The impact is greater when it has the sanction of the law; for the policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as denoting the inferiority of the Negro group. The lawyers from the NAACP had to gather plausible evidence in order to win the case of Brown vs. Board of Education . Their method of addressing

6785-719: The demand by issuing Executive Order 8802 , which barred racial discrimination and created an agency to oversee compliance with the order. The strategy of public education, legislative lobbying, and litigation that had typified the civil rights movement during the first half of the 20th century broadened after Brown to a strategy that emphasized " direct action ": boycotts, sit-ins , Freedom Rides , marches or walks, and similar tactics that relied on mass mobilization, nonviolent resistance, standing in line, and, at times, civil disobedience. Churches, local grassroots organizations, fraternal societies, and black-owned businesses mobilized volunteers to participate in broad-based actions. This

6900-462: The demographics of Northern and Western cities; happening at a period of expanded European, Hispanic, and Asian immigration, it added to social competition and tensions, with the new migrants and immigrants battling for a place in jobs and housing. Reflecting social tensions after World War I, as veterans struggled to return to the workforce and labor unions were organizing, the Red Summer of 1919

7015-508: The discretion of each city or town's School Committee. The METCO program is funded predominantly by a state line item allocated by the Legislature every year and distributed to each participating district by a formula related to the number of students enrolled. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education administers the grant and related reporting. The city of Boston does not contribute any money to METCO operations. The majority of

SECTION 60

#1732798271133

7130-590: The doctrine of separate but equal . At the culmination of a legal strategy pursued by African Americans, in 1954 the Supreme Court struck down the underpinnings of laws that allowed racial discrimination as unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education . The Warren Court made further pro-civil rights rulings in cases such as Browder v. Gayle (1956) and Loving v. Virginia (1967), banning segregation in public schools and public transport, and striking down all state laws against interracial marriage . Following

7245-579: The entire process of developing and training the mental, physical and moral powers and capabilities of human beings". Risa Goluboff wrote that the NAACP's intention was to show the Courts that African American children were the victims of school segregation and their futures were at risk. The Court ruled that both Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), which had established the "separate but equal" standard in general, and Cumming v. Richmond County Board of Education (1899), which had applied that standard to schools,

7360-604: The executive director of METCO Inc. in 1973. She held this position for more than four decades, spanning the period of court-mandated desegregation in Boston and multiple waves of funding pressure and local opposition. In response to an order by the Massachusetts Department of Education in the mid-1990s, McGuire began actively recruiting Latino and Asian students to more accurately reflect the changing demographics in Boston . In 2018, Milly Arbaje-Thomas assumed leadership of METCO, Inc. The organization has reformed

7475-402: The federal government found the city was not in compliance with the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Transition to a fully integrated school system did not begin until 1971. Many Northern cities also had de facto segregation policies, which resulted in a vast gulf in educational resources between black and white communities. In Harlem , New York, for example, neither a single new school was built since

7590-552: The federal government. The early 20th century is a period often referred to as the " nadir of American race relations ", when the number of lynchings was highest. While tensions and civil rights violations were most intense in the South, social discrimination affected African Americans in other regions as well. At the national level, the Southern bloc controlled important committees in Congress, defeated passage of federal laws against lynching, and exercised considerable power beyond

7705-521: The first Citizenship Schools in South Carolina 's Sea Islands . They taught literacy to enable blacks to pass voting tests. The program was an enormous success and tripled the number of black voters on Johns Island . SCLC took over the program and duplicated its results elsewhere. In the spring of 1951, black students in Virginia protested their unequal status in the state's segregated educational system. Students at Moton High School protested

7820-501: The funding goes to transportation, which is organized by each suburban school district. Other major budget items are salaries of dedicated METCO personnel in each district, and the central administration at METCO, Inc. METCO, Inc. is the Boston-based 501(c)3 that oversees the recruitment, eligibility screening, and school assignment of Boston students. It also provides support services in Boston to METCO families. Districts determine

7935-612: The funeral in Jet is credited as a crucial moment in the civil rights era for displaying in vivid detail the violent racism that was being directed at black people in America. In a column for The Atlantic , Vann R. Newkirk wrote: "The trial of his killers became a pageant illuminating the tyranny of white supremacy ". The state of Mississippi tried two defendants, but they were speedily acquitted by an all-white jury . "Emmett's murder," historian Tim Tyson writes, "would never have become

8050-473: The future overturning of 'separate but equal'. On May 18, 1954, Greensboro, North Carolina , became the first city in the South to publicly announce that it would abide by the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education ruling. "It is unthinkable,' remarked School Board Superintendent Benjamin Smith, 'that we will try to [override] the laws of the United States." This positive reception for Brown, together with

8165-457: The harm it did to all the students. The decision to integrate the school was a landmark event in the civil rights movement, and the students' bravery and determination in the face of violent opposition is remembered as a key moment in American history. The city and state were entangled in very expensive legal disputes for decades, while suffering a reputation for hatred and obstruction. During

8280-427: The individual person's attitude and mental response to crises and violence" (Civil Rights Movement Archive). Hartford and activists like him, who trained in tactical nonviolence, considered it necessary in order to ensure physical safety, instill discipline, teach demonstrators how to demonstrate, and form mutual confidence among demonstrators (Civil Rights Movement Archive). For many, the concept of nonviolent protest

8395-426: The issue of school segregation was to enumerate several arguments. One pertained to having exposure to interracial contact in a school environment. It was argued that interracial contact would, in turn, help prepare children to live with the pressures that society exerts in regard to race and thereby afford them a better chance of living in a democracy. In addition, another argument emphasized how "'education' comprehends

8510-460: The landmark Supreme Court case of Smith v. Allwright (1944), which prohibited white primaries , progress was made in increasing black political participation in the Rim South and Acadiana – although almost entirely in urban areas and a few rural localities where most blacks worked outside plantations. The status quo ante of excluding African Americans from the political system lasted in

8625-441: The last African Americans were elected to Congress from the South before disenfranchisement of blacks by states throughout the region, as described below. From 1890 to 1908, southern states passed new constitutions and laws to disenfranchise African Americans and many Poor Whites by creating barriers to voter registration; voting rolls were dramatically reduced as blacks and poor whites were forced out of electoral politics. After

8740-491: The leadership of Walter Reuther , the United Auto Workers donated $ 75,000 to help pay for the NAACP's efforts at the Supreme Court. On May 17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren ruled unanimously in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas , that mandating, or even permitting, public schools to be segregated by race was unconstitutional . Chief Justice Warren wrote in

8855-573: The medical center to have lunch with the Batson Scholars, hear their life's stories and share her experiences, especially with the health care system in America. Civil rights movement 1954–1959 1960–1963 1964–1968 The civil rights movement was a social movement and campaign in the United States from 1954 to 1968 that aimed to abolish legalized racial segregation , discrimination , and disenfranchisement in

8970-419: The method of nonviolence and why it is considered useful, and there is the tactical method, which ultimately teaches demonstrators "how to be a protestor—how to sit-in, how to picket, how to defend yourself against attack, giving training on how to remain cool when people are screaming racist insults into your face and pouring stuff on you and hitting you" (Civil Rights Movement Archive). The philosophical basis of

9085-473: The military pressed for full civil rights and often led activist movements. In 1948, President Harry Truman issued Executive Order 9981 , which ended segregation in the military . Housing segregation became a nationwide problem following the Great Migration of black people out of the South. Racial covenants were employed by many real estate developers to "protect" entire subdivisions , with

9200-471: The number of whites in the South. Characteristics of the post-Reconstruction period: African Americans and other ethnic minorities rejected this regime. They resisted it in numerous ways and sought better opportunities through lawsuits, new organizations, political redress, and labor organizing (see the Civil rights movement (1896–1954) ). The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

9315-499: The number of “marginal seats” available in each grade, and request a corresponding number of student applicants from the METCO, Inc. central office. The METCO application policy was revised in 2019 to clarify eligibility for the program and the process by which students are referred from Boston to a participating school district, as well as the basis by which a district places students in open seats. METCO Directors from each district formed an independent non-profit membership organization,

9430-479: The opportunity to experience the advantages of learning and working in a racially, ethnically, and linguistically diverse setting." The mission of METCO is two-fold: to give students from Boston's under-performing school districts the opportunity to attend a high-performing school and increase their educational opportunities, and to decrease racial isolation and increase diversity in the suburban schools. Each suburban district operates its METCO program independently, at

9545-490: The original Board of Directors were Paul Parks from the NAACP, arts educator Elma Lewis , Boston teacher John D. O'Bryant , Brookline School Superintendent Robert Sperber, Newton Superintendent Charles Brown, and Newton School Committee member Katherine Jones. The group received grants from the Carnegie Corporation and the U.S. Department of Education , and engaged a research group from Harvard to evaluate

9660-470: The original casket to the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American Culture and History, where it is now on display. In 2007, Bryant said that she had fabricated the most sensational part of her story in 1955. On December 1, 1955, nine months after a 15-year-old high school student, Claudette Colvin , refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a public bus in Montgomery, Alabama, and

9775-546: The other hand, did provide legal support for the protestors. The Racial Imbalance Bill was filed by State Representative Royal L. Bolling and passed in 1965 as Massachusetts General Law Chapter 76, Section 12A. This law authorized the withholding of funds from any public school deemed to be perpetuating “racial imbalance,” which was defined as having more than 50% non-white students. The law also enabled city and town school committees and districts to "help alleviate racial isolation" (defined as any public school where more than 70% of

9890-505: The overcrowded conditions and failing facility. Some local leaders of the NAACP had tried to persuade the students to back down from their protest against the Jim Crow laws of school segregation. When the students did not budge, the NAACP joined their battle against school segregation. The NAACP proceeded with five cases challenging the school systems; these were later combined under what is known today as Brown v. Board of Education . Under

10005-763: The philosophy of the Batson Foundation. More recently, Batson had directed the revitalized Museum of African American History in Beacon Hill , stepping down in 1990. Her financial support for medical students at Boston University School of Medicine , the school, under the leadership of Dr. Aram Chobanian , established the Ruth Batson Scholarship in 1997. Since that time, the school has awarded more than US$ 500,000 in scholarships to 40 Boston University minority medical students, including four MD and PhD students. Each year, Batson visited

10120-501: The practice of nonviolence in the American civil rights movement was largely inspired by Mahatma Gandhi 's "non-cooperation" policies during his involvement in the Indian independence movement , which were intended to gain attention so that the public would either "intervene in advance" or "provide public pressure in support of the action to be taken" (Erikson, 415). As Hartford explains it, philosophical nonviolence training aims to "shape

10235-445: The pressure of the lawsuit with a school boycott in 1959. During the boycott, some of the first freedom schools of the period were established. The city responded to the campaign by permitting more open transfers to high-quality, historically white schools. (New York's African-American community, and Northern desegregation activists generally, now found themselves contending with the problem of white flight , however.) Emmett Till ,

10350-446: The primary intent to keep " white " neighborhoods "white". Ninety percent of the housing projects built in the years following World War II were racially restricted by such covenants. Cities known for their widespread use of racial covenants include Chicago , Baltimore , Detroit , Milwaukee , Los Angeles , Seattle , and St. Louis . Said premises shall not be rented, leased, or conveyed to, or occupied by, any person other than of

10465-487: The program in 1968, and the Massachusetts State Legislature began funding the program through a yearly line item. Additional school districts applied to participate in METCO in the late 1960s, with the full cohort of 33 current districts signing on by 1972. Robert C. Hayden served as executive director from 1969 to 1973. Boston Public Schools teacher and community activist Jean McGuire became

10580-540: The program's initial effectiveness. The first 220 METCO students, individually recruited and interviewed by Batson, rode buses from Roxbury , North Dorchester , and the South End to their first day of school in seven participating school districts in Greater Boston: Arlington , Braintree , Brookline , Lexington , Lincoln , Newton , and Wellesley . Batson became the executive director of

10695-475: The remainder of the South, especially North Louisiana , Mississippi and Alabama, until national civil rights legislation was passed in the mid-1960s to provide federal enforcement of constitutional voting rights. For more than sixty years, blacks in the South were essentially excluded from politics, unable to elect anyone to represent their interests in Congress or local government. Since they could not vote, they could not serve on local juries. During this period,

10810-633: The rental or sale of housing. African Americans re-entered politics in the South, and the Black Power movement emerged, which criticized leaders of the existing movement for their cooperative attitude and adherence to legalism and nonviolence . Black Power leaders, including within the Black Panther Party , demanded not only legal equality, but also economic self-sufficiency for the community. Support for Black Power came from African Americans who had seen little material improvement since

10925-459: The same time as African Americans were being disenfranchised, white southerners imposed racial segregation by law. Violence against blacks increased, with numerous lynchings through the turn of the century. The system of de jure state-sanctioned racial discrimination and oppression that emerged from the post-Reconstruction South became known as the " Jim Crow " system. The United States Supreme Court made up almost entirely of Northerners, upheld

11040-646: The states failed to implement the acts, the laws allowed the Federal Government to get involved. Many Republican governors were afraid of sending black militia troops to fight the Klan for fear of war. After the disputed election of 1876, which resulted in the end of Reconstruction and the withdrawal of federal troops, whites in the South regained political control of the region's state legislatures. They continued to intimidate and violently attack blacks before and during elections to suppress their voting, but

11155-718: The student population is white) through voluntary cross-district enrollment. In response to Civil Rights protests in the Southern United States, groups in the Boston suburbs (such as fair housing advocates, civil rights committees, the League of Women Voters , churches, and members of School Committees) began to conceive of programs to enroll Black students allowed under the Racial Imbalance Act. A group led by MIT Professor Dr. Leon Trilling (Chair of Brookline's School Committee) presented what they called

11270-432: The time period considered to be the "African-American civil rights" era, the predominant use of protest was nonviolent, or peaceful. Often referred to as pacifism, the method of nonviolence is considered to be an attempt to impact society positively. Although acts of racial discrimination have occurred historically throughout the United States, perhaps the most violent regions have been in the former Confederate states. During

11385-546: The turn of the century, nor did a single nursery school exist – even as the Second Great Migration was causing overcrowding. Existing schools tended to be dilapidated and staffed with inexperienced teachers. Brown helped stimulate activism among New York City parents like Mae Mallory who, with the support of the NAACP, initiated a successful lawsuit against the city and state on Brown 's principles. Mallory and thousands of other parents bolstered

11500-414: The unanimous Supreme Court ruling, many states began to gradually integrate their schools, but some areas of the South resisted by closing public schools altogether. The integration of Southern public libraries followed demonstrations and protests that used techniques seen in other elements of the larger civil rights movement. This included sit-ins, beatings, and white resistance. For example, in 1963 in

11615-440: The white or Caucasian race. While many whites defended their space with violence, intimidation, or legal tactics toward black people, many other whites migrated to more racially homogeneous suburban or exurban regions, a process known as white flight . From the 1930s to the 1960s, the National Association of Real Estate Boards (NAREB) issued guidelines that specified that a realtor "should never be instrumental in introducing to

11730-480: The white-dominated Democratic Party maintained political control of the South. With whites controlling all the seats representing the total population of the South, they had a powerful voting bloc in Congress. The Republican Party —the "party of Lincoln" and the party to which most blacks had belonged—shrank to insignificance except in remote Unionist areas of Appalachia and the Ozarks as black voter registration

11845-471: Was a more direct and potentially more rapid means of creating change than the traditional approach of mounting court challenges used by the NAACP and others. In 1952, the Regional Council of Negro Leadership (RCNL), led by T. R. M. Howard , a black surgeon, entrepreneur, and planter organized a successful boycott of gas stations in Mississippi that refused to provide restrooms for blacks. Through

11960-404: Was a way of life, a culture. However, not everyone agreed with this notion. James Forman, former SNCC (and later Black Panther) member, and nonviolence trainer was among those who did not. In his autobiography, The Making of Black Revolutionaries , Forman revealed his perspective on the method of nonviolence as "strictly a tactic, not a way of life without limitations." Similarly, Bob Moses , who

12075-401: Was also an active member of SNCC , felt that the method of nonviolence was practical. When interviewed by author Robert Penn Warren, Moses said "There's no question that he ( Martin Luther King Jr. ) had a great deal of influence with the masses. But I don't think it's in the direction of love. It's in a practical direction … ." (Who Speaks for the Negro? Warren). According to a 2020 study in

12190-689: Was arrested, Rosa Parks did the same thing. Parks soon became the symbol of the resulting Montgomery bus boycott and received national publicity. She was later hailed as the "mother of the civil rights movement". Parks was secretary of the Montgomery NAACP chapter and had recently returned from a meeting at the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee where nonviolence as a strategy was taught by Myles Horton and others. After Parks' arrest, African Americans gathered and organized

12305-417: Was discovered and retrieved from the river. After Emmett's mother, Mamie Till , came to identify the remains of her son, she decided she wanted to "let the people see what I have seen". Till's mother then had his body taken back to Chicago where she had it displayed in an open casket during the funeral services where many thousands of visitors arrived to show their respects. A later publication of an image at

12420-497: Was elected President of this organization. The lengthy protest attracted national attention for him and the city. His eloquent appeals to Christian brotherhood and American idealism created a positive impression on people both inside and outside the South. The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine students who attended segregated black high schools in Little Rock , the capital of the state of Arkansas. They each volunteered when

12535-613: Was founded in 1909. It fought to end race discrimination through litigation , education, and lobbying efforts. Its crowning achievement was its legal victory in the Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education (1954), when the Warren Court ruled that segregation of public schools in the US was unconstitutional and, by implication, overturned the " separate but equal " doctrine established in Plessy v. Ferguson of 1896. Following

12650-493: Was marked by hundreds of deaths and higher casualties across the U.S. as a result of white race riots against blacks that took place in more than three dozen cities. Urban problems such as crime and disease were blamed on the large influx of Southern blacks to cities in the north and west, based on stereotypes of rural southern African-Americans. Overall, blacks in Northern and Western cities experienced systemic discrimination in

12765-410: Was suppressed. The Republican lily-white movement also gained strength by excluding blacks. Until 1965, the " Solid South " was a one-party system under the white Democrats. Excepting the previously noted historic Unionist strongholds the Democratic Party nomination was tantamount to election for state and local office. In 1901, President Theodore Roosevelt invited Booker T. Washington , president of

12880-811: Was the author of The Black Educational Movement in Boston: A Sequence of Historical Events (1638–1975) , a comprehensive chronology documenting the heroic efforts and contributions of African American parents to educational history in Boston. Northeastern University 's School of Education printed the manuscript of nearly 900 pages in October 2001. She was the founder in 1969 of the Ruth M. Batson Educational Foundation , which provided grants to African American college students for tuition and emergency needs. The Batson Foundation also awards grants to educational institutions and community organizations whose program objectives reflect

12995-749: Was the first black woman on the Democratic National Committee and the first woman elected president of the NAACP's New England Regional Conference, serving from 1957 to 1960. After serving as chairwoman of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination from 1963 to 1966, she helped launched the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) voluntary desegregation program. As associate director, then director, she helped guide METCO's growth from transporting 225 black urban children to several suburbs, to 1,125 children to 28 communities. She stepped down in 1969. She served in several roles at Boston University : director of

13110-500: Was to preserve the peace, deployed the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the black students from entering the school. Faubus defied federal court orders, whereupon President Dwight D. Eisenhower intervened. He federalized the Arkansas National Guard and sent them home. Then he sent in an elite Army unit to escort the students to school and protect them between classes during the 1957–58 school year. In class, however,

13225-625: Was unconstitutional. The federal government filed a friend of the court brief in the case urging the justices to consider the effect that segregation had on America's image in the Cold War . Secretary of State Dean Acheson was quoted in the brief stating that "The United States is under constant attack in the foreign press, over the foreign radio, and in such international bodies as the United Nations because of various practices of discrimination in this country." The following year, in

#132867