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With All Deliberate Delay: Kennedy, Johnson, and School Desegregation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 April 2009

Dean Kotlowski
Dean Kotlowski
Affiliation:
Salisbury University, Maryland
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Extract

The desegregation of southern schools, mandated by the United States Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), presented a dilemma for national politicians of both parties. “If presidents felt they should speak up, or act to enforce court rulings,” a correspondent for the Los Angeles Times wrote in 1969, “they risked offending conservatives, segregationists, and the South. If they wanted to sit tight, they invited the wrath of liberals.” Even presidents who were capable of acting in other areas of civil rights were content to assume a low profile on school desegregation, assign responsibility for this area of policymaking to subordinates, and enforce it only under external pressure, usually from the federal courts.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Policy History , Volume 17 , Issue 2 , April 2005 , pp. 155 - 192
Copyright
Copyright © The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA. 2005

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References

Notes

1. “White House Pattern Seen in Desegregation,” Los Angeles Times, 3 12 1969, 1–A, 2.Google Scholar

2. A mostly favorable account of Kennedy's handling of civil rights is Carl Brauer, M., John F. Kennedy and the Second Reconstruction (New York, 1977)Google Scholar, while more critical accounts include Stern, Mark, Calculating Visions: Kennedy, Johnson, and Civil Rights (New Brunswick, N.J., 1992), 1–112Google Scholar; Matusow, Allen J., The Unraveling of America: A History of Liberalism in the 1960s (New York, 1984), 60–96Google Scholar; O'Reilly, Kenneth, Nixon's Piano: Presidents and Racial Politics from Washington to Clinton (New York, 1995), 189–237Google Scholar; and Dallek, Robert, An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917–1963 (Boston, 2003), 707Google Scholar. Favorable interpretations of Johnson's handling of civil rights include Steven Lawson, F., “Civil Rights,” in Exploring the Johnson Years, ed. Divine, Robert A. (Austin, 1981), 93–114Google Scholar; Blum, John Morton, Years of Discord: American Politics and Society, 1961–1974 (New York, 1991), 162–186Google Scholar; Bernstein, Irving, Guns or Butter: The Presidency of Lyndon Johnson (New York, 1996), 80–81, 244Google Scholar; Califano, Joseph A. Jr., The Triumph and Tragedy of Lyndon Johnson (College Station, Tex., 2000), 55–57Google Scholar; and Mayer, Jeremy D., “LBJ Fights White Backlash: The Racial Politics of the 1964 Presidential Campaign,” Prologue 33 (Spring 2001): 7–19Google Scholar. More critical accounts include Matusow, Unraveling of America, 180–216; O'Reilly, Nixon's Piano, 239–76; Caro, Robert A., The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Vol. 3, Master of the Senate (New York, 2002), 711–760Google Scholar; Dallek, Robert, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times (New York, 1998), 111–121, 211–26, 322–29.Google Scholar

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42. Bowles, who led the fight for the plank, and Harris Wofford, who drafted it, both used the phrase “cursory glance” to describe JFK's attention to it. Bowles, Promises to Keep, 291; Wofford, Harris, Of Kennedys and Kings: Making Sense of the Sixties (New York, 1980), 51Google Scholar. On the following page, Wofford attributes the Kennedy camp's laissez-faire stance to poor coordination within the campaign.

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133. Keppel to Celebrezze, 13 April 1965, Folder: Civil Rights Act of 1964, Box 195, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA; Orfield, Reconstruction of Southern Education, 96.

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135. Seeley to Edwin G. Thurman, 7 July 1965, Folder: Civil Rights Act Guidelines February–December 1965, Box 197, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

136. United States Commission on Civil Rights, Survey of School Desegregation in the Southern and Border States, 1965–66, February 1966, Folder: Civil Rights Act of 1966—Printed Material, Box 475, Celler Papers, LC.

137. Unsigned, undated memorandum, “Impact of the Civil Rights Crisis on the Political Picture,” [circa 1958], Folder 2, Box 355, Stevenson Papers, PU.

138. “N.C. Official Gets U.S. Education Job,” Charlotte Observer, 19 December 1965, 1A, 12A; Harold Howe II to Henry Schwartzschild, 5 January 1966, Folder: HEW 1965–68, Box I:102, LCCR Papers, LC; Harold Howe II Speech, “Picking Up the Options,” 1 April 1968, Folder 3, Box 96, Cohen Papers, SHSW; John W. Gardner to Cater, 22 February 1966, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 Education Schooling 12/17/65–3/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL (quotation).

139. Secretary to Agency Heads, 5 August 1966, Folder 7, Box 115, Cohen Papers, SHSW; Douglass Cater to Marvin Watson, 22 February 1966, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 Education Schooling 12/17/65–3/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

140. Katzenbach to LBJ, 10 February 1966, Folder 8, Box 116, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

141. HEW news release, 7 March 1966, Folder: Civil Rights Act-Guidelines-Press Releases Only, Box 196, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

142. Cater to Watson, 22 February 1966, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 Education Schooling 12/17/65–3/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL; Policy Group Meeting, 11 February 1966, Folder: Civil Rights Act-Guidelines-January–March 1966, Box 197, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

143. F. Peter Libassi to Cater, 21 January 1966, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 Education Schooling 12/17/65–3/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL; Seeley to Howe, no date, Folder: LL10 Staff Correspondence-Civil Rights, Box 196, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA (quotation).

144. News clippings, “Johnson Popularity Up in South Since Election,” 3 February 1965, and “No Sizeable GOP Shift Is Evident in South,” 4 April 1965, Folder: Polls 1964–1966, Box 36, Graham T. Molitor Papers, Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow, New York.

145. Gardner to LBJ, 9 February 1966, Folder 8, Box 116, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

146. Matusow, Unraveling of America, 194; Redford, Emmette S. and McCulley, Richard T., White House Operations: The Johnson Presidency (Austin, Tex., 1986), 148–149.Google Scholar

147. Cater to Watson, 22 February 1966, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 Education Schooling 12/17/65–3/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

148. Johnson Handwritten Comment on Cater to LBJ, 25 March 1966, Folder: Handwriting President Johnson March 1966 [4 of 4], Box 13, Handwriting File, LBJL.

149. LBJ to Senator, no date [May 1966], Folder: Ex HU 2–5 5/4/66–8/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

150. Johnson Handwritten Comment on Cater to LBJ, 19 May 1966, Folder: Handwriting President Johnson May 1966 [3 of 4], Box 14, Handwriting File, LBJL.

151. Dallek, Flawed Giant, 196.

152. Graham, Hugh Davis, “The Transformation of Federal Education Policy,” in Exploring the Johnson Years, ed. Divine, , 155.Google Scholar

153. Krock, Arthur, “In the Nation: The Chicago School Affair,” New York Times, 10 10 1965, 10Google Scholar; UPI Wire Report, 7 October 1965, Folder 5, Box 115, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

154. Wilbur J. Cohen Oral History, 10 May 1969, 10, LBJL.

155. Leroy V. Goodman to News Section Staff Members, 15 December 1965 and UPI wire report, 15 October 1966 (quotation), Folder 5, Box 115, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

156. HKS to Clark, 13 June 1966, Folder: Civil Rights (1965), Box 3-W(A), Clark Papers, HSP.

157. Cater to LBJ, 19 May 1966, Folder: Handwriting President Johnson May 1966 [3 of 4], Box 14, Handwriting File, LBJL.

158. Howe to Gardner, 2 June 1966 and Gardner to Cater, 4 August 1966, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 5/4/66–8/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

159. HEW news release, 14 May 1966, Folder: Civil Rights Enforcement 1966, Box 194, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA; “6 Areas in South Lose School Aid,” New York Times, 6 12 1966, 24.Google Scholar

160. Samuel Halperin memorandum, no date, Folder 8, Box 171, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

161. Aronson to Cooperating Organizations, 4 October 1966, Folder: LCCR Memos 1966, Box I:42, LCCR Papers, LC.

162. Henry H. Wilson Jr. to LBJ, 28 September 1966, Folder: HU 2–5 9/1/66–1/5/67, Box 51, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

163. “Johnson Upholds Hospital, School Desegregation Policy,” Baltimore Sun, 1 10 1966, 1 (quotations)Google Scholar; Cater to Ralph Huitt, 29 March 1968, Folder: HU 2–5 1/1/68–6/19/68, Box 52, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

164. “Howe Sticks to His Guns on School Integration,” Washington Star, 19 11 1966Google Scholar, Folder: LL10 Civil Rights-Guidelines-Press Releases Only, Box 196, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

165. “School Integration on U.S. Guidelines Is Ordered by Court,” New York Times, 30 10 1966, 1.Google Scholar

166. Patterson, Brown v. Board of Education, 143–45.

167. Ruby G. Martin to Cohen, 5 September 1968, Folder 5, Box 116, Cohen Papers, SHSW; Wilkins to Gardner, 31 March 1967, Folder: Health, Education, and Welfare Dept. 1967 [1 of 2], Box I:99, NAACP-Washington Bureau Papers, LC (quotation).

168. Aronson to Participating Organizations, 17 May 1967, Folder: Memorandum 1967, Box I:43, LCCR Papers, LC.

169. Cohen to Gardner, 2 May 1967, Folder 1, Box 117, Cohen Papers, SHSW; HEW news release, 12 May 1967, Folder: HEW 1965–68, Box I:102, LCCR Papers, LC; Howe to Ernest Stone, 16 May 1967, Folder: CR 5–1 Court Orders/Enforcement, Box 272, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

170. Harry McPherson to LBJ, 12 October1967, Folder: HU 2–5 10/1/67–12/31/67, Box 52, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

171. The reasons for Gardner's resignation remain cloudy, although Cater's proximity to the president and his penchant for interfering in departmental matters played some role. Cohen Oral History, 10 May 1969, Tape #5, 10, LBJL. After two years at HEW, Gardner also thought “he had exhausted his contribution under the prevailing political circumstances.” See “January 20, 1969,” Wilbur J. Cohen Handwritten Memoirs, no date, Folder 1, Box 279, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

172. Howe (“Doc”) to Cater (“Doug”), no date [April 1967], Folder: HU 2–5 4/6/67–7/5/67, Box 51, WHCF-HU, LBJL.

173. Berkowitz, Edward D., Mr. Social Security: The Life of Wilbur J. Cohen (Lawrence, Kan., 1995), 316.Google Scholar

174. “New Guidelines Set to Foster Equality in Northern Schools,” New York Times, 19 03 1968, 1Google Scholar; HEW Memorandum, “Policies on Elementary and Secondary School Compliance …,” February 1968, Folder: School Guidelines March 1968, Box 75, Clark Papers, LBJL.

175. The amendment was sponsored by Representative Jamie L. Whitten (D.-Miss.). See “House Panel Cuts Education Funds,” New York Times, 21 06 1968, 23.Google Scholar

176. “Justices Caution South on Schools,” New York Times, 28 05 1968, 33.Google Scholar

177. Graham, Civil Rights Era, 374; Orfield, Reconstruction of Southern Education, 96.

178. Cohen to LBJ, 30 August 1968, Folder 6, Box 104; Cohen to Richard B. Russell, 16 January 1968, Folder 8, Box 115—both in Cohen Papers, SHSW.

179. Cohen to Wayne Morse, 11 July 1968, Folder: HEW 1965–68, Box I:102, LCCR Papers, LC.

180. This figure was widely reported and accepted. See Kilpatrick, James J., “Integration Effort Loses Its Magic, Reformers Find,” Washington Star, 14 11 1968Google Scholar, Folder: Harold Howe II-Clippings 1965–69, Box 394, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

181. Taylor, William L., “Executive Implementation of Federal Civil Rights Laws,” 3 12 1968Google Scholar, Folder 7, Box II:11, LCCR Papers, LC.

182. James Hamilton to Committee on Compliance and Enforcement, 24 December 1968, Folder: HEW 1965–68, Box I:102, LCCR Papers, LC.

183. “U.S. Opens Drive to Desegregate Schools in South,” New York Times, 7 07 1968, 1.Google Scholar

184. Wilkins to Cohen, 6 December 1968, Folder: HEW 1965–68, Box I:102, LCCR Papers, LC.

185. Irons, Peter, Jim Crow's Children: The Broken Promise of the Brown Decision (New York, 2002), 206.Google Scholar

186. Peter E. Holmes to John A. Buggs, 25 September 1974, Folder: CRC Reports—Twenty Years After Brown (1), Box 57, Arthur S. Flemming Papers, DDEL.

187. “Progress Slight, Howe Says of School Integration Effort,” Washington Post, 10 11 1968Google Scholar, Folder: Harold Howe II-Clippings 1965–69, Box 394, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA.

188. “Accomplishments in Civil Rights in 1965,” no date, Folder: Ex HU 2–5 Education Schooling 12/17/65–3/31/66, Box 50, WHCF-HU, LBJL; “Civil Rights: The Democratic Record,” no date, Folder: Clippings, James Gaither Files, LBJL; John E. Barriere to Carl Albert, 14 January 1969, Folder 5, Box 238, Legislative Series, Carl Albert Collection, Carl Albert Congressional Research and Studies Center, University of Oklahoma, Norman.

189. Shultz, George P., Turmoil and Triumph: My Years as Secretary of State (New York, 1993), 1046.Google Scholar

190. Ehrlichman, John, Witness to Power: The Nixon Years (New York, 1982), 231.Google Scholar

191. Small, The Presidency of Richard Nixon, 183.

192. Cohen to LBJ, 7 January 1969, Folder 6, Box 98, Cohen Papers, SHSW.

193. Kotlowski, Nixon's Civil Rights, 23–31.

194. See Holmes to Buggs, 25 September and 20 November 1974, Folder: CRC Reports—Twenty Years After Brown (1), Box 57, Flemming Papers, DDEL; Matusow, Unraveling of America, 192–94.

195. Kotlowski, Nixon's Civil Rights, 37.

196. Ibid., 31.

197. Graham, “Richard Nixon and Civil Rights: Explaining an Enigma,” 95.

198. Kotlowski, , Nixon's Civil Rights, 31–37, 271Google Scholar; Morgan, Nixon, 82–83.

199. Wicker, One of Us, 506.

200. Conversation between John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, Burke Marshall et al., 1 June 1963, audiotape #90.2, reel 2 of 3, Presidential Recordings, POF, JFK Presidential Papers, JFKL.

201. Mayer, Michael E., “With Much Deliberation and Some Speed: Eisenhower and the Brown Decision,” Journal of Southern History 52, no. 1 (1986): 45.Google Scholar

202. Conversation between John F. Kennedy, Landon Miller, Caldwell Marks, et al., 23 September 1963, audiotape #112.6, Presidential Recordings, POF, JFK Presidential Papers, JFKL.

203. Wicker, One of Us, 504.

204. Kotlowski, Nixon's Civil Rights, 29.

205. Kilpatrick, James J., “Arrogant Commands from U.S. Education Office,” Seattle Times, 20 03 1966Google Scholar, Folder: Civil Rights Act-Guidelines-Press Releases Only, Box 196, Office Files of the Commissioner of Education, RG 12, NA (first quotation); Kotlowski, Nixon's Civil Rights, 30 (second quotation).

206. Strom Thurmond Oral History, 1 February 1974, 15, Oral History #A-166, Southern Oral History Project, Southern Historical Collection, Louis Round Wilson Library, University of North Carolina (UNC), Chapel Hill.

207. Harry S. Dent Oral History, 22 February 1974, 25, Oral History #A-147, Southern Oral History Project, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, UNC.

208. Jimmy Carter to Arthur S. Flemming, 16 February 1977, Folder: 2/17/77, Box 8, Presidential Handwriting File, Jimmy Carter Library (JCL), Atlanta, Georgia.

209. Louis Martin to Carter, 26 September 1978, Folder: 9/26/78 [2], Box 103, Presidential Handwriting File, JCL.