BY TED LEONARD
BOSTON - "This is a racist plan for the Boston school
system," read a sign held by one of the 75 people who attended
the Boston School Committee meeting on July 14. Parents,
teachers, and activists jammed the meeting to speak out
against the proposal of Boston School Superintendent Thomas W.
Payzant to "modify the Boston Public Schools controlled choice
student assignment policy by eliminating race as a factor."
The school committee voted 5-2 to approve Payzant's proposal, which would end the remnants of the busing plan to achieve school desegregation.
Superintendent Payzant told the school committee that it was necessary to adopt his proposal because of a lawsuit filed in June in federal court by a group called Boston Children First and several white parents. The legal action challenged the use of race/ethnicity in the school committee's citywide student assignment process. They claim white children are being discriminated against.
"Odds are," said Payzant, "we can not win the lawsuit." Arguing why his proposal should be adopted in a statement the superintendent wrote, "the national trend in federal court decisions has been to strike down as unconstitutional student assignment policies that use race."
The federal court decisions Payzant referred to included litigation involving court-ordered desegregation plans in public school systems throughout the country. On June 21, 1974, Federal District Judge A. Wendell Garrity ordered desegregation for the previously all-white schools in Boston, which included a busing plan. That fall racist opposition to the desegregation plan erupted into violence when white mobs attacked school buses carrying Black children into predominantly white schools.
The racist forces included James Kelly, who is currently president of the Boston city council. He had been a leader of ROAR (Restore Our Alienated Rights), which organized opposition to Judge Garrity's order in the streets.
Mass demonstrations, involving thousands of people, were organized in 1974-75 to defend Black students' right to an equal education. Since the 1974 federal court ruling, the capitalist rulers have been chipping away at affirmative action programs, including school desegregation plans in other cities such as Charlotte-Mecklenburg in North Carolina, and Louisville, Kentucky.
`Race does matter'
More than two dozen people took the floor to address the
Boston School Committee meeting. The majority of them spoke
against the proposal and appealed to the appointed body to
postpone a decision that evening and organize public hearings
on the proposal in the community.
Sandra Rogers, a Black parent, chided the school board members as setting a "bad precedent" by ending the use of affirmative action without a fight. She added the Boston Children First group should be renamed "White Boston Children First."
Steve Dockman, head of the citywide parent council, told the committee, "race does matter" and urged them to slow down on making their decision and to "give some consideration to what you have heard here tonight."
Dennis Michaud, a father of two children in the Boston school system, collected 53 signatures of parents opposed to the superintendent's proposal in a couple of days before the meeting. He told the committee, "I fear if you don't oppose the lawsuit, the progress made so far will crash against the rocks."
Another speaker appealed to the school committee to "take the high ground, the moral, ethical ground. Continuing the speaker pointed out, "until realtors change, you can't say race doesn't matter."
Other speakers asked the school committee what kind of example were they setting for young people by saying that if it costs too much money you shouldn't fight for what is right.
Shelia Decter, executive director of the American Jewish Congress' New England region, told the committee, "Boston may well be the first city convicted of racial segregation that gets convicted a second time."
Andrea Morell, Socialist Workers Party candidate for city council at-large in Boston, in addressing the committee explained she was a trade unionist. "Affirmative action is in the interest of every working person, because it increases our social solidarity and our ability to unify in order to defend our interests."
She pointed to the results of a recent study done by Harvard University that showed where race was eliminated in considering admissions, school districts were rapidly resegregated. Massachusetts and Rhode Island were named as states where this trend has gone the furthest.
City Council President Kelly addressed the school committee. Kelly said someone had called him at his office and told him the school committee was discussing busing. He told them, "busing should be eliminated as soon as possible." Kelly said he "couldn't think of many positive things that have come about in the past 25 years. I disagreed with Garrity."
After listening to the speakers, instead of voting immediately on the proposal the committee met behind closed doors in an "executive session." After an hour the body returned and approved the superintendent's proposal.
Eighty-five percent of the students in the Boston school system are members of an oppressed nationality. The Boston Herald, a major daily newspaper, reported the day after the school committee decision that Boston mayor Thomas Menino expects white families to move back into the city and send their children to public school.
Ted Leonard is a member of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees.