Thread by @econsarahreber

School desegregation is in the news.

I have worked on these questions with @eucascio @NoraEGordon @ethanglewis!

A thread on some of the things we learned about the Federal role in deseg in the 50s, 60s, 70s.

(Many have written on this; I summarize some of my own work here.)

Trends in segregation for districts in the former Confederacy

10 yrs after Brown (1964)
7% districts under Fed court supervision
26% districts had ANY black student in school with ANY white student
99% black students attended ALL-black sch

Where "leaving it to locals" got us

Note
-Dual system was illegal and courts were involved, so 1964 is not even pure "leave it to the locals" outcome
-There was somewhat more deseg in the Border region, but data are incomplete, so we focus on the former Confederacy in this work

Paper here: doi.org/10.1016/j.jue.…

By 1966, nearly all districts had at least 1 black student in school with 1 white student

That's a BIG change (from 26% in 1964)!

Yet, only 77% of black students in school with any white student in average district

Still local school boards are resisting

What happened between 1964 and 1966?

More Federal enforcement, by Federal Courts and by the Executive

First, the 1964 Civil Rights Act authorized Justice Dept to bring/join cases --> more districts litigated-->more court ordered deseg
(typically wasn't "busing" at this time)

Second, CRA also said you can't get Fed $$ if you discriminate on the basis of race

1965 Elementary & Secondary Education Act authorized new Fed $$ for K12

Southern Districts had to desegregate to get new Fed $$

We show threat of withdrawal of Fed $$ (CRA) + increase in $$ on the table (ESEA Title I) encouraged desegregation

doi.org/10.1162/qjec.2…

CRA enforcement also meant HEW issued Guidelines, specifying desegregation requirements to get Fed $$

Guidelines more stringent over time -->
Courts draw on Guidelines -->
Court ordered plans more stringent (Green & Swann decisions) -->
more desegregation after 1966

Nixon not so interested in enforcing funds withholding under CRA

Districts that had not dismantled desegregation were increasingly likely to come under Court order after 1970

By 1976, about half of Deep South school districts were supervised by a Court

In the Deep South, almost nothing happened for 10 years after Brown

But after 1964, reductions in Southern School segregation were DRAMATIC

This was because of Federal intervention and required all three branches:
CRA, ESEA, enforcement by courts, DOJ, and HEW

Fun fact: Districts in counties where support for Strom Thurmond in 1948 was strong (a proxy for "segregationist preferences"/racism) were slower to desegregate but no less desegregated by 1970

Federal enforcement was effective

More evidence that Federal enforcement was effective, this time from a national sample of large school districts that implemented a Court-Ordered desegregation plan at some point between 1960 and 1986:

Plan implementation is associated with substantial reduction in segregation

Some but not all of these plans were "busing" -- all were enforced by Federal Courts
jstor.org/stable/4129552

I find evidence that plan implementation caused some white flight

Plans were less effective than they might have been because of white flight, but they were still effective!

Non-white students went to school with more white students after deseg plans, despite some white flight

Effective school desegregation was Federally mandated

Federally mandated school desegregation was effective

Several papers suggest desegregation improved outcomes for blacks along a number of dimensions (will try to do another thread)

The effort to dismantle segregation did not solve racism or reverse the effects of slavery and Jim Crow. Many schools remained too segregated then and continue to be today

But the changes were big and important and not something locals were going to do without Federal pressure

Thank you for reading