In
Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, the Supreme Court ruled that the New Kent County school board's "freedom of choice" plan was not sufficient to integrate its public schools. Following a court order, the school board made improvements, reporting its new plan for desegregation in this court document. The plan assigned all children attending grades 1 through 6 to the New Kent County Elementary School (formerly George W. Watkins) and grades 7 through 12 to the New Kent High School (formerly New Kent School). Students would therefore be divided up according to grade, instead of by the legacy of racial division that previously existed.
The court case had begun when Calvin Green (father of three and president of the New Kent County chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) and other parents filed suit against the school district in New Kent County, Virginia. They argued that the district's "freedom of choice" plan did not adequately integrate the school system. They complained that students were still being educated in inherently unequal separate facilities, and that the school district refused to implement a plan providing for the elimination of racial discrimination.
Following the landmark Supreme Court decision in
Brown v.
Board of Education, which declared "separate but equal" unconstitutional, the
Brown II decision placed responsibility for how to desegregate schools "with all deliberate speed" on local school authorities. Many school districts implemented "freedom of choice" plans. In theory, "freedom of choice" let students choose which school they wanted to attend. In reality, the plans kept districts mostly segregated.
In New Kent County before
Brown, white students attended New Kent school and African American students attended George W. Watkins school. Under the district's new "freedom of choice" plan, some African American students transferred to New Kent; but no white students enrolled in George W. Watkins, which taught 85% of black students in the district.
In the District Court case, the "freedom of choice" plan was upheld. The case was then brought to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, which affirmed (agreed with) the lower court's decision (though it returned the case to the lower court for a more specific plan to desegregate teachers).
The case made it to the Supreme Court in 1968, which reversed the lower court rulings. In its unanimous opinion, the Supreme Court stated that the New Kent district was deliberately maintaining a segregated system, and that "freedom of choice" was not sufficient to bring about desegregation.
This primary source comes from the Records of District Courts of the United States.
Full Citation: Report and Motion; 7/12/1968; Charles C. Green, et al v. New Kent County School Board of Education et al; Civil Case Files, 1938 - 12/31/1998; Records of District Courts of the United States, Record Group 21; National Archives at Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA. [Online Version, https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/report-motion-green-new-kent-county, April 23, 2024]