Abstract
In Chap. 7, I draw the conclusion that desegregation policy was enacted exclusively. I use the disenfranchisement of predominately black schools as proof. Normandy High School, which was the school that graduated Michael Brown just days before he was killed, is profiled in this chapter. More than 30 years after Liddell’s case led to widespread desegregation of St. Louis schools, Normandy schools remain segregated. I conclude that the condition of the Normandy School District is a direct result of its exclusion from the lucrative financial benefits of the transfer program. Had attempts been made to desegregate predominately black suburban schools as part of desegregation policy, the state of Normandy School District and race relations in St. Louis would likely be entirely different. Finally, I hope this research engages policy makers in a contemporary dialogue about the state of racial contention in St. Louis, much of which, I contend, is traced to school inequality.
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- 1.
Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Racism Without Racists, Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in America, 4th ed. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014).
- 2.
See Pierre Bourdieu and Loic J. D. Wacquant, An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992).
- 3.
See Letter from Barbara Mueller; see also Letter from Margaret Irvin.
- 4.
“St. Louis Students Act to End Racial Flare-Ups,” Jet, March 24, 1955, 24, retrieved July 30, 2011. The incident was detailed in a short documentary by Charles Guggenheim, “A City Decides,” 1956.
- 5.
Ibid.
- 6.
Bonilla-Silva, Racism without Racists.
- 7.
“A Housing Proposal for St. Louis,” September 6, 1983; see also, Taylor-Morley-Simon, Inc. press release, 1983; see also Mayor Schoemehl’s New Year’s Eve Message, 1985, UMSL Archives, Thomas Jefferson Library, Western Historical Manuscript Collection, Mayor Vincent Schoemehl Collection, First Term, 1981–1985, Box 55, Surveys and Questionnaires Folder.
- 8.
“A Housing Proposal for St. Louis.”
- 9.
Freivogel, “St. Louis: Desegregation.”
- 10.
The courts recognized this. This fact served as the impetus to force schools to desegregate. The District Court Judge Meredith understood that segregated schools benefit from housing segregation. The schools, therefore, did not have to write blatantly racist policies forbidding the integration of students because housing policies did that for them. See Liddell v. Board of Education of the City of St. Louis, 1979.
- 11.
Dale Singer, interview with Hope Rias, June 4, 2014.
- 12.
Trenay Wallace, interview with Hope Rias, August 12, 2014.
- 13.
Ralph Reisner, “St. Louis,” Law & Society Review 2, no. 1 (1967): 55.
- 14.
Dale Singer, interview with Hope Rias, June 4, 2014.
- 15.
UMSL Archives, Thomas Jefferson Library, Western Historical Manuscript Collection. Mayor Vincent Schoemehl Collection, First Term, 1981–1985, Box 55, Surveys and Questionnaires Folder; see also Richard Gephardt Archival Collection at the St. Louis History Museum Library, Box 1, Folder 2.
- 16.
Heaney and Uchitelle, Unending Struggle, 80.
- 17.
Freivogel, “St. Louis: Desegregation.”
- 18.
Frank Kovarik, “School Deseg: History, Politics, Impact, Future?” Occasional Planet, January 12, 2011, http://www.occasionalplanet.org/2011/01/12/school-deseg-history-politics-impact-future/.
- 19.
Kenneth B. Clark, Isidor Chein, and Stuart W. Cook, “The Effects of Segregation and the Consequences of Desegregation: A (September 1952) Social Science Statement in the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka Supreme Court Case,” American Psychologist 59, no. 6 (2004): 459–501.
- 20.
Liddell VIII, 758 F. 2d 290, 1985 (8th Cir.) 731. The Federal Reporter, 2nd Series, 1310 (1985), Western Historical Manuscript Collection, University of Missouri–St. Louis, Heaney Desegregation Case, Box 9.
- 21.
Liddell v. Board of Education, 469 F. Supp. 1304.
- 22.
Trymaine Lee, “Missouri School Busing Causes ‘Crippling’ Fallout,” MSNBC, December 9, 2013, http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/heres-how-not-deal-failing-schools.
- 23.
Trymaine Lee, “White School District Sends Black Kids Back to Failed Schools,” MSNBC, June 25, 2015, http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/white-district-sends-black-kids-back-failed-schools.
- 24.
“HIV Scare at Missouri High School,” CBS NEWS, October 24, 2008, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/hiv-scare-at-missouri-high-school/; see also Michel Martin, host, “High School HIV Scare Alarms Community,” Tell Me More, NPR, October 28, 2008, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96211747; see also Lee, “White School District.”
- 25.
Michel Martin, host, “Is St. Louis’ School Transfer Program ‘A Mess’?” Tell Me More, NPR, November 8, 2013, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=243951597.
- 26.
Jake Halpern, “The Cop,” New Yorker, August 10, 2015, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/10/the-cop.
- 27.
Ibid.
References
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Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo. Racism without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in America. 4th ed. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.
Clark, Kenneth B., Isidor Chein, and Stuart W. Cook. “The Effects of Segregation and the Consequences of Desegregation: A (September 1952) Social Science Statement in the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka Supreme Court Case.” American Psychologist 59, no. 6 (2004): 459–501.
Freivogel, William H. “St. Louis: Desegregation and School Choice in the Land of Dred Scott.” In Divided We Fail: Coming Together Through Public School Choice, edited by The Century Foundation Task Force on the Common School, 209–235. New York: Century Foundation Press, 2002. http://www.tcf.org/Publications/Educationfreivogel.pdf.
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Lee, Trymaine. “Missouri School Busing Causes ‘Crippling’ Fallout.” MSNBC, December 9, 2013. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/heres-how-not-deal-failing-schools.
———. “White School District Sends Black Kids Back to Failed Schools.” MSNBC, June 25, 2015. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/white-district-sends-black-kids-back-failed-schools.
Liddell v. Board of Education of the City of St. Louis. 469 F. Supp. 1304, 1979. (District Court).
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Martin, Michael, host. “High School HIV Scare Alarms Community.” Tell Me More, NPR, October 28, 2008. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96211747.
———. “Is St. Louis’ School Transfer Program ‘A Mess’?” Tell Me More, NPR, November 8, 2013. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=243951597.
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Singer, Dale. Interview with Hope Rias. Personal Interview. St. Louis, June 4, 2014.
Wallace, Trenay. Interview with Hope Rias. Personal Interview. St. Louis, August 12, 2014.
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Rias, H.C. (2019). History Repeats Itself: The Perils of Normandy High School. In: St. Louis School Desegregation. Historical Studies in Education. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04248-6_7
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