Freedom of Choice, or Free transfer plan, was the name for a number of plans developed in the United States during 1965–1970, aimed at the integration of schools in states that had a segregated educational system.
Background
Ten years after the
US Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all Federal tribunals in the United States, U.S. federal court cases, and over Stat ...
ruled in ''
Brown II
''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court that ruled that U.S. state s ...
'' (1955) for school racial integration with "all deliberate speed," many
school districts
A school district is a special-purpose district that operates local public primary or secondary schools or both in various countries. It is not to be confused with an attendance zone, which is within a school district and is used to assign stud ...
in states with school segregation gave their students the right to choose between white and black schools, independently of their
race. In practice, most schools remained segregated, with only a small minority of black students choosing to attend a white school and no white student choosing black schools.
[Green v. County School Board, 391 U.S. 430 (1968). Allen, Jody and Daugherity, Brian. “Recovering a ‘Lost’ Story Using Oral History: The United States Supreme Court’s Historic Green v. New Kent County, Virginia, Decision,” Oral History Review, vol. 3, issue 2, 25-45 (June 2006).]
Challenge
In 1968, three cases were argued before the
US Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all Federal tribunals in the United States, U.S. federal court cases, and over Stat ...
on the inadequacy of ''Freedom of Choice'' plans. The Supreme Court ruled that if ''Freedom of Choice'', by itself, was not sufficient to achieve integration, as it was in the cases argued, other means had to be used, such as
zoning
In urban planning, zoning is a method in which a municipality or other tier of government divides land into land-use "zones", each of which has a set of regulations for new development that differs from other zones. Zones may be defined for ...
, to achieve the goal. The ruling and its consequences raised strong opposition in many school districts in which that kind of plan had been applied. By the early 1970s, none of the plans remained in effect.
See also
*
Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education
Notes
References
{{Reflist
Civil rights movement
School segregation in the United States