Implementing Equal Educa tion Opportunity Policy

• Author: Joseph Stewart,Charles S. Bullock
• Published date: 01 February 1981
• DOI: 10.1177/009539978101200403
• Date: 01 February 1981
• Subject Matter: Articles

This research examines the differential impact of HEW and Justice Department enforce-
ment efforts to implement equal educational opportunity policy in four Southern states
between 1968 and 1974. The evidence indicates that equal education opportunity remains
an unfulfilled goal and that the patterns of
deviation from the ideal are at least partially
attributable to the enforcement agency. Reasons are suggested for the patterns found.
Policy analysts will find clear examples of the impact of both problem definition and
implementation on policy outcomes.
IMPLEMENTING
EQ UA L ED UCA TION
OPPORTUNITY
POLIC Y
A Comparison of the Outcomes of
HEW
and Justice Department Efforts
JOSEPH STEWART, Jr.
University of New Orleans
CHARLES
S. B ULLOCK III
University of New Orleans
While Southern school desegregation efforts have succeeded
to the extent that Southern students are less racially isolated
than those in other parts of the country (Bullock and Rodgers,
1975), equal-education opportunity has not become a reality
in the region. Given what is known about institutional racism
(Knowles and Prewitt, 1969) and the attitudes of Southern
educators (Rodgers and Bullock, 1976), it is not surprising
that racial discrimination continues after de jure segregation
disappeared. Thus Rodgers and Bullock (1972: 69) find, &dquo;In
many of the schools that have been integrated in the South
AUTHORS’ NOTE: We thank James H. Kuklinski, James F. Sheffield, Gary L Wams-
ley, and two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.
427

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ADMINISTRATION &
SOCIETY / FEBRUARY 1981
the most invidious kinds of racial discrimination persist.&dquo;
Various reports conclude that overt, de jure discrimination has
often been succeeded by a &dquo;second generation&dquo; of discrimina-
tion in Southern schools (&dquo;Children out of school in America,&dquo;
1974; &dquo;It’s not over in the South,&dquo; 1972; &dquo;The status of school
desegregation in the South, 1970&dquo;; &dquo;The student pushout,&dquo;
1973). This discrimination has been manifest in underrepre-
sentation of black administrators and faculty and over-
representation of black children in certain kinds of classes.
The incidence of second-generation discrimination has not,
however, been constant across either districts or time. A
vari-
able that may be related to the severity of new modes of dis-
crimination is the agency responsible for desegregating a
district. The Departments of Justice, and Health, Education,
and Welfare worked as discrete agents in desegregating South-
ern schools with somewhat
different consequences. In the Pratt
decisions (Adams v. Richardson, 1972; Adams v. Weinberger,
1975), the district court implied that stricter standards were
used for determining whether segregation remained in districts
that HEW had desegregated than in ones desegregated by
Justice. Giles (1975) found that districts desegregated by
Justice had desegregated less in 1968 and 1970 than districts
handled by HEW. The enforcement agency was an important
variable even after controlling for proportion black and size
of district enrollment.
The purpose of this paper is to move beyond examination
of the policy output-desegregation-and to compare the
districts desegregated by each of the enforcement agencies in
terms of the degree of second generation discrimination
found-the policy outcome.
Data are examined for school
districts in four Southern states-Arkansas, Georgia, Louisi-
ana, and Texas-which had between 1 % and 99%
black enroll-
ment from 1968 to 1974.2 Based on research which assesses the
efficacy of Justice and HEW efforts, higher levels of second
generation discrimination are initially expected in districts
desegregated by Justice.

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429
Stewart, Bullock / IMPLEMENTING EQUAL EDUCATION
BACKGROUND AND HYPOTHESES
Over 81 % of the South’s biracial districts were desegregated
by either HEW
or the Justice Department. The typical scenario
saw HEW
attempt to negotiate a desegregation plan using
federal fund termination as the ultimate weapon. Some dis-
tricts submitted plans beginning in 1965 and kept pace with
increasingly stringent HEW guidelines. Other awaited the
initiation of administrative proceedings by HEW
to terminate
federal funds before they complied. A third set of districts
waited until until HEW
had terminated federal funds before
desegregating.
However, even this drastic step did not raise the cost of non-
compliance sufficiently for some local school officials. When
HEW
failed to achieve desegregation, districts were assigned
to the Justice Department where remedies were pursued in the
federal courts. Justice won court orders imposing specific
desegregation plans. The most recalcitrant schools were de-
segregated when Justice resorted to an innovative, compre-
hensive strategy: suing the state board of education to enjoin
it from providing state funds to noncompliant districts. This
technique was particularly effective because most Southern
school districts are financed largely with state funds. Regard-
less of the technique Justice employed, once it assumed juris-
diction, HEW ceased to be involved. Thus, the departments
worked separately, with Justice desegregating the most re-
calcitrant districts.
Since districts desegregated by Justice were slower to dis-
establish dual school systems, and since districts with relatively
high levels of segregation had less need to employ second-
generation discrimination, the first hypothesis is
H 1: Districts desegregated by the Justice Department will display
significantly lower levels of second-generation discrimination
at the earliest data point available (1968) than districts de-
segregated by HEW.

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430
ADMINISTRATION &
SOCIETY / FEBRUARY 1981
One factor lessens the likelihood of either agency effectively
thwarting second-generation discrimination. Initially, both
agencies mistakenly accepted the assumption that desegre-
gation was equivalent to equal-education opportunity. For a
time, desegregation was seen as an end, not a means; an out-
come, not an output. Thus it was assumed in some quarters
that once schools were desegregated, the objectives of HEW
and Justice would be achieved.
Some federal agents responsible for achieving equal-
education opportunities may have consciously opted to ignore
one aspect of second-generation discrimination, the displace-
ment of black faculty. A rationale for this strategy was that
it avoided further antagonizing white parents who opposed
desegregated classes and would find a black teacher even
harder to accept. Another reason is offered by a Justice
attorney:
There may have been a feeling on the part of many people at
HEW
and Justice that there were a lot of black teachers who
had been giving black kids bad educations and it wouldn’t be
surprising if you were going to lose a lot of these black teachers
through desegregation.
As it has become clear that new guises of discrimination
developed in many desegregated schools, HEW has been
quicker to take corrective actions than Justice. In part this is
because the agencies possess different enforcement capabil-
ities. HEW
has more personnel and they are more geographi-
cally dispersed, while Justice lawyers generally work out of
Washington, D.C. Because of these features, HEW is better
prepared to monitor progress. Moreover, the historically
greater obstinacy of Justice districts militates against Justice
combatting second-generation discrimination as effectively as
HEW. Furthermore, second-generation discrimination is a
subtle phenomenon which is more difficult to demonstrate and
treat as an adjudicable dispute than the former dual school
system. Thus, the bureaucracy may be a more appropriate

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431
Stewart, Bullock / IMPLEMENTING EQUAL EDUCATION
&dquo;arena of conflict&dquo; for dealing with this problem than the
judicial system.
While HEW’s efforts have been far from comprehensive, its
Office for Civil Rights has investigated a number of school
districts to see if they are guilty of racial discrimination in
special education, ability grouping, punishment, or personnel
practices. Such monitoring has occurred for district which
apply for Emergency School Aid Act (ESAA) funds. Surveys
done by one of the authors with OCR staffers in 1974-1975
revealed that most of them believed that these pregrant clear-
ances were quite useful in combatting second-generation dis-
crimination.
In contrast, interviews conducted during the same period
with lawyers of the Education Section...