Parental Handbook: Challenge Five
 

San Diegans Challenge Perpetual
Court Assignment of Pupils,
Emanating from Carlin v. Board of Education,
To Restore Local Control
According to the Constitution

admission to Boston Latin School, which allocated the second half of available seats on the basis of “flexible racial / ethnic guidelines” which apportioned them to five different racial / ethnic categories. But the number admitted in rank order from each of the five categories for these remaining spots had to match the proportion set by school officials for that category. Because the proportion set for “Whites” was filled, Sarah and other score-qualified applicants were passed over to admit lower-score ranked applicants, classified as Blacks and Hispanics, for admission. Wessmann v. Gittens, 160 F.3d 790 (1st Cir.1998). Reversed Wessmann by Wessmann v. Boston School Committee, 996 F.Supp. 120 (D.Mass. 1998).

Four white students successfully challenged the admissions process the University of Texas School of Law employed in 1992, which granted racial preferences to Blacks and Mexican Americans by means of a separate admissions track. Hopwood v. State of Texas, 84 F.3d 720 (5th Cir., 1996). Reversed Hopwood v. State of Texas, 861 F.Supp. 551 (W.D.Tex.1994).

Groundswell citizens have continuously emphasized the principle enunciated by Chief Justice Warren in his Memoirs (pp.287-8), that “any kind of racial discrimination in public education is unconstitutional.” By analogy, black citizens once faced racial discrimination by a state statute requiring registration for voting, without mentioning race, in such a way that effectively resulted in a failure of such citizens to register and thereby be prevented from ever entering the voting booths.

This earlier kind of racial discrimination, effectively depriving a class of citizens of their voting rights, was found unconstitutional in Lane v. Wilson, 307 U.S. 268 (1939). Justice Felix Frankfurter, applying the 15th Amendment (307 U.S. at 276), portended the constitutional scrutiny (under the 14th Amendment), facing present-day racial discrimination in public schools:

The Amendment nullifies sophisticated as well as simpleminded modes of discrimination.

Lane v. Wilson, 307 U.S. 268 (1939)
 

Carlin v. Board of Education, San Diego Unified School District, San Diego Superior Court No. 303800 (1967-1998)
San Diego, California
 

Hopwood 

Hopwood v. State of Texas, 861 F.Supp. 551 (W.D.Tex.1994)
 

Hopwood v. State of Texas, 84 F.3d 720 (5th Cir., 1996)
 

Wessmann 

Wessmann by Wessmann v. Boston School Committee, 996 F.Supp. 120 (D.Mass. 1998)
Boston, Massachusetts
 

Wessmann v. Gittens, 160 F.3d 790 (1st Cir.1998)
Boston, Massachusetts
 

— Handbook: Challenge Five, pages 65 - 74 —