Advocacy is Understandable, But Without Understanding,” of Busing — Opposed (pp.68 - 80).

On October 7, 1991 the parties argued the case and on October 15 I reviewed the Arguments Before the Court (60 LW 3279, 3280-81). Again, I found concerns expressed by the justices about busing the students, but necessarily from the evidence offered by the petitioning school system. This is because there was no evidence received directly from the students who were non-parties in the action to subject them to busing (Busing — Opposed at 62 - 64).

On March 31, 1992, the Court held the district court could relinquish supervision and control over the DCSS in incremental stages (in this case, over student assignments), reversed the judgment and remanded the case to the Court of Appeals. Freeman v. Pitts, 112 S.Ct. 1430. Further encouragement was offered San Diego citizens by Justice Antonin Scalia’s concurring opinion (id. at 1454):

... We must soon revert to the ordinary principles of our law, of our democratic heritage, and of our educational tradition: that plaintiffs alleging Equal Protection violations must prove intent and causation and not merely the existence of disparity [citations omitted]; that public schooling, even in the South, should be controlled by locally elected authorities acting in conjunction with parents [citations omitted], and that it is “desirable” to permit students to “attend schools nearest their homes....”