Freeman v. Pitts, 503 U.S. 467, 42 (1992)

Page:   Index   Previous  35  36  37  38  39  40  41  42  43  44  45  46  47  48  49  Next

508

FREEMAN v. PITTS

Souter, J., concurring

not independent of efforts to segregate, the causal relationship may be considered in fashioning a school desegregation remedy. See Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of Education, 402 U. S. 1, 21 (1971). Racial imbalance in student assignments caused by demographic change is not insulated from federal judicial oversight where the demographic change is itself caused in this way, and before deciding to relinquish supervision and control over student assignments, a district court should make findings on the presence or absence of this relationship.

The second and related causal relationship would occur after the district court has relinquished supervision over a remedied aspect of the school system, when future imbalance in that remedied Green-type factor (here, student assignments) would be caused by remaining vestiges of the dual system. Even after attaining compliance as to student composition, other factors such as racial composition of the faculty, quality of the physical plant, or per-pupil expenditures may leave schools racially identifiable. (In this very case, for example, there is a correlation in particular schools of overrepresentation of black principals and administrators, lower per-pupil expenditures, and high percentages of black students. Moreover, the schools in the predominantly black southern section of the school district are the only ones that use "portable classrooms," i. e., trailers. See ante, at 481- 482, 484.) If such other factors leave a school identifiable as "black," as soon as the district court stops supervising student assignments, nearby white parents may move in the direction of racially identifiable "white" schools, or may simply move their children into these schools. In such a case, the vestige of discrimination in one factor will act as an incubator for resegregation in others. Before a district court ends its supervision of student assignments, then, it should make a finding that there is no immediate threat of unreme-died Green-type factors causing population or student enrollment changes that in turn may imbalance student composi-

Page:   Index   Previous  35  36  37  38  39  40  41  42  43  44  45  46  47  48  49  Next

Last modified: October 4, 2007