The lasting legacy of Brown v. Board and ongoing education challenges

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• Geoff Bennett:

  Tomorrow marks 70 years since the landmark civil rights ruling of Brown v. Board of Education, when the U.S. Supreme Court declared that, in the field of public education, the doctrine of separate but equal has no place.

  President Biden met today with several of the original plaintiffs who brought the case to court and their families.

  Afterward, Cheryl Brown Henderson, one of the daughters of the lead plaintiff, Oliver Brown, said they were there to celebrate how the long fight had changed education. But she was quick to say, much work remains to be done.

  Cheryl Brown Henderson, Daughter of Plaintiff: We're still fighting the battle over whose children do we invest in. Any time we can talk about failing underfunded public schools, there is a problem. There should be no such thing. Public institutions, where most of us got our education, should be world-class educational institutions.

• Geoff Bennett:

  The families today also recalled how the path to integration was met with intense resistance, fear and violence. That was echoed at a different ceremony in Washington this past week by another pioneer, Gail Etienne, who was one of the so-called New Orleans Four, who were the first children to desegregate two all-white schools in New Orleans back in 1960.

• Gail Etienne, Civil Rights Pioneer:

  They treated us like animals. We didn't know it at the time, but that is exactly what they were doing. There were teachers definitely there that were encouraging them to do that to us, call all kind of names, spit on us.

  Anything that you could think of that young children shouldn't go through in school, we went through. That experience, I will never, ever forget.

• Geoff Bennett:

  For more perspective on this, I spoke yesterday with Annette Gordon-Reed. She's the Carl M. Loeb professor of history at Harvard Law School. And she was the first Black student to enroll in an all-white school in her hometown in Texas. And Kevin Young is director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

  Kevin Young and Annette Gordon-Reed, welcome to the "NewsHour."

  Kevin Young, Director, Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture: Thanks.

• Annette Gordon-Reed, Carl M. Loeb University Professor, Harvard University:

  Glad to be here.

• Geoff Bennett:

  And, Kevin, I will start with you because you, as I understand it, you knew Linda Brown, who, as a schoolgirl, was at the center of this landmark case.

  Her father, Oliver, tried to enroll her at an all-white school not too far from their home in Topeka. Tell us about her, her family, and their decision to partner with the NAACP and other plaintiffs to challenge segregation in public schools.

• Kevin Young:

  Well, it's such an important anniversary that we're marking the 70th anniversary of.

  And I did indeed grow up in Topeka, Kansas, in part, and went to the very church that Linda Brown played piano and organ at and sang. She was quite a force then, and I knew and was well aware of the case. It greeted me every Sunday in the vestibule with reverend Oliver Brown, who had been at that church, St. Mark's Church in Topeka.

  And I think it was that kind of spiritual center of the case that she posed and that she still held in Topeka, Kansas, that really is powerful to me. And I think there's a wrong road that leads to Brown v. Board, but it still remained in Topeka something that was full of history, but also was a living thing.

  And I think that's where I first encountered the kind of history you find throughout the museum, but also that this case centers in the change in the nation and the change in our world.

  And to hear her singing and expressing herself years later was so powerful.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Annette Gordon-Reed, this is an experience that you know well.

  You were the first Black student to integrate the Conroe Independent School District in Texas 60 years ago. What was that experience like for you?

• Annette Gordon-Reed:

  Very intense. This was obviously 10 years or so after Brown.

  The school districts across the South were resisting Brown's mandate, had come up with a freedom of choice plan. And my parents decided to buck the tradition, because the expectation was that white parents would pick white schools and Black parents would pick Black schools.

  My parents decided to do something different and sent me to Anderson Elementary School. And it was tough. I have to say, it was a tough year. I was there by myself. And it was — took a couple of years before the Supreme Court declared those freedom of choice plans unconstitutional. Then everybody had to change schools.

  But being there by myself was a pretty intense thing. The thing that really saved me, I think, was, well, obviously, my parents and my family, the support I had. But my first-trade teacher, Mrs. Daughtry, was absolutely wonderful. I'm sure they may have picked her to be the person who had me as a teacher.

  And she handled things very well. Some of the kids were supportive, and many of them were not. So it was just a very intense time.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Striking down segregation in the nation's public schools obviously provided a major catalyst for the civil rights movement, which yielded all sorts of progress.

  But racial segregation across the country in schools has actually increased dramatically since then. It's up by 64 percent. Segregation between white and Black students has increased by 64 percent in the 100 largest districts since the late 1980s.

  Kevin Young, what accounts for that?

• Kevin Young:

  I'm not sure what accounts for it in every place that you're mentioning.

  But I think what accounts for Brown's import is starting a process that's still ongoing. It's a process that took a long time to make it to the Supreme Court. And we raise up Thurgood Marshall and the others, including the other plaintiffs who were involved in the case.

  But I also think it's important to note, as you said, that there's work left to be done. They reopened Brown v. Board for its original purpose to desegregate Topeka schools when I was living in Topeka. And so that case continues to resonate in both good and — ways that still need to be relitigated in some ways, but also to be continually enforced.

• Geoff Bennett:

  And, Annette Gordon-Reed, you could argue that schools remain segregated today because neighborhoods in which they're located remain segregated and that education policy in many ways is linked to housing policy. How do you see it?

• Annette Gordon-Reed:

  Oh, absolutely. That's it. I mean, we fund schools through property taxes.

  And so where you live determines the kinds of the — the schools that you go to. And so as long as you have a pattern of segregation in housing, you're going to have segregated schools as well. So that's been a big driver of it. So there's a lot of — there are a lot of moving parts to all of this.

  I mean, Brown was important as a symbolic matter. And, actually, things did change to some degree, but it's largely the symbolic import of saying that separate was inherently unequal and starting people on the road to sort of questioning things that had been taken for granted for many, many years.

  But, certainly, housing patterns determine a lot about the composition of schools.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Kevin, what more needs to be done to fulfill the ultimate promise of Brown?

• Kevin Young:

  Well, I think we have to continue to be vigilant in terms of how people can access education just as a start.

  I mean, I grew up in public schools before going to college. And, to me, that was really important to have that education. Both my parents credited education as the thing that got them beyond. They grew up in the segregated South, in Louisiana, to be specific. And they each were the first among their family members to go to college.

  And they went all the way. My father ended up becoming a physician. And my mother got a Ph.D. in chemistry. And from there, I think they really saw — and they went to HBCUs, by the way, when historically Black colleges was the only place they could attend.

  And I think it was really important to them to maintain both HBCUs, important excellence — they raise and generate the most of our professionals in the African American community — and continue to support them, but also to support education more generally and provide that as something that everyone can access, but then also aspire to.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Annette Gordon-Reed, same question. What work remains, in your view?

• Annette Gordon-Reed:

  Well, to get people to recommit to public institutions, not just K-12, but public higher education as well.

  There's been a disinvestment in those areas. And the more you do that, the more problematic they become. It's sort of like a vicious cycle that continues. And so I think we have to realize that the nation's schools should be and have been in the past, and certainly K-12 and the university system have been very, very important to creating the country, making the country that it is.

  And we should go back to the idea that we should invest in all of our children. Not just our own children, but all children deserve a chance.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Annette Gordon-Reed and Kevin Young, thank you both so much for your insights. We appreciate it.

• Annette Gordon-Reed:

  Glad to be here.

• Kevin Young:

  Thank you.