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Bush Marks School Integration in Kansas
Associated Press ^ | 5/17/04 | BEN FELLER

Posted on 05/17/2004 9:09:38 PM PDT by mafree

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) -- President Bush marked a half-century of school integration at the symbolic home of the movement Monday, saying "it changed America for the better, and forever."

"Fifty years ago today, nine judges announced that they had looked at the Constitution and saw no justification for the segregation and humiliation of an entire race," Bush said at the opening of a national historic site at Monroe Elementary, a former all-black school in the heartland of the school desegregation effort.

"Here on the corner of 15th and Monroe, and in schools like it across America, that was a day of justice, and it was a long time coming," the president said.

But Bush said America still faces challenges.

"The habits of racism in America have not all been broken," he said. "The habits of respect must be taught to every generation." He said laws against discrimination should be vigorously enforced.

"While our schools are no longer segregated by law, they are still not equal in opportunity and excellence," Bush said. "Justice requires more than a place in a school. Justice requires that every school teach every child in America."

Monday marked 50 years since one of the signature legal decisions of the 20th century, the Supreme Court ruling that separating students by race was inherently unequal and unconstitutional. The Brown v. Board of Education ruling - named for a challenge in Topeka but encompassing five different cases - helped energize the civil rights movement, although resistance delayed desegregation for years.

Bush's speech comes at a time when, through a recent campaign swing and television ads, he tries to restore attention to his original domestic priority: improving education. Honoring a turning point in race relations, Bush hoped to make some inroads himself among black Americans skeptical of his commitment to equal opportunity. He drew just 9 percent of the black vote in 2000.

From Kansas, he was heading to Atlanta for a GOP fund raiser.

With the two-story brick schoolhouse behind him, Bush spoke to adults who lived through the civil rights era and children just learning about the Brown case.

His administration describes the No Child Left Behind Act as an extension of the Brown case because the education law seeks to end what Bush calls a bigotry of low expectations for minorities.

But the president increasingly finds the law he championed to be a tough sell, as schools struggle to meet goals and lawmakers, mainly Democrats, say much more federal money is needed.

Bush had no plans to turn the his commemoration into a speech about the law, aides said, instead focusing on progress in race relations and what still must be accomplished.

It was Bush's father who, as president in 1992, signed the law that turned Monroe Elementary into a national landmark. Now the younger Bush was in Kansas, a state he won comfortably in 2000, and one he had not previously visited as president.

In 2000, blacks supported Al Gore over Bush by a 9-1 margin.

The president was accompanied to Topeka by Education Secretary Rod Paige, his appointee and the first black person to hold the Cabinet post.

Bush, who opposes affirmative action programs for minorities, is unlikely to win over many black voters, said David Bositis, a political scientist at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a think tank focused on black issues.

"The negative feelings in general - the war in Iraq, a whole variety of issues - carry over into education," Bositis said. "Even if there were parts of No Child Left Behind that are potentially very positive educational reforms, it doesn't matter anymore, because I think the attitude among many African-Americans is it's time for Bush to go back to Crawford, Texas."

Bush and Democratic challenger Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts have been running close nationally on the question of who would do a better job on education. Bush is widely credited for helping the Republican Party claim ground in public education, with a focus on getting top teachers in all core classes and holding schools accountable for record increases in federal spending.

Kerry attended a different Brown ceremony in Topeka on Monday, contending that schools remain "separate and unequal" and warning that some were trying to reverse the gains made in civil rights, including affirmative action. Millions of children get a second-class education because they are poor, he said.

"We have certainly not met the promise of Brown when, in too many parts of our country, our school systems are not separate but equal, but separate and unequal," Kerry said on the steps of the Kansas Statehouse.

Unlike most of Bush's fund raisers, his appearance in the home of an Atlanta supporter Monday night was closed to the news media. Bush campaign officials have told backers that the campaign's policy of barring journalists from private homes is one advantage of holding them there instead of the usual hotel ballrooms where Bush raises money.


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; US: Kansas
KEYWORDS: blacks; brown; brownvboardofed; bush; integration; schools
Truth is, there was a lot of school "integration" already, especially in the North. Brown was only necessary to address the problem of unequal funding and facilities for whites and blacks. Other than that, the government has no business forcing segregation, desegregation, or integration.
1 posted on 05/17/2004 9:09:39 PM PDT by mafree
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To: mafree

Well, a conservative should think as you do. But a 'compassionate' conservative, well... that means you must look to feelings and image first, and forget about that limited government and freedom junk. Can't trust Americans to rule their own lives, you know, we might do something our betters would disapprove of.


2 posted on 05/17/2004 9:15:54 PM PDT by Pelham
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To: mafree

True,the government has no right to mandate either integration or segregation.
Unfortunately,many local and state governments in the South at one time illegally mandated SEGREGATION.Had that not been the case,there would have been no justification for the Feds to intervene at all.
Riverman


3 posted on 05/17/2004 9:20:53 PM PDT by Riverman94610
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To: Riverman94610

You are right. The eternal tragedy in all this was that the Feds felt the need to intervene in the first place.


4 posted on 05/17/2004 9:24:59 PM PDT by mafree
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To: mafree

I thought about that today listening to all the Brown talk while driving.

I wondered too that if the govt. could not force segregation then why could the govt force integration...busing seemed to be the end game?

We're still largely segregated although now it's more by income than anything else.

Then I heard Ward Connerly on the radio basically saying that all the money and desegregating in the world could not help if they parents weren't in control of their own lives and their childrens. Sage.


5 posted on 05/17/2004 9:28:34 PM PDT by wardaddy (This is it. We either win and prevail or we lose and get tossed into that dustbin W mentioned!)
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To: wardaddy

Connerly is right but that's just what the libs don't want.


6 posted on 05/17/2004 9:35:36 PM PDT by mafree
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To: wardaddy
"Then I heard Ward Connerly on the radio basically saying that all the money and desegregating in the world could not help if they parents weren't in control of their own lives and their childrens. Sage. "

exactly. one side of town, the high school is in the "top 100" in the nation. on the other side; its probably in the "bottom 100".
guess which side of town the kids have to do their homework first, before going out to play basketball?

7 posted on 05/17/2004 9:52:41 PM PDT by hoot2
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To: mafree

Not so sure that the liberals also in their OWN lives want to have strong healthy families.I think they DO.HOWEVER,many of their policies undermine strong family life-the permissiveness,promoting decadent and destructive lifestyles in the media and their tendency to try to excuse ill manners and sloppy attitudes.
Most liberals who condemn conservatives for racism are themselves leading very lily white lives.Personally,I prefer a diverse ethnic environment but can't stand the hypocritical liberals who try to force multiculturalism on others while they self-segregate shamelessly-minus their token black friend or Mexican cleaning lady!
Riverman


8 posted on 05/17/2004 9:52:47 PM PDT by Riverman94610
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To: hoot2

In large cities, I'd venture that anyone who can afford it or get scholarships send their kids private unless they are really liberal.....and then they shoot for the magnets.

Our public school system is really shot out. I have several cousins who taught in Jackson Mississippi public schools for a long time.....they gave up....too crazy.

Here in Nashville, there are several grade schools that might be ok but beyond that it's dicey.

I just don't want my kids exposed to public school PC cancer first and foremost.


9 posted on 05/17/2004 9:58:04 PM PDT by wardaddy (This is it. We either win and prevail or we lose and get tossed into that dustbin W mentioned!)
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To: Riverman94610
Most liberals who condemn conservatives for racism are themselves leading very lily white lives.

So true, so true. They'll never invite those "poor, helpless minorities" they claim to be "helping" into their social lives. Yet, too many of them seem uncomfortable with minorities who are their socioeconomic equal or better, especially if those minorities differ from them on key issues.

I know this too well firsthand. Because I'm a community activist and bit of a "do-gooder" I end up meeting a lot of libs. Things are usually cool until the subjects of guns, abortion, the Clintons or school vouchers come up. Some of us are still friends (especially the libs that may agree with me on one or more of those issues) and so we just have ongoing debates over these issues but others are uncomfotable and keep their distance from me. No problem- life sure ain't no popularity contest.

10 posted on 05/18/2004 10:16:26 AM PDT by mafree
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To: mafree

Both forced segregatation and forced separation is stupid.

We should allow academically excelling kids to bus into "better" schools, though.

Colleges don't care about GPAs anymore. What school you graduate from is far more important nowadays, and that's not fair to many many children.


11 posted on 05/18/2004 10:23:39 AM PDT by Nataku X (Please wait until November 3, 2004 to squabble. A house divided falls!)
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