# United States v. Hale County Board of Education

> Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · June 29, 1971 · 445 F.2d 1330

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9457136

## Case

- **Full name:** UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. HALE COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION Et Al., Defendants-Appellees
- **Court:** Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
- **Decided:** June 29, 1971
- **Citations:** 445 F.2d 1330; 1971 U.S. App. LEXIS 9238
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Dissent by Coleman
- **Judges:** Coleman, Wisdom, Simpson
- **Cited by:** 1 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

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## Opinion text

COLEMAN, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
Mr. Justice Holmes once wrote, “The Fourteenth Amendment is not a pedagogical requirement of the impracticable.” 1 If so, the Amendment can hardly be said to command futilities which defeat all semblance of compliance with that Amendment.
Here, in my opinion, we have a case which invokes the application of the doctrine.
Hale County now has 3,744 black students and 937 white students in its public school system. The number in private schools is not revealed by the record.
The plan adopted by the District Court was formulated by the Department of Education of the University of Alabama. The results up to now are that four of the seven schools are integrated. Three remain all black. There are 57 white teachers and 144 black teachers.
It is far better, and more in keeping with the commands of the Fourteenth Amendment, in my opinion, to keep this school system alive as presently integrated, with hope of inevitable improvement, than to enter decrees which will lead to the same result attained in the nearby County of Sumpter — every school all black and no white child attending a public school.
While every school house in Hale is not integrated, it is certainly true that the system as a whole is no longer segregated. Progress has been made. It is equally certain, from this record, that the Order now entered will seriously damage, if not totally destroy, that progress.
Of course, it is my duty, and I recognize it, to do all things reasonably calculated to enforce the Fourteenth Amendment. I do not conceive it to be my duty, in the name of the Amendment, to embrace unreasonable methods leading to the destruction of that already accomplished.
I respectfully decline to participate as a judicial pallbearer for the Hale County Public School system.
Therefore, I dissent.
. Dominion Hotel v. State of Arizona, 249 U.S. 265, 268 , 39 S.Ct. 273, 274 , 63 L.Ed. 597 (1919).

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9457136. Public record. Not legal advice.