Commentary: Kramer vs... Separate and unequal schools

Fifty years ago, a graduate of Baltimore City Public Schools won a landmark Supreme Court case providing equal educational opportunities for students of all races.

Fifty years later, more than 90 percent of the students at Thurgood Marshall's alma mater are unable to read the court's landmark opinion. According to test scores released by the Maryland State Department of Education, fewer than 8 percent of 10th graders at Frederick Douglas High School attained minimal proficiency in reading, and the school is one of 62 that are slated for state restructuring.

Of the 1,312 students at Frederick Douglas, all but seven are black. Far from making college plans, almost half of city students fail to graduate, and those that do may never catch up to those taking classes in wealthier suburban schools just across the county line.

This is hardly what Thurgood Marshall envisioned as a 45-year old civil rights lawyer representing a class of black children in Brown v. Board of Education. Though he won that case unanimously on May 17, 1954, a half-century of experience in Baltimore City and other urban school districts leaves little to celebrate.

While segregationists claimed that separate schools provided whites and blacks with equal chances to learn, Chief Justice Earl Warren conclude[d] that in the field of public education the doctrine of 'separate but equal' has no place. Echoing the arguments of a man who would later join him on the nation's highest court, Warren found that [s]eparate educational facilities are inherently unequal.

Observing that public education is the very foundation of good citizenship, Chief Justice Warren underscored the importance of equal educational opportunities. Today it is a principal instrument in awakening the child to cultural values, in preparing him for later professional training, and in helping him to adjust normally to his environment.

According to Justice Warren, it is doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed in life if he is denied the opportunity of an education. Such an opportunity, where the state has undertaken to provide it, is a right which must be made available to all on equal terms.

Despite 50 years of integration, we have returned to school systems which are separate and far from equal. Like Baltimore City, the flight of middle-class families to the suburbs has left urban schools with an anemic tax base and strapped resources to handle the special needs of impoverished children. Facing the challenges of poverty, these students are left to languish in classrooms which appear to be as racially segregated as they were a half-century ago.

This is certainly true of two Maryland schools sharing the name of the nation's greatest champion of educational rights: Thurgood Marshall Middle School, in Baltimore City and in Prince George's County, are both slated for state restructuring.

Irwin R. Kramer is a trial lawyer and managing partner of Kramer & Connolly, an AV-rated litigation firm representing businesses and individuals throughout Maryland and Washington, D.C. A former professor of evidence and trial procedure, Kramer offers crash courses on a variety of legal subjects at www.KramersLaw.com.

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