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257

COOPER V. AARON

officials refused to obey court orders and closed all high schools until 1959. Finally, parents and voters who cared more about education than segregation changed the school board. The integration of Little Rock schools resumed.

The Court's decision established an important precedent. But it did not end conflict over racial issues that have divided Americans since the time of slavery. School segregation, a relic of that system, stubbornly refuses to go away. Judges can decide legal issues, but they can't change housing patterns or cultural attitudes. Since its unanimous decision in Cooper v. Aaron, the Supreme Court has split over cases dealing with school integration. Brown remains on the books, but the question remains: Will black children in schools across the country receive the integrated -- and equal -- education the Constitution commands? It is a fateful question for the country.

EDITED SUPREME COURT OPINION

Cooper v. Aaron

Opinion of the Court by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE BLACK, MR. JUSTICE FRANKFURTER, MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS, MR. JUSTICE BURTON, MR. JUSTICE CLARK, MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN, and MR. JUSTICE WHITTAKER.

As this case reaches us it raises questions of the highest importance to the maintenance of our federal system of government. It necessarily involves a claim by the Governor and Legislature of a State that there is no duty on state officials to obey federal court orders resting on this Court's considered interpretation of the United States Constitution. Specifically it involves actions by the Governor and Legislature of Arkansas upon the premise that they are not bound by our holding in Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483. That holding was that the Fourteenth Amendment forbids States to use their governmental powers to bar children on racial grounds from attending schools where there is state participation through any arrangement, management, funds or property. We are urged to uphold a suspension of the Little Rock School Board's plan to do away with segregated public schools in Little Rock until state laws and efforts to upset and nullify our holding in Brown v. Board of Education have been further challenged and tested in the courts. We reject these contentions. . . .

The following are the facts and circumstances so far as necessary to show how the legal questions are presented. . . .

On May 20, 1954, . . . the Little Rock District School Board adopted, and on May 23, 1954, made public, a statement of policy entitled "Supreme Court Decision -- Segregation in Public Schools." In this statement the Board recognized that