NAACP Sues Over School Segregation
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
OMAHA, Neb. – The NAACP sued Nebraska’s governor and a state committee yesterday over a new law that divides Omaha public schools into three racially identifiable districts.
The law splits the Omaha district starting in 2008 into three districts: one mostly black, one largely Hispanic, and one predominantly white.
It was aimed at solving a dispute over school boundaries in the state’s largest city after Omaha public schools tried to take over some suburban schools. The NAACP’s federal lawsuit says the new law violates the constitutional principles embodied in the 1954 U.S.Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, which said separate but equal facilities have no place in public education.
“Segregation is morally wrong, regardless of who advocates it,” Tommie Wilson of the Omaha chapter of the NAACP said.
Supporters said the plan would give minorities control over their own school board and ensure that their children were not shortchanged.
