ABSTRACT
When the U.S. Supreme Court declared in 1954 that racial segregation of pub-
lic schools was unconstitutional, the court ordered that public school districts
desegregate “with all deliberate speed.” As in many urban districts across the
United States, desegregation in Texas school districts proceeded in a way that
was neither deliberate nor speedy. Almost twenty years would pass before the
largest cities would have desegregation plans in place. By that time, many
Whites would have moved from racially diverse cities to mostly White sub-
urbs. Thousands of school children would have passed through the twelve
grades of public schooling before their communities-and the courts-decided
who would sit together in schools, and what those schools should be like when
they did.
