Race, Politics, and Geography in the Development of Public Schools in the Southern United States

Abstract

The federal system of the United States places public schools under the political control of states, cities, and counties, resulting in wide variations in funding and an absence of uniform standards. In the southern states, public schools long suffered from poverty and the legacy of slavery. White hostility to the education of Blacks stunted the development of public education after 1865 and produced a racially segregated school system that perpetuated inequality. Those inequalities widened after 1900 when Black voters were disfranchised. Lacking a political voice, Black educators such as Booker T. Washington sought to improve Black schools by securing financial support from northern philanthropists while stressing “industrial education” in order to mollify southern Whites. The post-1945 civil rights movement attacked and eventually destroyed the segregated school system. School integration saw substantial improvements in the education of Blacks, notwithstanding de facto segregation and funding inequalities.