Title IV direct grants to individual school systems-Continued

Mrs. MARTIN. I hope that this committee will ask Mr. Richardson whether the title IV unit is any longer a viable unit, whether it is any longer capable of providing honest and sincere assistance to courts and school systems in tackling desegregation problems, or whether the title IV unit has completely discredited itself both because it appears to be on the lowest echelon an antischool desegregation political clearing house mechanism and because of its unbelievable performance in the nationally important Charlotte-Mecklenburg case.

TITLE IV AND EMERGENCY SCHOOL ASSISTANCE ACT

I think the question should be put to Mr. Richardson not only because Congress has appropriated over $19 million for this unit to assist in the school desegregation effort but also because this is the division, title IV is the division, within HEW that will have the responsibility for administering the $75 million emergency school aid funds which Congress recently appropriated.

There is no doubt in my mind that courts and school systems need assistance in dealing with these matters, but because of the present situation perhaps there is a need for Congress to consider the possibility of creating a new mechanism to provide real assistance, assistance that is honest, sincere, and helpful-assistance that is not dominated by sheer political considerations.

As school officials and courts try to develop plans that will not result in resegregation, that will not result in white flight and all of the other things that mitigate against lasting and meaningful desegregation, it is ridiculous for a branch of our National Government to be presenting to the courts desegregation plans that are both educationally unsound and destined to create more and harden existing school segregation.

EMERGENCY SCHOOL ASSISTANCE ACT: ADMINISTRATION MOTIVES

Another area of concern which I hope that this committee will raise with Mr. Richardson and Mr. Pottinger when they are here on Thursday involves the motives behind the administration's request for $150 million to assist school systems in the process of desegregating; and

how the Department of HEW plans to utilize the $75 million that have been appropriated for that purpose, assuming that the President signs the appropriations bill.

Are these moneys really intended to help desegregating school systems or will the moneys amount to some kind of political slush fund or payoff pot to southern school systems?

I think part of the answer will depend on the way in which Mr. Richardson interprets an amendment to the appropriations measure which was introduced by the chairman of the committee, an amendment granting the right to nonsouthern as well as southern school systems under legal obligation to desegregate to apply for these funds. I think that is a correct interpretation of that amendment.

EMERGENCY SCHOOL ASSISTANCE ACT: MONDALE AMENDMENT

It is my understanding that those southern school systems that meet the 2-year, 1970-71 terminal desegregation plan criteria have been identified and ranked by HEW in terms of priority that letters are typed and ready to be mailed to them and that meetings are being arranged and scheduled to provide them with technical assistance so that funds can begin to flow to them at the earliest possible legal moment.

On the other hand, I know personally that no such similar efforts have been made to implement the Mondale amendment regarding the eligibility of nonsouthern school systems to apply for these funds.

It is my understanding that so far as HEW again has identified only 14 nonsouthern school systems are eligible to participate in the emergency school aid funds and all of these systems are under a Federal court order or HEW administrative order to desegregate (I have a list of these 14 districts for the committee).

Mrs. MARTIN. No letters have been typed, no meetings have been planned or scheduled for these 14 systems nor has the machinery been devised to provide them with assistance and advice about developing proposals for funding under this provision.

As I read Senator Mondale's amendment there are a lot more than 14 nonsouthern school systems that are eligible to apply for these funds.

There are at least 40 other nonsouthern school systems that should be eligible to apply because they are under orders of a State court, a State commissioner of education, a State department of education, or in the case of Pennsylvania, a State commission on human relations to desegregate, and they otherwise meet the requirements for participation. I also have a list of these 40 districts for the committee.

Senator MONDALE. Those will appear at this point in your remarks. I think it would be a good idea for the committee to advise Secretary Richardson that we intend to inquire about the implementation of that amendment.

We ought to know whether this stipulation is to be fully carried out by the Department of HEW. The Congress clearly decided that the Emergency School Assistance Act should be a national program, at least in the first step; it did so after debate; and there was a vote on that amendment and it passed overwhelmingly.

We strongly feel this should be a national effort, and we should see, based on your suggestion, what is happening.

(The documents referred to follow :)

MEMORANDUM, AUGUST 3, 1970

To: School Desegregation File.

Fr: Ruby G. Martin.

Re: Northern School Systems-Eligibility to Participate in Emergency School Act Fund.

The Department of HEW has identified only 14 Northern and Western school systems that are eligible to apply for Emergency School Act funds. A 14 of these systems are desegregating pursuant to a Federal court order or an HEW plan.

A number of school systems in Northern and Western states have been required by their State Commissioner, State Department of Education or some other State agency with jurisdiction, to submit desegregation plans pursuant to State law and otherwise meet the HEW criteria. There is a division of opinion within HEW regarding the eligibility of school systems in this category to participate in Emergency School Act funds. The Department has assembled a partial list (40) of school districts in these categories. In addition, I believe that there are school systems in California, New York and possibly Connecticut and Rhode Island similarly situated but not allowed in the partial listing. The HEW partial listings are as follows:

Senator JAVITS. Mr. Chairman, of course, the concept of this amendment, the amendment by the Senator from Minnesota, which had certain technical problems and we ultimately defined it.

That was my opinion. I am very glad the witness testified that we can't necessarily assume that the money would be badly spent but certainly there are deep fears, and she is quite right to bring it before

us.

I would suggest, Mr. Chairman, upon completion of today's testimony and cross-examination, Mrs. Martin and Mr. Panetta, that a letter be written to the Secretary on behalf of the committee, saying

that the testimony today asks the following questions, and that we believe these are proper questions and we hope that you will come prepared on Thursday.

Senator MONDALE. Very well; I ask the staff to prepare that letter. You may proceed.

PRIVATE SCHOOLS: TAX-EXEMPT STATUS

Mrs. MARTIN. Another matter that will have a decisive impact on the process of school desegregation not only during the upcoming school year, but for the future, will be the manner in which the administration implements the Internal Revenue Service ruling denying tax exempt status to private schools that discriminate on the basis of race.

I hope that members of this committee will ask the HEW officials what role the Department will play in assuring that the ruling does not evolve into nothing more than the Government's collecting a lot of fraudulent assurances of open enrollment policies.

As this committee knows, less than a week after the IRS issued its ruling, six southern private schools were granted tax-exempt status, and it is my understanding that these declarations were made solely on written statements by the six private schools that they had open admission policies.

Inquiries by our office staff have revealed that several of these schools fit the classic pattern of the "segregation academy." At least two of them-DeSoto School in Helena, Ark., and Houston Academy in Dothan, Ala.-are presently under construction with opening due to coincide with implementation of a terminal desegregation plan this fall in their communities.

Another, Nathaniael Greene Academy in Siloam, Ga., is only 2 years old and was obviously opened in response to school desegregation. Last year it had over 185 students enrolled, none of them black, and while it expects 300 students for the upcoming school year, it is unlikely that any of them will be black, either.

This is probably because, for admission, the school charges a $250 contribution to the building fund. It is now operating in a former public school, leased from the city, which I think the committee might be concerned about, in view of the Mondale amendment. It has a tuition of $400 for the first two children in a family, dropping to $100 for the third child.

There is a $10 fee for testing, which is carried out by the school's principal, who then has discretion to determine whether or not to admit the child applying. The chances of such a school being a genuinely desegregated one are small. In addition this school is going to have a decisive negative impact upon the economic support for public education in poverty-stricken Greene County, Ga., where it is located.

Senator MONDALE. Would you yield there?

I think the Nation received the impression when the administration announced that tax exemption would be withdrawn from these academies, that from there on out such academies would be denied taxexempt status. That is a rather natural conclusion, I would think.

In fact, that may not be the case at all. It depends on how that policy is administered. What you are saying is that your staff in these specific cases, and perhaps there are others, have identified schools that have recently been issued tax-exempt status since the announce

ment.

Mrs. MARTIN. That is right.

Senator MONDALE. Which in your opinion are classic segregation academies.

Mrs. MARTIN. That is correct.

Senator MONDALE. Would you tell me why a segregation academy would be created to escape the thrust of the desegregation order, and then in order to retain tax-exempt status would desegregate?

Why go through all the trouble? Do you follow me?

Mrs. MARTIN. I am not sure I follow you. Two of these schools are not even in existence yet.

Senator MONDALE. Doesn't it then strain commonsense to believe a declaration presented by a segregation academy

Mrs. MARTIN. Oh, absolutely.

Senator MONDALE (continuing). That they intend to be integrated, when the whole reason for the school was for segregation?

Why go through the motions?

Mrs. MARTIN. They go through the motions because they can get the tax exemption status, and they probably-probably realize the Government is only going to require a statement on a piece of paper.

Someone from a tax exempt civil rights type organization went over to IRS to inquire about how the agency was going to implement and carry out the new ruling. This particular person was told that if they did not mind their own business perhaps their own tax-exempt status would be challenged; that was the IRS response to this particular organization's inquiry about enforcing the ruling.

That is a heavy club to hold over anybody's head.

Senator MONDALE. There was a statement appearing in the New York Times by Mr. Clark Reed. He is the chairman of the Republican Party of Mississippi. He assured a group in Florida that the Revenue Service would accept as evidence of nondiscrimination public statements of policy alleging that the school did not discriminate.

Senator JAVITS. I suggest the following be done, Mr. Chairman, the same practice that we followed with Secretary Richardson. Just because a newspaper, likes to write a story which involves good guys and bad guys, there is no reason why he, or Mrs. Martin, or we should be overwhelmed.

I think this is an assertion made in the public press, and now made on the record here, which the Internal Revenue Service would like to answer, and if we don't then like their answer, we could have them appear.

I hope conclusions will not be drawn from the puffing, and I use that word advisedly, from the selling job of a State Republican chairman, and I would say the same about a Democratic State chairman, without our getting the facts.

Senator MONDALE. Let's ask that he respond to that statement, and also respond to these specific examples which Mrs. Martin has presented here, as well as others that we can forward to him, not only with respect to those exemptions just newly granted since the

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