Evans v. Buchanan’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

7 federal appellate · 13 district · 3 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 28 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Authorization to set a school tax rate is properly a product of the political process. For that reason, it is my view a federal court should not become involved failing a total abdication of responsibility over a period of time such that further delay significantly jeopardizes constitutional rights. . [T]he luxury of further delay comes at the cost of endangering an or derly transition to a racially nondiscriminatory unitary school system. It is with deep seated reluctance overcome only by the pressing, immediate necessity and the realization that no other option is available to fill the legislative void that the Court becomes involved at all in matters of taxation. Were it not true that the desegregation process faces imminent peril unaddressed by any other practical alternative, the federal court would not intrude. If the political process had provided statutory machinery or a procedure for devising a tax rate for the single district, or if there were not an immediate need to act now, I would further defer the matter of local tax rate authorization. The Court is compelled, however, to order that a tax rate be established. This action is taken with the understanding that the Legislature can alter the parameters authorized. Because state political processes are preferred over even limited intervention by a federal court, the Delaware Legislature may raise or lower the tax authorization established here. The Court must caution, however, that any legislative action that lowers ”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Evans v. Buchanan · Evans v. Buchanan

2. “1. In-Service Training Administrators, faculty and other staff require orientation and training for desegregation. Therefore, the Board shall formulate and implement a comprehensive in-service training program for teachers, administrators and other staff in order to train personnel to cope with the desegregation process. 2. Reading and Communication Skills The Board shall institute an affirmative reading and communication skills program, which does not resegregate the pupils, in order to remedy the effects of the past discrimination. 3. Curriculum The Board shall provide curriculum offerings and programs which emphasize and reflect the cultural pluralism of the students, and all instructional materials, texts and other curriculum aids shall be free of racial bias. 4. Counseling and Guidance To ameliorate the pressures on students undergoing desegregation and to prevent resegregation under the guise of curriculum or program choices, the Board shall institute an effective and nondiscriminatory counseling and guidance program. This counseling and guidance program must insure that students are counseled on a racially nondiscriminatory basis concerning all programs available in the area of work opportunities and opportunities for a college education; and that the students who choose the vocational and other special public schools in the area do so on an nondiscriminatory, and non-segregated basis. 5. School Building Construction, Site Selection and Use of Existing Schools Selectio”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 901 F. Supp. 784 - Coalition to Save Our Children v. State Board of Education of Delaware

3. “Additional considerations further imperil the 10-2 concept. Credible testimony to the effect that the primary and high school grades are perceived as the most important grades indicates that the less important grades were assigned to the predominantly black districts. Concern was intimated over the prospect of children from the predominantly white districts travelling to school by bus in the primary grades; the worry was obviated by the expedient of assigning all children from the predominantly black districts to travel to the predominantly white districts during those years. No mention was made that the parents of those children from the predominantly black districts might be equally concerned about their children’s transportation in the early years. Also, failure to reassign any child in the predominantly white districts for grades 1 — 4 or for the high school years necessarily reduces the number of grades which the former black schools can offer. Moreover, plaintiffs point out that with a surplus capacity in the county as a whole, severe underutilization of the city schools will inevitably target them for closing. Arguably, these anticipated school closings, the conversion of the Wilmington high schools to grade centers, and the attendant demise of the Wilmington high schools as high schools will both identify the formerly black schools and create widespread misapprehension that something was wrong with the formerly black schools in the first place.... [T]he negative impac”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 512 F. Supp. 839 - Evans v. Buchanan