Florida, Kentucky, Oklahoma, and Tennessee are the only States that expressly prohibit the teaching of white and colored persons in the same private school. Other States—as Georgia and Texas—declare that, if a school admits both races, it shall have none of the public school fund, saying, by implication, that one may operate a school for both races if he will give up his claim to State aid. On the other hand, Minnesota has enacted a statute to the effect that, if a school refuses to admit pupils of both races, it shall have none of the public school fund, thus saying, by implication, that it is not unlawful to conduct a private school exclusively for one race. The recent decision of the Supreme Court of Michigan to the effect that a private school may exclude Negroes even though the law of the State requires public schools to be open to all, regardless of race or color, has been considered.
In general, the “accommodations, advantages, and facilities” of schools for Negroes are to be equal to those for white children, but the requirement has, in many cases, been loosely construed. It has been held in Missouri[489] and Ohio,[490] for instance, that it is not an unjust discrimination for the colored children to have to walk farther to school than the white children. The Supreme Court[491] of Kansas in 1903 decided that uniformity of schools for white and colored children did not require equality of buildings. The court said: “True, for the accommodation of a numerous white population a much larger and more imposing school building is provided than that set apart for the few colored children in the district. This, however, is but an incidental matter, and necessarily unavoidable in the administration of any extended school system. School-houses cannot be identical in every respect; but parents cannot, on this account, dictate the one their children shall attend.”
The County Board of Education of Richmond County, Georgia, in 1880, established a high school for Negroes, but in 1897 it was discontinued for economic reasons, because the money to educate fifty or sixty Negroes in the high school would give the rudiments of education to two hundred of the four hundred young Negroes in the county who were crowded out. It was understood that the school would be re-opened as soon as economic considerations permitted. A Negro brought suit against the board for discrimination against his race in that the white high school to which the Board made contributions had not been closed also. The Supreme Court of that State held[492] that the Board had the right to establish or discontinue high schools when the interests and convenience of the people require it. There were more white children of the high-school grade than colored; therefore, the court argued, the Board was justified in continuing the white high school. The case was appealed to the Supreme Court[493] of the United States, which affirmed the decision of the State court. Mr. Justice Harlan, delivering the opinion of the court, said: “... while all admit that the benefits and burdens of public taxation must be shared by the citizens without discrimination against any class on account of their race, the education of the people in the schools maintained by State taxation is a matter belonging to the respective States, and any interference on the part of the Federal authority with the management of such schools cannot be justified except in the case of clear and unmistakable disregard of rights secured by the supreme law of the land.”