Green v. County School Board of New Kent County
The Court ruled that New Kent County's "freedom-of-choice" plan did not satisfy the school board's constitutional duty to dismantle its dual, segregated school system, because after three years almost no white students had chosen the formerly Black school and most Black students still attended it.
The decision requires school boards operating dual systems to come up with plans that promise real, immediate results in eliminating segregation, not just a formal choice that leaves the old racial pattern largely intact.
“The burden on a school board today is to come forward with a plan that promises realistically to work, and promises realistically to work now.”
The Court's core standard for judging whether a desegregation plan is adequate.
How it got here: A federal district court approved the school board's freedom-of-choice plan; the Fourth Circuit affirmed that part but remanded on faculty desegregation; the Supreme Court took the case.
The Case in Depth
What happened
New Kent County, Virginia operated two schools — one historically for white students and one for Black students — even though the county's population was not residentially segregated. Black families sued in 1965 to end the racially segregated system, which had been maintained for years under state laws requiring segregation and later under a "freedom-of-choice" plan adopted by the school board.
The question before the Court
Could a rural Virginia school board satisfy its duty to desegregate simply by letting students freely choose which of the county's two schools to attend?
Why it matters
School districts across the South that had adopted freedom-of-choice plans to avoid actually desegregating now faced pressure to adopt more effective measures, such as geographic zoning, because courts would judge desegregation plans by whether they actually worked rather than by whether they offered nominal choice.
What changes now
The case goes back to the district court, which must require the school board to submit a new desegregation plan — such as one using geographic zoning or school consolidation — that promises to convert the system to a genuinely unitary one promptly. The district court is also directed to keep supervising the case until segregation is fully eliminated. This is a final ruling on the merits, though further proceedings on remand will determine the specific new plan.
What this does not decide
The Court did not hold that freedom-of-choice plans are always unconstitutional or can never be used. It held only that such a plan is not an end in itself and must actually work to eliminate the dual system; whether any particular alternative plan would suffice was left to the district court on remand.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court explained that Brown v. Board of Education required not just admitting some Black students to formerly white schools, but converting to a fully unitary system with no racially identifiable schools — covering faculty, staff, transportation, and facilities, not just enrollment.
- The Court held that school boards operating dual systems have an affirmative duty to take whatever steps are necessary to eliminate segregation "root and branch," rather than simply removing legal barriers to choice.
- Applying this standard, the Court found that freedom-of-choice was not automatically invalid, but was only acceptable if it actually worked to dismantle the dual system promptly and effectively.
- The Court looked at the plan's actual results: no white student had ever chosen the formerly Black school, and 85% of Black students still attended it, showing the plan had not converted the system to a unitary one.
- Because other options, such as geographic zoning, appeared readily available and more likely to work given the lack of residential segregation in the county, the Court concluded the freedom-of-choice plan was inadequate and had to be replaced.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms Brown v. Board of Education (349 U. S. 294)
The Court relies on Brown II's command to abolish dual school systems as the governing standard.