Fifty years later, Boston integration fight is a testament to grassroots power

Fifty years ago, Black families and white allies who fought for equal education scored a major victory when a federal judge ordered Boston Public Schools to desegregate.

Why it matters: The success of Boston's grassroots integration push is often overshadowed by the controversial implementation of busing.

What they're saying: There's a lesson to be learned in "the power of community organizing and advocacy … not waiting for elected officials to take action," says Tanisha Sullivan, president of the NAACP Boston branch.

• Boston's desegregation fight illustrated the power of communities using their voices to create an inclusive culture through demonstrations and initiatives like the integrated Freedom Schools.

Flashback: In 1963, nearly a decade after the Brown v. Board of Education ruling, a Boston parent named Ruth Batson made her case for equal education to the BPS committee.

• Batson, chair of the local NAACP's education committee, read the organization's 14-point proposal to end de facto segregation in BPS, per GBH News archives .
• School committee member Louise Day Hicks replied saying the district didn't segregate schools; it just assigned students based on where they lived.

Black parents and allies sought to prove that was wrong.

📚 Stay Out for Freedom Day on June 18, 1963: Thousands of Black junior and senior high school students in Boston attended Freedom Schools instead of their public school.

• The temporary schools, created in protest by civil rights leaders, educated Black students on politics, civics and other topics.

📊 NAACP research found 13 BPS schools were predominantly Black.

• Those schools were in old buildings and overcrowded. Four had been condemned.

📚 Stay Out for Freedom Day on Feb. 26, 1964: More than 10,000 Black and white children attended Freedom Schools across Boston, per GBH News archives .

• There were 35 Freedom Schools citywide.
• By that point, similar demonstrations were happening in New York, Chicago, Milwaukee and Cleveland.

🪧 Racial Imbalance Law

State Rep. Royal Bolling, a Black community activist, introduced the Racial Imbalance Bill in 1963.

• The proposal would withhold state funds from schools where over 50% of the school population were racial minorities.
• It passed in August 1965, months after the state's Kiernan Report confirmed that segregation in public schools harmed students.

Yes, but: The Boston School Committee refused to comply with the law, losing millions in state funding.

• The committee was finally working toward complying when lawmakers repealed it in 1974.
• Gov. Francis Sargent vetoed the repeal but amended the law so no more funds would be withheld from schools out of compliance.

⚖️ Federal court

Black parents and advocates took their cause to the courts with 15 parents, supported by the NAACP , suing BPS committee members in 1972.

• The parents accused the school committee of failing to comply with the 1965 Racial Imbalance law.
• The lawsuit led to Judge Wendell Garrity's ruling in favor of the parents and ordering the schools to implement the state's busing plan.

Get more local stories in your inbox with Axios Boston.