Suit: Miss. fails to educate black children equally

Governor disputes allegations of systemic racism

JACKSON, Miss. — Mississippi is denying good schools to African-American students in violation of the federal law that enabled the state to rejoin the union after the Civil War, a legal group alleged Tuesday.

The Southern Poverty Law Center wants a federal judge to force state leaders to comply with the 1870 law, which says Mississippi must never deprive any citizen of the “school rights and privileges” described in the state’s first post-Civil War constitution.

Deliberate deprivation

That law still obligates Mississippi to provide a “uniform system of free public schools” for all children, but the state has instead watered down education protections in a white supremacist effort to prevent the education of blacks, the group said.

“From 1890 until the present day, Mississippi repeatedly has amended its education clause and has used those amendments to systematically and deliberately deprive African-Americans of the education rights guaranteed to all Mississippi schoolchildren by the 1868 Constitution,” the suit states.

The named defendants include Gov. Phil Bryant, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves, House Speaker Philip Gunn and Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, all Republican elected officials. It also names state school Superintendent Carey Wright and the nine appointed members of the state Board of Education.

‘Misguided views’

Mississippi’s public schools have stubbornly ranked at or near the bottom of national measures of academic achievement and progress. But Bryant and Reeves said Mississippi’s education system is improving under their leadership.

“This is merely another attempt by the Southern Poverty Law Center to fundraise on the backs of Mississippi taxpayers,” the governor said in a statement. “While the SPLC clings to its misguided and cynical views, we will continue to shape Mississippi’s system of public education into the best and most innovative in America.”

All 19 Mississippi school districts rated “F” by the Mississippi Department of Education have overwhelmingly African-American student bodies, while the state’s five highest-performing school districts are predominantly white, the SPLC says.

The schools attended by the plaintiffs’ children “lack textbooks, literature, basic supplies, experienced teachers, sports and other extracurricular activities, tutoring programs, and even toilet paper,” the SPLC said.

Mississippi already faces a lawsuit over statewide public school funding. Former Gov. Ronnie Musgrove represents 21 districts demanding the state money they say they were shorted under the public school funding formula between 2010 and 2015.