Brown Legacy

The Times’ review of the decision in Brown vs. Topeka (May 15) presents an overall picture that “Brown’s beacon has dimmed,” and there is no doubt this is a realistic assessment.

Nevertheless, the picture is one-sided. It leaves out the fact that there is a strong and continued faith in desegregation, and perhaps for integrated education in these United States, albeit unrecognized in our courts, in Congress and in official boards of education throughout our country.

It is extremely important, I believe, to acknowledge the validity of the statement of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1954 decision in its memorable, unanimous opinion, holding:

“Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a detrimental effect upon the colored children” and, “Whatever may have been the extent of psychological knowledge at the time of Plessy vs. Ferguson, this finding is amply supported by modern authority.”

Part of that authority stems from the work of the late Otto Klineberg of Columbia and his students. I was one of them, with a thesis (1932) titled “A Study of the Effect of Environment on the Binet IQ Scores of Ten-Year-Old Negro Boys.” That study concluded that the longer Negro boys from the South were educated in the northern schools such as those in New York City, the higher their IQs.

The Klineberg studies had a direct effect on the reasoning of the Supreme Court in holding that segregation of black children meant inferior education. That is still our problem, as our major cities become more and more black and brown. Los Angeles is no exception, as the Crawford desegregation case so amply proved !

H. ROGIE ROGOSIN

Laguna Hills