Segregation in Hartford Schools Ruled Illegal

In a landmark ruling that is expected to influence efforts to integrate public schools across the nation, the Connecticut Supreme Court declared Tuesday that segregation in the Hartford area schools violates the state constitution.

The ruling was a victory for the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People and other civil rights groups, which have been turning to the state courts to achieve desegregation at a time when such efforts are being severely limited in the federal courts.

David J. Armor, a George Mason University professor, described the Connecticut ruling as the most important desegregation decision since 1974, when the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling in a Detroit case that made it more difficult for plaintiffs to win court-ordered busing between cities and suburbs.

“With the success here, you are going to see the same lawsuit filed in other states,” predicted Armor, who noted that such a case is already being argued in Minnesota.

Even though the state’s high court ruled, 4 to 3, in favor of the plaintiffs in this case, the justices stopped short of ordering what steps must be taken to improve the education of students. They left it up to the governor and the legislature.

The suit had asked the court to require a merger of Hartford city schools with those in the suburbs.

Schools in Hartford have a 95% minority enrollment and those in the surrounding suburban towns have less than 10% minorities. This racial isolation is largely the product of New England-style government, in which each small town runs its own schools.

“The public elementary and high school students in Hartford suffer daily from the devastating effects that racial and ethnic isolation, as well as poverty, have had on their education,” Chief Justice Ellen Ash Peters wrote in the majority decision. “We hold today that the needy schoolchildren of Hartford have waited long enough.”

Connecticut Atty. Gen. Richard Blumenthal, who represented the state, said after the ruling: “There will be many who are disappointed with this decision. . . . We disagree and fear the consequences.”

The suit, Sheff vs. O’Neill, was filed in April 1989. It took its name from the lead plaintiff, Milo Sheff, a Hartford fourth-grader, and the chief defendant, then-Gov. William A. O’Neill.