Whites’ freedom to flee schools was denied because it exposed segregationist logic as self-defeating

Evidence

School officials, however, worried about setting other precedents. First, they feared that giving whites the freedom to change schools would allow blacks to change as well. That precedent would destroy the pupil placement program and thus, the attorney general warned, “lead to massive wholesale integration of the worst sort.” Second, the Atlanta school board worried that other whites would make transfer requests, too. Only the Melkilds had thought to make the request during the two-week window for applications, but many more expressed interest after the window closed. For these reasons, the school board believed that letting Sandra Melkild change schools would destroy the city’s entire program of token integration. — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 369

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Freedom of association was defined negatively as the right to exclude, not positively — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 373; Pool desegregation appeared peaceful only because whites fled rather than accepted it — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 289; White families fled to suburbs rather than send children to integrated schools — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project: A New American Origin…, 1187

Broader Connections

• White families fled to suburbs rather than send children to integrated schools #corroborates (0.82) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1187