Separate is “inherently unequal,” the Supreme Court declared nearly 70 years ago. Today, journalists and educators are working overtime to tell us that Brown v. Board of Education was written with an asterisk.
But the attorneys we spoke with were flabbergasted by the notion that black-only courses, even voluntary ones, would hold up in court.
William Trachman, a former official in the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, said that the Title VI law that bans race discrimination by federally funded programs “does not distinguish between mandatory and optional activities.”
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