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This chapter examines several court decisions pertaining to distributive justice and the school system in order to present a fuller portrait of the “Milliken” and “Marshallian” theories of democracy. It discusses two types of cases in particular. First, the chapter interprets cases involving race, especially segregation and voluntary pupil assignment, as confrontations between these two theories of democracy. Second, it provides a somewhat briefer treatment to the cases that arise out of the challenges to the states' public school funding schemes on behalf of low-income students.

By some fateful fortuitous circumstance, the first fighting of Negro troops in the Mississippi Valley during the War of the Rebellion was as severe and fruitless as that of their brethren and comrades in the Department of the South. Port Hudson and Fort Wagner, where Negro soldiers earned their reputation for valor, were much alike. Both were strongly fortified; one was protected by a bayou under its very guns, the other had made captive the ocean in its treacherous trenches; and in each instance, the service to be performed demanded the highest qualities of courage, steadiness, endurance, and prompt obedience. The battle of Milliken's Bend will always rank as one of the hardest-fought actions of the Civil War. The battle of Poison Springs in Arkansas was one of those decisive engagements wherein individual valor is severely tested and conspicuously displayed. Colonel J. M. Williams was in command of a train-guard comprising the First Kansas Negro Volunteers, the Eighteenth Iowa Infantry, and a detachment of the Second Kansas Cavalry.

Testimony to the martial valor of the Negro soldiers during the War of the Rebellion comes from both friends and foes. The Negro troops exhibited the highest qualities of soldiership at Port Hudson in repeatedly assaulting the enemy in strong works with great physical obstructions to contend with. At Milliken's Bend they were raw recruits, and yet they did their fighting with bayonets. At Olustee and Honey Hill, at Poison Springs and Chaffin's Farm, the Negro soldier proved that he was endowed with that military intelligence of unit which makes the concrete strength of an army. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton said that at Petersburg, the hardest fighting was done by the black troops. Other witnesses to the courage shown by Negro soldiers during the war include Major-general James G. Blunt, Major-general S. A. Hurlbut, General George C. Strong, Brevet-major-general Thomas J. Morgan, and Colonel John A. Foster. Of the 178,975 Negro soldiers in the United States Volunteer army, 36,847 were killed, wounded, or missing.

The introduction provides an overview of key legal cases and historical concepts related to metropolitan school desegregation. It also presents the rationale behind contemporary regionalism and discusses how the two movements overlap and differ. The central argument of the book—that new evidence related to the success of metropolitan school desegregation efforts in combating both housing and school segregation must inform the regional agenda—follows. The introduction closes with a synopsis of the significance of the South and the four metro areas examined throughout the book.

This chapter carefully describes how school district boundaries help structure segregation in our highly urbanized country. Drawing upon evidence from education, sociology, political science and law, it argues that politicized, invisible walls give shape to segregation in schools and communities and makes the case for why that still matters. The ongoing link between racial and economic segregation and unequal opportunity is contrasted with the current educational policy paradigm that largely ignores the fundamental importance of such issues. The chapter contends that today’s regionalism addresses problems related to metropolitan fragmentation, but often does so to the exclusion of critical conversations about educational opportunity.

On January 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation was issued. The Proclamation gave official federal authorization to use black troops as part of the Union’s war strategy. Thereby, northern blacks now had the opportunity to fight for their country, prove their worthiness for citizenship, and help bring an end to slavery. The 54th Massachusetts Infantry became the first black regiment formed in the North. Many other black regiments were to follow. Prominent abolitionists and black leaders such as Frederick Douglass, and a host of other black men and women, helped recruit for black regiments. Not all northerners agreed blacks would make effective soldiers. However, as the war progressed, most doubters would become believers, especially after black troops performed bravely at three key early battles in 1863: Port Hudson on May 27th; Milliken’s Bend on June 7th; and the 54th Massachusetts famous charge at Fort Wagner on July 18th.

Grant and Porter were now focused on capturing Vicksburg. Although supported by naval gunfire, the assault was repulsed, so Grant decided to lay siege to the rebel stronghold. On May 27 the Cincinnati was ordered to shell rebel batteries, but, heavily damaged, it ran ashore and sank. When Confederate soldiers attacked US Colored Troops defending Milliken’s Bend, Porter sent the new ironclad Choctaw and the veteran Lexington to chase them into the woods. Meanwhile, Walke took the Lafayette to Simmesport to clear out a nest of rebels. Banks’s second attack on Port Hudson also failed.

With Maj. Gen. U. S. Grant’s campaign against Vicksburg presenting an increasing threat to that vital river fortress, Confederate authorities in Richmond called for Confederate forces in the trans-Mississippi to cooperate with the city’s garrison to raise the siege. A division of Texas troops struck the Federal line on the west bank of the Mississippi River, but, after achieving initial success, were repulsed by Union gunboats.

This chapter looks at Black struggles for equal rights during the 1960s and 1970s, first assessing the impact of the Vietnam War on Blacks, with Muhammad Ali drawing the link between the war and the denial of civil rights to Blacks. The chapter looks closely at the sit-in movement that started in the 1940s and spread across the country, followed by convoys of buses in Freedom Rides marked by White mob violence, beatings, and hundreds of arrests. Activists from the Congress of Racial Equality and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee launched a “Freedom Summer” campaign in 1964 to register Black voters in Deep South states; the fierce White resistance included the murders of more than twenty Black and White volunteers. The chapter then shifts focus to Detroit, as the city became progressively more Black with the flight of several hundred thousand Whites from city to suburbs. The racial segregation of Black children in Detroit schools, while the suburban schools were virtually all-White, led to an NAACP lawsuit that resulted in a judicial order for large-scale busing between Detroit and its suburbs. This case, Milliken v. Bradley, ended in 1974 with a 5–4 Supreme Court decision that banned busing across school district lines, with a passionate dissent by Justice Thurgood Marshall; that year also saw violent White resistance to a busing order in Boston.