Ashcroft's Accuracy on Desegregation Challenged
By Dan Eggen and David A. Vise
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, January 18, 2001 ; Page A12
From The Washington Post
In his opening testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee this week, attorney general nominee John D. Ashcroft vigorously defended his fight against a landmark voluntary desegregation plan in St. Louis, arguing the state had "done nothing wrong" and "had been found guilty of no wrong" in the case.
But court documents show that a federal district judge ruled that the state was a "primary constitutional wrongdoer" in perpetuating segregated schools in St. Louis, both by denying blacks an equal education in the past and doing little to remedy the situation later. Appellate courts repeatedly upheld that conclusion, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear three appeals initiated by Ashcroft while he was the state's attorney general.
These and other discrepancies related to Ashcroft's opposition to desegregation plans in St. Louis and Kansas City have emerged as a key point of contention between Democratic and Republican senators during this week's hearings.
Ashcroft said Tuesday, for example, that "in all of the cases where the court made an order, I followed the order, both as attorney general and as governor."
But U.S. District Judge William Hungate threatened to hold
Ashcroft -- who was Missouri's attorney general – and the state in contempt in 1981 for "continual delay and failure to comply" with orders to file a desegregation plan. "The state has, as a matter of deliberate policy, decided to defy the authority of this court," Hungate wrote in a subsequent
order.
In a town forum three years later during his run for governor,
Ashcroft said he had done "everything in my power legally"
to fight the desegregation plan, according to a wire service account
."Just ask Judge Hungate, who threatened me with contempt,"
he said.
Ashcroft repeated his assertion yesterday that he had always complied
with court orders, but acknowledged that he had mounted
what he considered valid legal challenges to desegregation plans.
Ashcroft also sought yesterday to "clarify" other statements he made Tuesday, when he repeatedly told the committee that Missouri "had never been a party to the litigation" surrounding the St. Louis plan.
In fact, Missouri became a defendant in the case in 1977, during Ashcroft's first term as attorney general.
The battles over both districts extend back to lawsuits filed in the 1970s, in an era when Missouri's Constitution still included a segregation clause. Federal judges ordered and oversaw desegregation plans in both cities, including voluntary busing and magnet schools in St. Louis and a massive rebuilding effort in Kansas City, which was funded in part by tax increases ordered by the courts.
Ashcroft vigorously fought both plans, arguing that racial disparities were not the lingering effects of legal segregation and routinely chiding Hungate and other federal judges for the costs
In addition to making opposition to voluntary busing in St. Louis
a major theme in his inaugural run for governor in 1984, he lobbied the
Reagan Justice Department to join one of his FAILLED ATTEMPTS
to reverse the decision.
"I've been involved in dozens of cases for 30 years, and I have never
seen a public official act the way Ashcroft did," said Gary A. Orfield,
a Harvard University desegregation expert who helped craft
the St. Louis plan. "The SCHOOLS WERE IN RUINS, and there was
nothing but denial and obfuscation and obstruction at every stage from the state."
Orfield and other critics argue that Ashcroft, by dragging out
compliance with court orders and angering federal judges
in two jurisdictions, is largely responsible for desegregation costs
to the state that surpassed $2.5 billion, according to most estimates.
Ashcroft's successor, Democratic Gov. (Mrs?) Mel Carnahan, settled both cases in 1999.
In his testimony to the committee, Ashcroft said he fought the
desegregation plans because he felt federal judges had exceeded their authority, that the state
had been ordered to shoulder an unfair portion of the cost and that racial imbalances were caused
by white flight unconnected to state actions.
"I opposed a mandate by the federal government that the state, which had done nothing wrong . . . should be asked to pay this very substantial sum of money over a long course of years," Ashcroft said Tuesday in reference to the St. Louis case. "I have always opposed segregation. I have never opposed integration."
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) has spent much of his speaking time in the past two days attacking Ashcroft's "relentless opposition" and "scorched-earth" legal challenges to the St. Louis plan.
"My question is, how costly was this going to be, Senator Ashcroft, before you were going to say that those kids were going in lousy schools, that you were going to do something about it?" Kennedy thundered on Tuesday.
Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said Kennedy had taken Ashcroft's comments and actions out of context.
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