When Judge Jack Weinstein initially issued a court order to integrate District 21 schools, he proposed a wide-reaching plan that called for the Board of Education, District 21’s school board, and private real estate developers and housing officials to integrate the district’s neighborhoods and schools.
The all-white board of Community School District 21 in Brooklyn approved a proposal to desegregate Mark Twain Junior High School by making it a school for “gifted and talented” students - or, in the language of the day, students in “special progress” or “rapid advancement” classes.
The Negro Family: A Case for National Action (excerpt) Daniel Patrick Moynihan Office of Policy Planning and Research United States Department of Labor March 1965
Signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on June 2, 1964, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed discrimination based on race, religion, sex, and national origin.
