Survey of Student Opinion Toward Desegregation at the University of Tennessee

The South is currently undergoing a period of transition for the traditional values, basic to a southern way of life, were upset by the 1954 Supreme Court decision concerning the desegregation of public schools. This ruling intensified the conflict between these traditional beliefs and attitudes of white supremacy and the fundamental principles of Christianity and democracy. Such conflict will not easily be resolved because it inevitably involves emotional behaviors which are not subject to logic or reason. The decision of the Supreme Court permitted the process of desegregation to be worked out by the local educational boards with all possible haste. Some three years following the decision, most of the South appears to be playing a waiting game. As a result of the actions of individual courts, the process of desegregating the elementary and secondary schools is progressing with mixed results.