Randall v. Sumter School District

Front: Though the U.S. Supreme Court had declared racially segregated school unconstitutional in the landmark decision Brown v. Board (1954), school boards in much of the South maintained segregated school systems well into the 1960s. This included Sumter School District No. 2, which served families stationed at Shaw AFB. In 1963, 14 African American airmen from Shaw challenged the legality of the segregated system. Reverse: The lead plaintiff was Col. James E. Randall, who had been a Tuskegee Airmen and flew missions in Korea and Vietnam, and renowned civil rights attorneys Matthew J. Perry and Ernest Finney Jr. argued the case. In Aug. 1964 the U.S. District Court ruled that Sumter County’s segregated school system violated the rights of the plaintiffs and ordered Sumter Co. to begin district-wide desegregation in the fall of 1965.