Consolidated Parent Group (Washington, D.C.)

Organized in 1947 to oppose segregation in Washington, D.C., public schools.

From the description of Consolidated Parent Group records, 1947-1955. (Moorland-Spingarn Resource Center). WorldCat record id: 780439949

In the fall of 1947, a group of concerned citizens and parents of Washington, D.C. organized an investigative committee to examine inadequacies of the educational facilities at the Brown Junior High School. With the passage of time the Brown Junior High School Parent Group grew to encompass more diversified supporters, including civil rights advocates as well as parents from other city high schools. By February 1948, the original alliance of parents had re-organized under the leadership of its original chairman, Gardner L. Bishop, who was also the Brown Junior High P.T.A. President. The organization renamed itself the Consolidated Parent Group, Inc.

Among some of the controversial issues at question were the perfunctory validity of the District of Columbia's Board of Education, which had been found to act selectively in favor of white schools. Throughout their struggle, the parent group demanded the unconditional resignation of the Board's Chairman, Hobart M. Corning. From the issue of over-crowding in Negro Schools-compared to unused space in white ones, grew the idea of desegregation of schools, with this point eventually becoming the pivot on which the organization operated.

Between the years 1947 and 1949 the Consolidated Parent Group, Inc., brought before the courts four cases with complaints of discrimination in the Washington, D.C. school system. None of these cases received a ruling and all of them were subsequently dropped from the courts. With the death of their lawyer, Charles H. Houston in 1949, the Consolidated Parent Group became less vocal and less public. However, that year also marked the beginning of a stronger alliance with the NAACP and three Negro lawyers who would eventually plead their case successfully before the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1954, the Consolidated Parent Group, Inc. witnessed a major victory as the aforementioned trio of attorneys, Thurgood Marshall, James Nabrit and George E.C. Hayes won a ruling to abolish segregation in the District of Columbia Schools and Schools in 48 states.

From the guide to the Consolidated Parent Group Inc. Records, 1947-1956, (Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, Howard University)