Riddick v. School Board of the City of Norfolk

Judith Brooks-Buck

The national resegregation movement began with a little-known case resolved in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, Riddick et al. v. School Board of the City of Norfolk, Virginia (1986). In 1986, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the case, but the strategy employed by the attorneys in Riddick took on a life of its own. Exploiting the notion of unitary status—the dissolution of dual school systems—and capturing the support of an ineffective Justice Department, attorneys for the School Board of the City of Norfolk employed an approach that served as the impetus for disassembling desegregation efforts. Pledging support for diversity and touting the progress made since the end of massive resistance in the Norfolk, the board successfully avoided court oversight, promised a reversal of White flight trends, and resegregated 12 elementary schools by both race and class. Since Riddick , schools throughout the South have found ways to ...

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