The Dream Is Over

Because they regard the city as an ideal mirror of U.S. tastes, dozens of companies use Denver to test-market new products. If the same holds true of racial attitudes, then a key election in Denver last week suggests that Americans oppose school integration (at least via bussing) by 21 to one.

The vast majority of Denver's elementary schools are de facto segregated. Almost two-thirds of the white pupils attend schools that are more than 85% white; in predominantly black schools, the pupils are rapidly falling behind in their studies. Goaded by the murder of Martin Luther King last year, the Denver school board sought a drastic remedy: make each Denver school reflect the overall ethnic composition of the city's 96,000 pupils--65% white, 20% Mexican-American and 15% Negro.

By a vote of 5 to 2, the board approved a bussing plan, due to start next fall, that would have sent more than 500 whites to predominantly black schools and guaranteed that no minority-area school would be less than 70% white. The plan was less than satisfactory to the Rev. Jesse R. Wagner, co-chairman of a black-white group called Citizens for One Community that wanted fuller integration. Still, he worked hard for the bussing scheme--in contrast to Denver's black separatists, who told Wagner, in effect: "Do your thing and you'll see."

What he and other Negro integrationists saw was a strong backlash by anti-bussing whites. Last week the whites got a chance to express their feelings when a record 50% of Denver's registered voters turned out for the school-board election. At issue were two six-year seats on the seven-member board. In seeking those seats, Lawyer James C. Perrill and Frank K. Southworth, a real estate man, ran primarily "against forced bussing and for neighborhood schools." They won by a landslide, switching the board majority to 4 to 3 against integration.

In Negro precincts, the pro-integration vote ran as high as 10 to 1; the heaviest vote against it came from white precincts that were totally unaffected by bussing now but fearful of it in the future. As a result, bussing is highly unlikely in Denver. Said Jesse Wagner: "The dream is over. The white majority is not willing to take on the commitment and make our country one." Unfortunately, Denver's whites have also strengthened the city's black separatists.

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