Battle over the Buckeye Three

In Louisiana, a federal and a state judge clash on busing

They were typical adolescent girls in central Louisiana, one fond of cheerleading, another keen on basketball, the third active in the school booster club.

Last week as they returned from Christmas vacation, the three found themselves caught up in a blizzard of nationwide publicity. No longer were they merely Ramona Carbo, 12, Lynda McNeal, 13, and Michelle LaBorde, 13. Suddenly they were the Buckeye Three.

The reason: they had become key figures in an unprecedented federal-state crossfire over desegregation.

The conflict began last August with a busing order by Federal District Judge Nauman Scott in Alexandria, La. Scott redrew local districts to put 107 seventh-and eighth-graders from the all-white Buckeye High School--including Carbo, McNeal and LaBorde--into the area served by the racially mixed Jones Street School in Alexandria, 15 to 20 miles away. Only 22 of the students complied. McNeal and LaBorde joined the majority who enrolled in private schools. A bogus address enabled Carbo to stay at Buckeye.

Then in November, the parents of the three got State Judge Richard Lee to approve a transfer of custody to friends who lived within the Buckeye district.

Scott denounced the scheme as a "sham" and overturned Lee's decision.

As school opened, Lee directed Buckeye Principal Charles Waites to ignore Scott and re-enroll the girls. To make sure the principal got the message, Lee sent the trio to school accompanied by four state troopers. The federal judge issued an order banishing the troopers. Lee countered by escorting the girls himself for the next two days. But the Justice Department sought a contempt of court ruling against Lee, and even the Buckeye Three stopped showing up at school. This week is expected to bring a dramatic face-off between Lee and Scott over the contempt motion--in Scott's courtroom.

Lee reasons that since custody has become an issue, the dispute centers on family law, traditionally the purview of state courts.

Under the Constitution's Supremacy Clause, however, a federal judge has the power to look through state law questions and, if they are evasions of federal law, to disregard them.

"He's off the wall," insists Virginia Law Professor A.E. Dick Howard.

This week's hearing probably will result in a simple choice for Lee: fall in line or continue to risk a fine of up to $1,000 a day. The contempt papers also name a constable who assisted Lee as an escort, Waites, the school superintendent, the parents and the friends who took custody of the three girls.

For many local residents, the case has at least provided a chance to vent frustrations over their inability to control their schools as they see fit. "People are fed up." says Waites. "We have a say-so over Judge Lee; we elected him. But not over Judge Scott." Bumper stickers have sprouted, reading LEE IS HOT--SCOTT IS NOT. A Mobile, Ala., lawyer who is president of the conservative Taxpayers Education Lobby has arrived in town to represent Lee, frankly "looking for a classic confrontation." Says Dan C. Alexander Jr., with obvious relish, "This is the first time we've found a state judge who would say no to a federal court."

The two judges pair off in more than judicial philosophy. According to one person who knows them both, Lee, 44, is a country boy who drinks bourbon, coaches Little League and says he is descended from Robert E. Lee; Scott, 64, is a city boy who favors Scotch, plays golf and reads.

Justice Department officials, however, are eager to avoid intensifying the conflict or arousing memories of Governor George Wallace's defiant stand before a doorway at the University of Alabama when two blacks tried to enter under a federal order. They are reluctant, for instance, to call in marshals to keep the Buckeye Three out of the white school.

Says one official: "The purpose is not to re-fight the Civil War."

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