Misleading the Issue of Evidence
The Social Science Statement submitted to the Supreme Court in the Brown hearings in 1953, was an excerpted draft from a report, "The Effects of Prejudice and Discrimination," presented at the Midcentury White House Conference on Children and Youth in 1950.*
The 1950 Draft and the 1953 Social Science Statement are different documents, of course, because the Statement is only (est.) 3800 words, while the Draft is (est.) 10,000 words. The Statement generally addresses "segregated groups," while making it clear it was focusing on the American Negro. The Draft addresses, in addition to Black Americans, Jews, Mexicans, and Italians as minorities who had received prejudice and discrimination. The Draft drew extensively on social science studies of Anti-Semitism. This subject was omitted from the Statement.
The main difference between the Statement and the Draft concerns the evidence for findings about the effect of segregation on African American children. Presented to other social scientists, and to a federal agency that employed social scientists, the Draft made it clear that there was little scientific evidence regarding the effect of prejudice, discrimination, and/or segregation on the personality formation of African American children.
"In spite of a wealth of material on the existence of prejudice and discrimination, on its origins, and on means of reducing these un-American attitudes, there is little in the scientific literature on the precise effects of prejudice and discrimination on health of personality."(Pp. 135-136.)
There was more research conducted on the effects of segregation on other ethnic and racial minorities, than on African Americans; so the author of the Draft intended to draw upon those studies. Making inferences was difficult, however, because children of different groups reacted differently to segregation; caution was warranted:
"In connection with what follows it must be remembered, however, the various minority groups that are affected by prejudice and discrimination differ greatly in their situation, and that the impact of adverse circumstances varies considerably from individual to individual. There are great differences between the situations of, say, Jews and Negroes, and within each group there are further differentiations."(Pp. 136.)
The admonition about evidence was repeated later in the Draft in a cautionary remark about research methods:
"Unfortunately for scientific accuracy and adequacy, thoroughly satisfactory methods of determining the effects of prejudice and discrimination on health of personality have not yet been devised, nor has a sufficient number of studies dealing with the various minority groups been made."(Pp. 140.)
Concern about inaccurate research methods was reinforced by quoting from scientific study by the social scientist, Otto Klineberg:
"'Conclusions obtained through the use of tests cannot be more valid than the test used.... Completely satisfactory research in this field will have to wait until psychologists have devised more adequate measure for the study of personality.'"(Pp.140.)
Such frank characterization of inadequacy in previous research studies and caution regarding available research methods is expected and appropriate in scientific study. Within the context of such prefatory explanation, the Draft then draws tentative conclusions, carefully qualifying inferences to restrict them to the available evidence.
The Statement** abandoned the tone of scientific caution. While disentangling the effects of segregation from other forms of discrimination was difficult, the Statement acknowledged, evidence permitted social scientists to present findings confidently. Notice the shift in language in the Statement's characterization of the Midcentury White House Conference's findings.
"It [the Conference's report] highlighted the fact that ..."(P. 495).
"The report goes on to point out that ..."(P. 496.)
"The report indicates ..."(P. 496; this language is repeated several times, p. 496.)
"The evidence suggests ..."(P. 496.)
"Studies have show ..."(P. 496.)
"On the basis of this general fund of knowledge, it seems likely ..."(P. 497.)
"It may be noted that many of these social scientists supported their opinions on the effects of segregation ... by reference to one or another or several of the following four lines of published and unpublished evidence..."(P. 498.)
"The available scientific evidence indicates that much, perhaps all, ..."(P. 498.)
"The most direct evidence available on this problem comes from observations and systematic study of instances in which desegregation has occurred. Comprehensive reviews of such instances clearly establish the fact that ..."(P. 498.)
"The available evidence also suggests ..."(P. 499.)
Only at the end of the Statement do its authors acknowledge that the language of the Statement constitutes a shading and an interpretation of incomplete and inadequate research:
"The problem with which we have here attempted to deal is admittedly on the frontiers of scientific knowledge. Inevitably, there must be some differences of opinion among us concerning the conclusiveness of certain items of evidence, and concerning the particular choice of words and placement of emphasis in the preceding statement. We are nonetheless in agreement that this statement is substantially correct and justified by the evidence ..."(P. 499.)
Whether the social science research summarized in the Statement constituted a sufficiently strong rock for the Court to anchor its findings on inequality of segregated schools is not the point of this brief article. Rather, the point has to do with the consequences of the Brown decision.
The Brown decision did more than end segregated public education; it forced a new educational philosophy into the schools, profoundly reshaping the content of instruction and changing the role of schools in American society for all students, not just formerly segregated students. It was for those other consequences, a revolution in the ontology of American life, that the social science research was an inadequate anchor.
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* [Kenneth B.Clark], "The Effects of Prejudice and Discrimination," pp. 135-158, in Helen L. Witmer and Ruth Kotinksy, editors, Personality in the Making: The Fact-Finding Report of the Midcentury White House Conference on Children and Youth, reprint edition ([1952, Harper & Brothers] Science and Behavior Books, Inc, Palo Alto, California, n.d.). The White House conference was apparently sponsored by the Children's Bureau, Federal Security Agency.
** Kenneth B. Clark, Isidor Chein, and Stuart W. Cook, "The Effects of Segregation and the Consequences of Desegregation; A Social Science Statement," reprinted in American Psychologist 59 (September 2004), 495-501.
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