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Judge orders Virginia county to replace Confederate names it restored to schools
🇺🇸 United States /Crime & Justice

Judge orders Virginia county to replace Confederate names it restored to schools

From PBS NewsHour · () English

Translated from English, summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.

At a glance

News From a news agency Outcome reported
  • A federal judge ordered a Virginia county school board to replace Confederate names on two schools, ruling the decision discriminated against Black students.
  • The judge stated that reinstating names like Stonewall Jackson and Ashby-Lee, associated with segregation, violates the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause.
  • The ruling is seen as a victory by the Virginia NAACP, which argued the names inflicted racially disproportionate harm and were impossible to explain outside of racial bias.

A federal judge has mandated that Shenandoah County, Virginia, must again rename two schools that had their Confederate-era names reinstated. U.S. District Judge Michael F. Urbanski ruled that the school board's decision to revert to names like Stonewall Jackson High School and Ashby-Lee Elementary violated the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause, discriminating against Black students.

The Confederate names were restored with complete awareness of their historic legacy and ongoing discriminatory impact.

— Judge Michael F. UrbanskiIn his opinion explaining the ruling against the school board's decision.

The judge emphasized that these names are "vestiges" of the county's segregationist past. He wrote that the "affirmative act of reinstating these vestiges of segregation is far more problematic than a passive failure to remove a long-standing name or symbol." Urbanski ordered the board to select new names on a "racially nondiscriminatory basis with all deliberate speed," stressing that schools should provide an educational environment free from such discriminatory symbols.

In the court's view, the affirmative act of reinstating these vestiges of segregation is far more problematic than a passive failure to remove a long-standing name or symbol.

— Judge Michael F. UrbanskiExplaining why the reinstatement of Confederate names was particularly egregious.

The Virginia NAACP, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of six students and their parents, hailed the ruling as a "decisive victory." Rev. Cozy Bailey, president of the NAACP Virginia State Conference, stated that honoring Confederate leaders in schools has a long history of racial discrimination and that the board's 2024 renaming decision could only be understood through a racial lens. Kaitlin Banner, deputy legal director at the Washington Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, added that the court recognized the "real, racially disproportionate harm" inflicted by such names.

The school board's 2024 renaming decision is impossible to explain except through the lens of race.

— Rev. Cozy BaileyPresident of the NAACP Virginia State Conference, commenting on the ruling.
DistantNews Editorial

Originally published by PBS NewsHour in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.

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