By Associated Press
Montgomery, AL – Alabama's long-running college desegregation case has ended with a federal judge ruling that segregation policies and conditions in its higher education system have been eliminated. U-S District Judge Harold Murphy on Tuesday approved agreements that settle the 25-year-old case. All that remains are some court-ordered expenditures by the state.
Murphy issued the two major orders in the case and others approved other agreements. They include additional courses, new money for classroom buildings, diversity scholarship and endowment funds for the state's historically black universities.
There's also the creation of a unified Alabama Cooperative Extension Service, increased funding for a need-based scholarship program, and agreements by the historically white universities and some two-year schools to boost their numbers of black faculty and administrators.
The state has appropriated or set aside nearly 210 (m) million dollars to carry out Murphy's orders and most of that has gone to Alabama A-and-M University and Alabama State University.
Six objections were filed to settling the case. But Murphy said the objections were not enough to justify disapproving the agreements. Retired teacher Alease Sims of Birmingham, a plaintiff in the suit, said the legal fight accomplished a lot.
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)