Busing and Race
What exactly were Kamala Harris and Joe Biden arguing about?
Millennials and others were left scratching their heads after Kamala Harris confronted Joe Biden during the first Democratic Presidential debate over his position on “busing.”
I’m fifty-one years old now and I remember as a child, whose family lived in Canada at the time, being asked by an older boy what I thought about busing. The question made no sense to me, and I responded that busing should be unnecessary if there is a school within walking distance. In my ignorance, little did I know I had just labeled myself a racist.
It’s hard to imagine now that a generation ago, busing was one of the most divisive issues ever to face our country. With Brown v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court permanently outlawed “separate but equal” schools for people of different racial backgrounds.
You see, in the 1950s people went to their neighborhood schools. Due at least in part to our national housing policy, Black Americans settled in certain neighborhoods, White people settled in others. The result was continued segregation just because people went to the school near them.
Then, in 1971, the Supreme Court responded to this continuing problem in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education. In that case, the Court held…
