Buttars 'rephrases': Senator says desegregation decision was big but not perfect

Sen. Chris Buttars on Tuesday recanted his comment that Brown v. Board of Education was "wrong to begin with," saying he believes the decision that desegregated the nation's public schools was monumental but not perfect.

"I thought, my goodness, it was a great decision, but there is a down side," Buttars said. "I made one sentence; I guess I didn't phrase it right."

Buttars said Tuesday he was surprised when asked about the monumental 1954 Supreme Court decision Monday on KVNU-AM radio in Logan while discussing judicial activism and the roles of the courts.

On the radio, Buttars said "Well, I think Brown v. Board of Education is wrong to begin with," then declined to discuss the matter further, citing time constraints.

On Tuesday, Buttars told the Deseret Morning News, "I think Brown v. Board of Education was a monumental step forward. It took that kind of a bullet to break through that segregation wall."

But Buttars said there were drawbacks to desegregation for some children who were taken out of neighborhood schools where they were in the majority, something he says is detailed in the book "Education Myths" by Jay Greene.

"He talks about how you had schools in the South that were really geared toward the special needs of minority kids," Buttars said. "Then all of a sudden you bused half those kids to a different school that maybe got more money, but they weren't geared to the needs of those kids."

Still, many were taken aback by Buttars' comments, including some Utahns who attended segregated schools.

Jeanetta Williams, president of the Salt Lake Branch of the NAACP, recalled being unable to finish reading schoolbooks with torn-out pages, handed down from white schools when Oklahoma schools were segregated.

And Forrest Crawford, education professor at Weber State University, doubted he'd hold his current position if it weren't for Brown v. Board and the civil rights movement that followed.

"I experienced enough of that segregation to know the underlying intent and debilitating impact it has," said Crawford, who grew up in Oklahoma. "The spirit of Brown really is sort of the blueprint for how we ought to celebrate and access the success of student achievement, particularly achievement among underrepresented students."

Crawford acknowledged the Brown ruling wasn't a perfect formula, in large part because the systemic infrastructure wasn't perfect to facilitate integration. He added that neighborhood schools may have been psychosocially more comfortable, but they were also underfunded.