voluntary
compliance appeared futile. At the end of the 1964 school year more
than 76,300 military dependents, including 6,177 black children, at
forty-nine installations attended segregated schools. Another 14,390
children on these same bases attended integrated schools, usually (p. 598)
grade school, on the military base itself.[23-63] Because of the
restrictions against base closings and off-limits sanctions, there was
little hope that base commanders could produce any substantial
improvement in this record. Fitt admitted that the Department of
Defense could not compel the integration of a school district. He
recognized that it was impossible to establish an accredited
twelve-grade system at the forty-nine installations, yet at the same
time he considered it "incompatible with military requirements" to
assign black servicemen with children to areas where only integrated
schools were available. Even the threat to deny impacted-area aid was
limited because in many communities the services' contracts with local
school districts to educate dependent children was contingent on
continuous federal aid. If the aid was stopped the schools would be
closed, leaving service children with no schools to attend.[23-64]

[Footnote 23-63: Memo, DASD (CR) for Under SA et al.,
25 May 64, sub: Off-Base Equal Opportunity
Inventories, copy in CMH.]

[Footnote 23-64: For an example of how these contracts
for the education of dependents were tied to
federal aid, see the case concerning Columbus Air
Force Base, Mississippi, as discussed in Ltr, DASD
(CR) to J. Francis Pohlhous, NAACP, 5 Nov 63. For
the views of the secretary's race counselor on the
Fitt assessment, see Ltr, Evans to Mrs. Frank C.
Eubanks, 10 Jun 64. Copies of both in CMH.]

The only practical recourse for parents of military dependents, Fitt
believed, was to follow the slow process of judicial redress under
Title IV of the civil rights bill then moving through Congress.
Anticipating the new law, Fitt asked the services to provide him with
pertinent data on all school districts where military dependents
attended segregated schools. He planned to use this information in
cooperation with the Departments of Justice and Health, Education, and
Welfare for use in federal