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Complex Justice: The Case of Missouri v. Jenkins

by
Joshua M. Dunn (Author)
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Joshua M. Dunn (Author)
4.8 out of 5 stars 4 customer reviews
ISBN-13: 978-0807831397
ISBN-10: 0807831395
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Product Details

  • Hardcover: 240 pages
  • Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press (April 14, 2008)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0807831395
  • ISBN-13: 978-0807831397
  • Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.5 x 0.8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
  • Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,012,488 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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5.0 out of 5 starsinteresting guide to an interesting problem
By Michael Lewyn VINE VOICE on September 4, 2014
Format: Hardcover
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, a federal judge from a conservative background ordered some unusual remedies in a Kansas City, Mo. school desegregation case; instead of requiring busing or manipulating school attendance zone boundaries, he sought to improve city schools (and thus bring whites to Kansas City from the suburbs, thus integrating city schools) by ordering tax increases leading to billions of dollars of spending, raising teacher salaries by 44 percent, reducing class sizes so that student-teacher ratios were less than 13-1 (well below the national average), and ordering the creation of gold-plated magnet schools with magnificent physical facilities. The results were dismal: white enrollment continued to decline (ensuring segregated schools) and student test scores did not improve.

What went wrong? Dunn points out that the magnet school format was unlikely to work, because white suburbanites were basically satisfied with their schools, and both whites and blacks were more interested in quality basic education than the exotic curricula of magnet schools.

This book explains why the judge endorsed the policies he did. Judge Clark (the trial court judge presiding over the Kansas City case) was not a left-wing activist; however, he was constrained by Eighth Circuit and Supreme Court precedent that (1) required some sort of aggressive action in urban school districts, even those that had sought to comply in good faith with earlier supreme court decisions but (2) prohibited busing students to or from suburban school districts, thus ensuring that the Kansas City schools would forever continue to be overwhelmingly African-American.Read more ›
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5.0 out of 5 starsComplex Justice
By Barbara Madden on May 10, 2012
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
I am finding this book fascinating. The subject matter is complex, but the author has taken the time to synthesize the material so a layperson can understand deeply and meaningfully. I recommend that all education leaders and political leaders take the time to read Complex Justice. To paraphrase a great quote--if we do not know our history, we are destined to repeat it--over and over again to the detriment of our young people.
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4.0 out of 5 starsThis was never about race it was about taxes.
By Andre Lynch on September 3, 2013
Format: Kindle Edition Verified Purchase
As the author stated this is a mostly forgotten case. I only remember because I lived in Kansas City at the time. However I never attended the Kansas City school District. I remember vividly the number of times tax increases were put to a vote of people and it failed every single time. So supporters of increased taxation used this farce of a desegregation case to steal more money from the people and got a federal judge to sign off on it. However as the author shows this case was never about desegregation or about improving the education for local children it was about corrupt politicians stealing more money from the local citizens.
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5.0 out of 5 starsExpensive "Justice" in Kansas City
By Ronald E. Parsons on April 13, 2011
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
<Complex Justice> is about a relatively recent but little remembered (unless you happen to have been a Kansas City, MO or Missouri taxpayer) case in which a federal judge took control of a large city's school system to bring black students' test scores up to the level of white students'. Though he (1) ordered Kansas City, MO taxes to be raised, (2) diverted Missouri state taxes to the Kansas City (MO) School District, and (3), caused around two BILLION dollars to be spent to "upgrade" the school system which served mostly black students, the results were zero. It was a waste of 2 BILLION dollars by a federal court which thought it had all of the answers about how to raise black test scores -- and which didn't mind going through 2 BILLION dollars of taxpayers' money like a drunk at the racetrack in the losing gamble on an impossible result..

If the court and its "experts" had read massive psychological data on record at the time, they would have known that test scores depend on IQ which is (1), largely inherited and cannot be raised significantly, and (2), that black IQ in the U.S. is around 15 points (1 standard deviation) lower than white IQ on the bell curve. A good argument can be made that the court and its so-called experts were grossly negligent in taking the actions they took.

Joshua Dunn, author of <Complex Justice> did an excellent job in putting the account of the case, Missouri v. Jenkins, clearly and succinctly into book form easily understood by anyone having the sense to read it. This book is unlikely to be a best seller because it is not the type to attract a wide audience. Never mind.Read more ›
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