Rubey M. Hulen

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Rubey Mosley Hulen was born July 9, 1894 [1] in Hallsville, Missouri. Hulen served as Boone County prosecutor and was nominated to the federal bench on July 8, 1943 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

In July, 1950, Judge Hulen issued a landmark injunction requiring the City of St. Louis, Missouri to open its Fairgrounds and Marquette swimming pools to people of color.

Judge Hulen's 1950 court order laid the groundwork for the May, 1954 United States Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal."

In his ruling, Judge Hulen "suggested that racial exclusion from any municipal pool, even if another truly equal pool were provided, might still violate the Constitution."[2] Hulen observed that a comparable pool "may mitigate discrimination, but it will not validate it as to other sections of the city."

Author Jeff Wiltse remarks that "Hulen seemed to be saying that a black swimmer who had to walk past a whites-only pool to get to a truly equal Jim Crow pool would not be receiving equal treatment under the law, as mandated by the Fourteenth Amendment."

This is the essence of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling, that a black student should not have to travel to a more distant segregated school. In that case, the plaintiff's daughter, Linda, a third grader, had to walk six blocks to her school bus stop to ride to Monroe Elementary, her segregated black school one mile away, while Sumner Elementary, a white school, was only seven blocks from her house[3].

In the St. Louis case, in the course of an exchange with the city's attorney (who happened to be named James Crowe), Judge Hulen asked rhetorically:

"Does the viewpoint of the community set aside the Constitution? Is the Constitution to be shelved for an hour, or set aside, because one part of the community happens to have an antipathy towards it?"

Background

On June 19, 1950, three African Americans attempted to enter the Fairgrounds Park Pool in St. Louis, Missouri, in contravention of the city's segregation policy, which had been re-instituted following one day of integration in 1949 which culminated in The Fairgrounds Park Riot. A pool attendant told the three African Americans attempting access in June, 1950 that they needed permits to enter the pool.

The St. Louis chapter of the NAACP sued in US District Court, seeking a court order requiring desegration of the city's swimming pools.

Death

Judge Hulen died July 7, 1956.

Scholarships

Rubey M. Hulen Memorial Honor Scholarships are awarded each year to outstanding entering University of Missouri - Kansas City law students from a fund provided by the will of Anna Hulen, widow of Rubey M. Hulen, a distinguished alumnus of the University of Missouri - Kansas City.

[edit] References

  1. ^ http://www.fjc.gov/public/home.nsf/hisj Federal Judicial Center: Biographical Directory of Federal Judges
  2. ^ Wiltse Jeff (2007). Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pool in America. The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, North Carolina. ISBN 978-0-8078-3100-7 p. 178
  3. ^ Brown v. Board of Education
  • Wiltse, Jeff (2007). Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pool in America. The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, North Carolina . ISBN 978-0-8078-3100-7.

[edit] External links