[TAPE 1, SIDE A]

[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]

WILLIAM LINK:

We're on now. Let me just start by asking you to review the chronology here. You mentioned a little bit about that you arrived in HEW in 1969?

PETER HOLMES:

Yes.

WILLIAM LINK:

How did you get there?

PETER HOLMES:

I was working on the Hill as a legislative assistant to Senator Griffin, from Michigan, in late—or in '69. And a friend of mine who, at that time, legislative assistant to Senator Tom Keekle, a Republican from California. That friend being Leon Panetta, was asked by Bob Finch, the first secretary of HEW, under the Nixon administration, to come down to HEW as director of the Office for Civil Rights. Leon asked me and another person who was working on the Hill at the time, a fellow named Peter Gaugh, to join him. I handled his congressional relations for him. The other fellow handled his public relations, press relations. And then Leon was there as director for a year, then resigned, under fire. He was replaced by a fellow by the name of J. Stanley Pottinger, as director of the Office for Civil Rights in '70. And then Stan, in '73, was named assistant attorney general for Civil Rights at Justice, and I succeeded Stan Pottinger as director of the Office for Civil Rights, being named by the then secretary that was Cap Wineberger.

WILLIAM LINK:

You became director of OCR in 1973?

PETER HOLMES:

'73. I was there from '73 to mid-'75.

WILLIAM LINK:

Did you become director before or after the Pratt's order, Judge Pratt's order?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, I'm trying to think. What was the date of Pratt's order and I'll tell you. Do you recall?

WILLIAM LINK:

Well, I don't recall. I believe it was sometime in 1973.

PETER HOLMES:

I believe it was after—huh?

WILLIAM LINK:

It was sometime in '73.

PETER HOLMES:

It was in '73? It wasn't before '73? It was in '73?

WILLIAM LINK:

I'm pretty sure '73. Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, wait a minute. I became director afterwards, because Pratt's order was Adams vs. Richardson, and he was the secretary at the time—I guess he was the secretary at the time of the order. The suit was styled Adams v. Richardson. I was named by Wineberger, so I must have assumed the position of director after Pratt's order became effective.

WILLIAM LINK:

I see. Okay. Let me just ask you a general question about Bill Friday, since that's what my book is on. You had over, the course of your term as director of OCR, some dealings with Bill Friday.

PETER HOLMES:

Correct.

WILLIAM LINK:

Some negotiations that occurred. Just generally speaking, what you remember of it, how would you characterize those negotiations? How would you characterize his style as a negotiator?

PETER HOLMES:

I remember Bill Friday, and it's been a long time ago, as a very distinguished individual, committed to the higher education, wanting to work cooperatively, and negotiate cooperatively with the department in all respects, in trying to resolve the legal issue, of the continued duality of the higher education system in North Carolina. I have nothing but fond memories of him. And I found him a, as I say, cooperative, pleasant, cooperative, but also a very firm individual in his positions and what he felt that state was able to do in terms of responding.

WILLIAM LINK:

Any other people that you recall working with —

PETER HOLMES:

From North Carolina?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah, from North Carolina.

PETER HOLMES:

I don't. If you name some names I might remember, because there seems to me as though there was another individual that was with Friday a lot. And I can't remember.

WILLIAM LINK:

Raymond Dawson. Does that ring a bell?

PETER HOLMES:

No.

WILLIAM LINK:

He was a senior vice president. Cleon Thompson. He was a black vice president.

PETER HOLMES:

I remember that name vaguely.

WILLIAM LINK:

Felix Joyner?

PETER HOLMES:

No. No.

WILLIAM LINK:

It's probably Dawson, I think, would have been the person.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah, maybe Dawson, I just don't remember the name.

WILLIAM LINK:

Tell me a little bit about the Office of Civil Rights when you took over and—well, we're going back to 1969, since you've had a good bit of contact with it. Describe in a little bit more detail the problems that the office had, if it had problems—appeared it did in retrospect—particularly the problems in had in enforcing an order after 1973. I mean it must have been a tremendous challenge in a way to have been given such a blanket order from Pratt, that required so much without a great deal of specificity in a way.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. Well, I guess it—by necessity, I'll have to generalize. I mean, the Pratt order, I thought, was an unfortunate development, quite frankly. It, in effect, set down some very specific, very inflexible timetables, as I recall. Certainly very burdensome recording requirements on the office. Recording requirements that in effect required us to report directly to the plaintiffs in the case. And they, in effect, were—became a sort of ex officio representatives of the government, if you will, under the court order. I thought the order was unnecessary to begin with, because I felt like the department, in particularly, the Office for Civil Rights, very diligently was carrying it out its responsibilities under the law. The order was multifaceted. It had—it wasn't exclusively ready to the higher education issue, as you know so well.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

What it involved was the elementary and secondary education issues. Of course, the focus of the office had been—the focus of the office had been in the elementary and secondary education area. And it was in that period of '69, '70, '71, and '72, where a concerted effort was made to negotiate successfully in those southern border states, desegregation plans at the elementary and secondary level. The office was sort of, as I recall, and I don't want to misrepresent anything but, the issue of higher education and desegregation was an issue that was sort of—it was an issue that was raised, as I recall, by the former director of the Office of Civil Rights and the former administration, after the former president had lost reelection, and before the new president came in. As I recall, and I may misstate it, but it's my recollection, a number of letters were sent out officially citing for noncompliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act in the state higher education systems. This was a very difficult area. An extremely difficult area to work in. The law was not sharply defined. The—you did not have—you don't have compulsory attendance, such as you have in elementary and secondary levels. And the law, neither the law nor the policies were clearly defined with regard to the higher education desegregation issue. The mere fact, however, that those letters had been sent out, prior to the incoming Nixon administration, putting states on notice, were on the record. And, well, certain steps were taken in the period of '68 through '72 - '73, on the issue that the states, the fact that nobody had been brought to the bar and been cited for non-compliance—or not cited, but Federal funds cut off, what have you. It was sitting out there and Pratt through it in his order that you have to—that the office had to undertake certain steps with regard to higher education desegregation. Those were very difficult years. The focus of the policies, the focus of the initiatives of the Office for Civil Rights were not in the higher education area at the time. They were in the elementary and secondary education area. During that same period you had Executive Order 11246 that come up, dealing with employment, affirmative action in employment in higher education. Federally funded higher education systems throughout the country. So, much of our higher education divisions responsibilities at the time, during that period, were devoted primarily to enforce an Executive Order 11-246 of Higher Education Affirmative Action, standards with regard to higher education employment. Efforts with regard to the dual higher education systems in the south took a secondary to triciary place, quite frankly, in our policy priorities.

WILLIAM LINK:

So, most of your attention was occupied with these other matters?

PETER HOLMES:

Correct.

WILLIAM LINK:

And you dealt with this as it came out, sort of?

PETER HOLMES:

That's right.

WILLIAM LINK:

Did you feel yourself in something of a difficult position regarding this?

PETER HOLMES:

An extremely difficult position. I mean, you're in an extremely difficult—and I don't have it here but I have it—I have it at home, a picture sitting in the Cabinet Room at the White House with President Nixon, at the time, and the presidents of probably twenty-five black colleges from around the country, who—I don't know how they got the meeting with the President, but they got the meeting with the President to express their concern that the pressures with regard to higher education desegregation were going to

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spell the end, the demise of black colleges as we know them. It's a tough issue, yes. A very difficult issue. And the law was very unclear. And what is it? It's 1991, many, many years later and we still see the issue in the courts. We now see the Supreme Court taking surge on a case out of Mississippi. So, very difficult issues. And not clearly defined, you know, not —with very little law, very little policy on how you address the issues.

WILLIAM LINK:

What was the attitude generally of the White House? Was there much White House involvement? Or was it something —

PETER HOLMES:

I don't think there was much White House involvement. I mean, I refer to the fact that the black college presidents had a meeting with the President, with Nixon, in the White House, at the time. I mean, it was an issue—there was a domestic policy staff at the White House. They followed closely the enforcement of programs in the domestic policy area, by all the agencies, all the departments. But was there political interference? No, I don't think there was political interference by the White House at the time. Or anything that anyone could say related to that. There was a sensitivity—sensitivity at the White House, a sensitivity at the level of secretary of HEW. A sensitivity in the director of the Office for Civil Rights, that the area we were embarking on, by attempting to eliminate the vestiges of the duality in the higher education system was a very difficult area to address and one of which there was really no law or policy for. And a wide, a very wide—no unanimity. No unanimity whatsoever, within the Civil Rights community, or the black community, as to how the issue should be readdressed.

WILLIAM LINK:

At this point, in the early and mid-70s, it's my impression that the regional offices of OCR were very active, is this true?

PETER HOLMES:

Well—I mean, they were the ones on the front line that had the direct interrelationship with the higher education, or elementary and secondary school officials.

WILLIAM LINK:

They were kind of the point people?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, they were the people in the field that had the responsibilities to conduct the investigations, do the preliminary analysis of elementary and secondary education issue, and Executive Level 11-246 issue on higher education desegregation.

WILLIAM LINK:

I think in the case —

PETER HOLMES:

In terms of negotiating—and I probably in the first level of negotiations on the issue were carried out at the regional level. And then they would inevitably, depending on the issue, but particularly in the higher education area, the negotiations would go up into the national office at OCR.

WILLIAM LINK:

At some point they bring you in?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, at some point we would get in. Not only would they bring us in but we would insert ourselves. Because this was again, and I underscore an area without clear law or policies and so we were trying to develop policies, certain policies. And those were being developed at the national office, implemented at the local office. If there was a question as to the proper implementation or negotiations regarding the implementation of policies the national office always got involved. And there were all these questions that came up in the higher education areas, as to whether the policies

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were the proper policies to apply to this particular factual situation in North Carolina as opposed to South Carolina, or some other state.

WILLIAM LINK:

You left office in, let's see, 1975. I think you had left the OCR by the time—there was an intervention during 1975 over the case over the vet school. I don't know if that was after you left or not. I'm not entirely clear.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, the veterinary school was very much an issue during the negotiations with North Carolina. Yeah.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes. So you recall those specific negotiations?

PETER HOLMES:

I generally recall those negotiations, because there was an interest and desire, we thought a good faith demonstration on the part of the higher education system in North Carolina would be to put that veterinary school, I think it was a new School of Veterinary Medicine at one of the former black colleges.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. Tell me, off the record, tell me what was the resolution? Where is that school?

WILLIAM LINK:

It's at N.C. State. It's not at A&T, which is the black school.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. It is North Carolina State?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes. And of course what happened, I think that by the time the issue was resolved you were no longer director.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. No, no, I mean, because that issue lingered on, I know. Does it bother if I smoke a cigarette?

WILLIAM LINK:

No, not at all. No, what I happened, what made me think of it was—when I asked the question about the regional directors, the first part of the controversy was raised by William Thomas, who was the regional director in Atlanta.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah, yeah.

WILLIAM LINK:

And, in fact, he attended a Board of Governors meeting and presented a case, made a case, and wrote a very strong letter. Maybe—you remember all of this, I'm sure.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, vaguely.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

A very strong letter recommending the establishment of the Veterinary Medicine School at A&T.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes, actually. Recommending the reconsideration of the locational question. And the Board responded by agreeing to do a study, by an outside consultant, which eventually resulted in locating at State, rather than A&T. You mentioned earlier about the plaintiffs in the Adam's Case.

PETER HOLMES:

Right.

WILLIAM LINK:

The Legal Defense Fund. I'm sort of struck by the unusual position that the LDF, that you were suggesting earlier, I'm struck by it, too, the LDF held in this case. Over time it seems that if the LDF were working cooperatively, or working within the department almost. What kind of contacts developed with the LDF over the years?

PETER HOLMES:

Oh, we met with them frequently. Elliot Lichtman—Was that a [unclear]

WILLIAM LINK:

That's right. Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

I remember Elliot very well. I mean, we used to meet, you know, we'd meet with him periodically, give him reports on—I mean, we'd file reports with the court. We'd give him copies of the reports as to where we were. It almost became a numbers game, unfortunately, you know. Okay, you sent a letter out, you know, if you haven't followed up by—there were a lot of demands on the system. Okay. First of all, those higher education citation letters may or—maybe or maybe not should have been sent out by the director of the Office for Civil Rights, prior to the new administration coming in. I think it was done to embarrass the new administration, quite frankly. If I'd been director in the prior administration I would not have done that. I would have left that policy decision, that policy decision to the newly elected administration that was coming in.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

And the policy makers of HEW. They did it however. And it was out there and then it was incumbent upon the Office to follow up on it. When those letters were issued, and I hope I'm recalling this correctly, that those letters went out before it. If I'm not my whole thesis is wrong here. But that's my best recollection. The policies were not clearly thought through at the time of those letters. There was some ideas in the enforcement mechanism, in the enforcement unit, as to how you approach the issue of duality in higher education system. But they were not clearly thought out. There were policy suggestions that were the creation, I think, by and large, of people internally in the department, staff in the department, had not been fully explored or discussed with higher education of people with a broad experience in higher education. And particularly within the state systems of higher education. But nonetheless the letters went out. And when there wasn't sufficient follow up then we were exposed, that, "Hey, you sent a letter of citing noncompliance on such-a-such date in 1968, and here it is 1971, and you haven't even cut their funds off or negotiated an acceptable plan." So, "shit or get off the pot," pardon my French.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

And so we, the department, was exposed in that regard. The letters couldn't have been sent out, then you have the difficulty of how you're going to implement this. And what are you going to do? So, then you start into this process, a very lengthy process, as history as shown, as to how to address the issue? How do you address the issue? Of course, one of the things that we've focused on and thought was a reasonable approach was attempting to establish—to establish programs at formerly black institutions, as well as at formerly white institutions that would attract people of the other races. And a—a program of unique, special uniqueness, such as veterinary medicine. They didn't have a veterinary medicine school at State, I don't believe, at the time. That placement at A&T would certainly, for people who wanted to pursue veterinary medicine, black or white, would go to A&T and get that. Perhaps I'm

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jumping ahead. There may be arguments against doing that. There may be other programs that should be at A&T. There may be other approaches to enhancing the ability of A&T to attract whites. One might even argue that the placement of the Veterinary Medicine School, the special School of Veterinary Medicine at North Carolina State is going to increasingly attract blacks to North Carolina State. So, again, the difficulty of the issues.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. Was there much contact between your office and elements within the states, in this case North Carolina, for example, much communication that was going on either at an official level or particularly in an unofficial level with—between your office, people at your office, and any one at the, let's say the five traditionally black institutions, that you are aware of? Or recall?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, was there a lot of communications? Was there a lot of communication and discussion? Yes. I think that primarily focused with the representatives of the higher education system and the representatives of the black institutions. Okay. Now, I do not recall incidences, and again I could be wrong, that we sat down with the chancellor, or the president, or whoever, or whatever it is at North Carolina State, or the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, what have you, where we dealing with the representatives of the system, as well as having frequent contact with the head of the black institution, whose name I don't recall. Who was the head of the black institution?

WILLIAM LINK:

Well, they're five. And they were part of the—1973 coincided with the merger, essentially, or restructuring of the system that brought the black institutions into the university.

PETER HOLMES:

In the [unclear] system.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. So, there were actually five different chancellors. Lewis Dowdy would have been the person at A&T.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. Well, yeah, you had a chancellor for each of the campuses.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes.

PETER HOLMES:

Right. Dowdy. Yeah. I remember the name.

WILLIAM LINK:

The reason I'm asking is that I'm sure you're aware of this. And you would have been aware of this nationally. There's a great deal of ambivalence on the part of black educators about this whole question. A great deal of ambivalence.

PETER HOLMES:

The point I was making before.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

We're very much aware of it.

WILLIAM LINK:

Simultaneously they wanted enhancement, but at the same time they were very fearful of —

PETER HOLMES:

Of losing their racial identifiability.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

There's no question. I mean, that was the basis for these black college presidents to come in and see President Nixon at the time. And expressing concern that, yes, they wanted enhancements, they wanted to increase their financial support for their institutions. But that pressures to achieve numbers, goals, what have you, in terms of racial composition, would ultimately leave to the elimination of the racial identifiability, and thus undermine their ability to provide the type of educational opportunity they wanted to to minority students.

WILLIAM LINK:

Tell me about the people within the OCR that would have —

PETER HOLMES:

An argument that you didn't see in the elementary and secondary education level.

WILLIAM LINK:

You didn't. Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

Very seldom would you see the principal of the black school arguing that, "You can't require us to desegregate our school because this is going to hurt our—" You didn't have that attitude. It was unique to the higher education level.

WILLIAM LINK:

It's interesting, actually, you hear that now. I think that's in retrospect.

PETER HOLMES:

You hear what?

WILLIAM LINK:

From black elementary and secondary. The black community, in Greensboro, for example, that it was a lot better then than it is now. That may not be the case, but they say that.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. That's the argument.

WILLIAM LINK:

Who were some of the people within OCR that were most involved in this case, below the level of the director?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, Burt Taylor, Burton Taylor, who was head of the higher education system office. Mary Lepper was a woman that was—no, now you're really testing me. Our higher education division in OCR was, because the focus—because the focus of the program was in elementary and secondary education. There was not the support, personnel or otherwise, given to the higher education division of OCR, as you have known as elementary and secondary education. There was a person by the name of Burt Taylor who was sort of running that office. When the pressures—when the issue of Executive Board 11-246, and we can't overlook this, when the whole affirmative in higher education and employment issue—which had nothing to do with North/South, it was Federally assisted education institutions. When that became a policy focus of the office that issue tended to dominate over the issue of higher education desegregation. Okay.

WILLIAM LINK:

I see.

PETER HOLMES:

Because it was nationally scoped. And there was more unanimity, quite frankly more—the law was a little better defined. You had the EEOC. You had some employment cases. You had affirmative action cases that were better defined, thus the policies were better defined. At that time I named a person as head of—I either did or my predecessor did, I can't remember which, but Mary Lepper—L-E-P-P-E-R, who was a former executive,

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administrator with one of the higher education institutions. I can't remember which one. Where did I interview her? I interviewed her out in San Diego at a higher education conference. What University—I've forgotten what university she was—She came in for a couple of years and sort of headed that program there. But Burt Taylor was the guy who was in the higher education division and I think remains today. I think he's still very much involved in over at the Office of Education. He was the guy that had the closest handle on the higher education desegregation issue.

WILLIAM LINK:

In terms of division of labor would the policies emerge from his section, or his division?

PETER HOLMES:

That's correct. That's right.

WILLIAM LINK:

And then come to you?

PETER HOLMES:

Right.

WILLIAM LINK:

And Mary Lepper was working in that same office? That same —

PETER HOLMES:

Mary Lepper was head of that office. She was over Burt Taylor as head of that office.

WILLIAM LINK:

Burt Taylor was a person who came into OCR way back, didn't he?

PETER HOLMES:

Yes, he did. Yeah. He was there when I got—when we got there. He had been there for a number of years. A very able guy. A very able guy. And I think he's still there. Do you know his name? Do you know the name?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes, I've heard the name.

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah. I think Burt's still there.

WILLIAM LINK:

I was going to ask you about the—a couple of specific things. And just let me know if it's too fuzzy to answer, or do your best, I'd appreciate it. In early 1973 you wrote to the University of North Carolina an official letter that requested the development of the state plan. I wonder if you could recall, or what you recall, about the kind of response. And I don't mean the official response but the kind of contact that you might have had prior to the University of North Carolina's official response. You must have been in regular communication or had a series of —

PETER HOLMES:

I can't remember specifically, Bill, but I do know a number of occasions that Mr. Friday and some of the other people with the system came to Washington. Now, it would not surprise me, and I just don't recall specifically, that after that letter had gone out—and you tell me that letter went out on that date, I accept that—that after receiving that they may have come to Washington to sat down with us and talk. What was their response? Again, I can't be very specific but, other than to say that it was one of wanting to cooperate but, also them recognizing that this is an area where the law was not very clearly developed, and perhaps some of our suggestions of some of the things we were asking, some of the proposals we were making were not as reasonable as they felt, or as attainable, as we thought they might be.

WILLIAM LINK:

Well, in talking with people at the UNC side which, of course, I've heard more from them than I have from what was going on here. Their position was that the messages they were getting from OCR was mixed, not so much, I think, in this period of OCR as later, '77, '78, '79, particularly. And I suppose what you're saying is that reflected the nature of the whole case, the standards were so ill defined really?

PETER HOLMES:

What were the nature of the messages—what were the nature of messages later as opposed to earlier?

WILLIAM LINK:

The late '70s?

PETER HOLMES:

Yeah.

WILLIAM LINK:

Well, they had—there are several incidents in which they actually changed the rules. At least according to UNC that OCR actually changed the rules.

PETER HOLMES:

Right.

WILLIAM LINK:

Saying they wanted one thing at one point and when UNC attempted to meet those positions, and felt they did, OCR would come in later and completely change the rules. I think the duplication—well, the duplication issue is really one—was true, particularly.

PETER HOLMES:

The earlier position being eliminate duplication, the later position being that duplication was all right, or the earlier position being that some duplication was all right, and the later one is eliminate all duplication?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes, exactly. Or define what duplication was. That's the key.

PETER HOLMES:

Right. It wouldn't surprise me in the least that that would be the case.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. What a core curriculum was. And what outside the core would be duplicated. In 1973 UNC developed this plan and it—during that year, and I may be—I'm probably too specific here, I realize this has been twenty years ago.

PETER HOLMES:

Go ahead, Bill.

WILLIAM LINK:

Your office responded to North Carolina that the plan is inadequate. Would the primary reasons for reaching that decision, from the point of view of you as a director, were the primary reasons the fact that you were facing pressure from the court? Feeling that the plan would not make it pass the court? In other words, what was guiding you in the negotiations?

PETER HOLMES:

Oh, I don't think it was the court. I don't feel it was the court at all. As a matter of fact I felt—I felt, I mean, as director of the office, I felt no compulsion or pressure whatsoever to negotiate a—or enter into an agreement on a resolution of an issue that would be acceptable or unacceptable to court. If I can explain myself.

WILLIAM LINK:

Sure.

PETER HOLMES:

The court wanted to see—it became mechanical with the court. Letters were sent out and no actions were followed up, therefore we're

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going to give you certain time frames in which you've got to do things, do them. My view was fine, that was a mechanical timetable as to how you do things, but we had the complete policy authority. Because the court defined—the court did not attempt to define any particular standards of what higher education desegregation was. We had the total policy flexibility to make the determination ourselves as to whether this plan was acceptable or not. And we would advise the court that we viewed it as acceptable. And if somebody wanted to differ with our conclusion as to whether it was acceptable or unacceptable then they could challenge us and take the issue to court. And then we'd defend our position. So, to answer your specific question, if the plan was rejected, and as I recall it was, it was because we, as a policy matter, felt that their response was insufficient. Not that the court had some higher or different expectation.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. So, you weren't feeling a kind of daily pressure or direct pressure from the court? You felt kind of —

PETER HOLMES:

No, I was feeling no pressure at all from the court, in terms of the substance of a plan of desegregation for higher education systems. There was pressure from the court in terms of the timetables of getting certain—achieving certain milestones and reacting to the things, as I recall. And that is the way I viewed the court decision.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. How did you find Pratt as a justice, in terms of —

PETER HOLMES:

I have no opinion. I mean, I've never met him. I've never presented in court. I was constantly deposed on, you know, why we did this, why we did that, what have you. And they were filed by the plaintiffs with the court. But, I've never met Pratt. I mean, I go back to my original reaction, I felt that this was an unfortunate decision. It was an unnecessary decision. There wasn't foot dragging on these issues of elementary and secondary desegregation, or even higher education desegregation. The office was very effectively prosecuting cases involving elementary and secondary education, where the law was clearer, where the standards were clearer, and where we were comfortable with the policies to implement those—implement the law. In those areas where it was not clear, like in higher education desegregation. It was going to be a long process, we knew, from the beginning. But the court was imposing on us certain deadlines, and timetables, by which certain actions that had to be taken. Which was unfortunate and was wrong.

WILLIAM LINK:

And that was much of the problem?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, it was a large part of the problem. It was a large part of the problem.

WILLIAM LINK:

The attitude of the University of North Carolina—did you feel as though they were—to what extent were they trying to negotiate something less than a fully desirable outcome?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, I can't—I can't comment—I really can't comment on that. I can't comment because I can't remember.

WILLIAM LINK:

Right.

PETER HOLMES:

Here we are almost twenty years later talking about it, when I remember about the higher education—I remember Bill Friday, because I happened to like him as an individual.

WILLIAM LINK:

Right.

PETER HOLMES:

I find him a very distinguished, honest, straight-forward man. I remember him, and I remember too, the issue of the veterinary school. And that was central. I think most of the other issues could have been easily resolved but, the veterinary school issue became sort of a symbolic issue, really. Are they going to do this or aren't they not? And so, you know, I'm sure they resisted. Every state did resist many of our suggestions on eliminating duplication in curricula and what have you. But I don't think that North Carolina was any more resistant. In fact I'd probably say North Carolina was probably a lot more interested in cooperating and trying to resolve the issue as a legal matter. And get it behind them.

WILLIAM LINK:

That was something I was going to ask you is, yeah, how did North Carolina fit in? Whether it was a state that occupied just proportionately more time on the question of higher education, or was it one that you considered it less important, or more important?

PETER HOLMES:

No, I think that [pause] —I don't think it occupied more of our time or less than other state systems. Friday is a very well organized guy. A lawyer himself, as I recall. He, perhaps more so than other state systems, his approach was analytic, in many respects, business-like. Not to suggest that the others were not, but not to the same degree as North Carolina. How better to explain that? Many of the higher education systems were headed, I guess, by academics, whose focus was more on the substance sometimes of many of our proposals than on the procedures of getting it—getting the result. I think Mr. Friday was very much interested in resolving this issue and getting it behind the state of North Carolina. I guess we didn't—has it resolved today?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes.

PETER HOLMES:

Is it?

WILLIAM LINK:

Well, yeah. The final outcome was in 1981 was a consent decree that—after a long—it went through administrative hearings. As you probably know. You mentioned that the vet school, the primary thing that concerned the office was that the vet school was an example of bad faith, or of a plan that wasn't working? Is that right? I mean, here you have the vet school comes on the heels of the desegregation plan having been approved by the OCR, and on the heels of that you have the question of locating a new program that could enhance a black institution—it could encourage desegregation in the system, and yet it's located in the white institution? Is that an accurate rendition of what how your office viewed the issue of the vet school?

PETER HOLMES:

[pause] It's probably accurate. Probably accurate. My own personal view, clearly the location of the veterinary medicine school at the black college would have been an extraordinary, a special, a unique demonstration of a very high profile and symbolic effort to enhance the black college. My personal view was though that that was not our decision to make. It was North Carolina Higher Education System's decision to make as to where they located that veterinary school. And so long as their decision was not racially discriminatory, or racially motivated, I didn't think we could differ with it, as a matter of law and policy. It became symbolic. If they had done it, fine, I think it would have been a major breakthrough. But I don't think the fact that they did not locate it, or did not propose to locate it at the black school, that they located at a predominately white school was a basis for fighting them in noncompliance with Title VI.

WILLIAM LINK:

After you left the office, right in between the Ford and Carter Administrations, Martin Gerry, who succeeded you as director, was deposed, as part of the Adam's Case—I guess fairly frequent event for a director at OCR to be—but the deposition is rather remarkable, really, I don't know if you're aware of this. He was deposed in early 1977 and in the deposition it essentially said that enforcement of desegregation in higher education had been ineffective in previous administration. Is that—are you aware of that deposition?

PETER HOLMES:

I'm not aware of it though it wouldn't surprise me that Marty would say that. I mean, what was his point? That there is going to be under his directorship there is going to be a new, more effective enforcement of higher education desegregation?

WILLIAM LINK:

Well, that's why I find it so curious. He was an out-going director. There's been some suggestion maybe that he was positioning himself for another position—for some place in the new administration there.

PETER HOLMES:

In the Carter Administration?

WILLIAM LINK:

Of course he's —

PETER HOLMES:

No.

WILLIAM LINK:

— he's pretty solidly Republican. His dedication.

PETER HOLMES:

He's back there now.

WILLIAM LINK:

He's back there now, I know.

PETER HOLMES:

Right. Right.

WILLIAM LINK:

Can you offer another explanation?

PETER HOLMES:

No. I mean, you know, was enforcement ineffective? Is that what he said? The enforcement wasn't effective?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes.

PETER HOLMES:

Probably was ineffective, you know. It probably was not as effective as it could be. Because we're dealing with issues—we're dealing with matters where we, again, still, we didn't have any clear legal standards. You did not know how to proceed with any degree of specificity. And into that vacuum, into that vacuum, into that legal vacuum, you bring a bunch of bureaucrats—and I say that affectionately—but you bring a bunch of bureaucrats who are faced with the fact that they are remnants of a racially separate higher education system out there. A bunch of bureaucrats whose principle experience has been with successfully dismantling the duality of a elementary and secondary school system and there is complete frustration, with this group of bureaucrats, on how you deal—on how you grapple with these higher education issues. Particularly when there's no unity, lack of legal standards, no unanimity within the civil right's community, and, in fact, outright—opposition—you said ambivalence—on the part of the black university presidents. And so you try to deal—you try to develop suggestions, policies, approaches, in the hopes that you can nudge, conjoin, inch higher education systems to focus in on this system. "This is a problem. Let's focus on it. And you help us resolve these issues." We can do—our people go in and do the analysis all the time. You can find that per capita

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Page 14

expenditures, capital expenditures, for example, that the black institutions substantially less than the white institutions. I mean, that—that blatantly, I think, is discriminatory.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

So, the response to that is they're not to—you know, they're going to correct that and you're going to make damned sure that your capital expenditures at the black institution are equal to, if not greater than, what they were at the white institution. Good. That's a good first step. Does that eliminate the racial undefinability of the institution? Now it's coming into question as to whether the racial identifiability of the institution should even be eliminated. So, my point is it was a difficult—because of the actions of a prior director of Office for Civil Rights and a prior administration, to embarrass a new administration coming in—one that they viewed as going to be ultra-conservative on civil rights—they initiate this legal process, we're caught up in it, then we are exposed and sued in the Adam's Case, and then forced, in effect by the court order to comply with it, to pursue it —

[TAPE 1, SIDE B]

[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]

PETER HOLMES:

— at least '76 or '77, in connection with the Pratt Case, with all [unclear] you could make the point that the higher education desegregation enforcement program has been ineffective for the last several years. Because it hasn't—because we didn't know how to resolve with the issue. We thought we knew how to resolve it. We had suggestions for it. But these—there wasn't any unanimity on it. And—well, I'm sort of—I'm going on at the mouth here.

WILLIAM LINK:

No, that's—well, everything you've said is very useful.

PETER HOLMES:

And, you know, in the elementary and secondary education area you had some very clearly distinct policies and standards, and legal standards, and some precedence of cases that had gone into the courts and they'd decided—they'd given you guidance on how you dismantle a dual secondary and elementary education school system. Higher education had nothing, nothing. We were operating from the seat of our pants in that respect.

WILLIAM LINK:

In the absence of the legal—a kind of an extensive legal framework if you had from the ground all the way through.

PETER HOLMES:

Right. Right. And we probably, you know, if we'd been left to our own devices. If we'd been left to our own devices—and I'll probably get into trouble saying this—but if those letters hadn't gone out to that prior administration we would have thought twice, three times, about whether you are going to initiate a legal process of requiring action to dismantle the system before we were—had a good notion, or there was a understanding, or there was some history in the courts, as to what were acceptable remedies.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

But, we were well-intentioned people. We felt that it was not unreasonable to suggest to the states that their capital expenditures per capita should be equally, if not greater, at the black institutions and the white institutions. That that we seemed comfortable with that. We seemed comfortable

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Page 15

with the idea of eliminating duplicate curriculum, particularly at nearby institutions. That became a major issue in the Norfolk area, with Norfolk State and Old Dominion, virtually side-by-side campuses, offering the same curricula. And the result was that there was no, there was no impetuous for—or there was no reason for a white student to go to a black, or a black student to a white, because they can get, what, the same curriculum at a racially identifiable school. Suggestions of shared curriculum between those two schools, were excepted in some respects. This helped bring some white students into the former black institution. An increasing number of black students into the white institution. I don't know, what is A&T right now? What's the racial composition of A&T?

WILLIAM LINK:

Uh —

PETER HOLMES:

Probably ninety-five percent black.

WILLIAM LINK:

No, it's close to twenty percent white now.

PETER HOLMES:

Is that right?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes. That's, in fact, it's—in the TBI's it's been—integration has been relatively more successful. Although, UNCG, for example, is about twelve percent black which is, you know, it's one of the—I think it's the highest in the system as [unclear] by TBI.

PETER HOLMES:

Where?

WILLIAM LINK:

Greensboro, where I am.

PETER HOLMES:

At UN State?

WILLIAM LINK:

UNC Greensboro.

PETER HOLMES:

Oh, Greensboro. It's twelve percent black?

WILLIAM LINK:

But even Chapel Hill has gone up to seven or eight percent, which is, for a top, you know, top ten, top fifteen school nationally.

PETER HOLMES:

But A&T is twenty percent white?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. Close to twenty percent. Eighteen or nineteen, or something like that.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, that's interesting.

WILLIAM LINK:

And that came on the heels of the consent decree actually, in a way. A significant integration compared to what it was twenty years ago.

PETER HOLMES:

How much did that consent decree differ from some of the earlier programs and proposals that were made by OCR?

WILLIAM LINK:

Not substantially. I think very close to the kinds of things you were talking about in the early '70s. And the key thing that was different was program duplication which UNC essentially got what it wanted on program duplication control. The key—one of the most important revisions of it was that it was—the agreement wasn't to monitored by OCR, but would be monitored by a court.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, I'll tell you, that's—that is, unfortunately, is a situation that existed with regard to a lot of education entities. There are many, many school districts, obviously higher education systems, who felt that the courts—the monitoring by the courts of a plan, the implementation plan, would be much better from their stand than by OCR. Because they saw personnel changes, policy changes within OCR with some frequency.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

You could never—the feeling was, you know, "Okay, we've reached a unitary system in elementary and secondary education, that should mean we've eliminated the duality of our school system but five years later you're going to come back and tell us you've got to do more. Because neighborhood patterns have changed, what have you." And they felt like they would rather be under the court's jurisdiction rather than OCR's jurisdiction. And I can't blame them in that regard, in terms of some long term certainty, and the definiteness to whatever resolution they agreed to. But there's no guarantee that they're under the court order, and the court could ask them, tell them, or require them to take certain additional actions, too.

WILLIAM LINK:

But the decree that was—the '81 decree that was in Franklin Dupree's court, which is North Carolina. A North Carolina court. They succeeded in moving jurisdiction from Pratt to Dupree, who's in Raleigh, making themselves —

PETER HOLMES:

So, they were pulled out entirely under the Adams v. Richardson or the Pratt order by that that decision?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. This is two million dollars —

PETER HOLMES:

[unclear] Huh?

WILLIAM LINK:

This is two million dollars in legal fees later.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, probably the proper decision to make.

WILLIAM LINK:

Let me ask you about the—just a brief question. Was there much involvement from—at the secretary level in this? My perception is there's very little. Is that true?

PETER HOLMES:

Uh, no. No, I don't think that you could say that there was much involvement at the secretary's level. So long as the secretary had confidence in the people that were heading the Office for Civil Rights, there wasn't any involvement. They were interested—they were briefed constantly on the issue. But there wasn't any direct intervention. I mean, if it had gotten to the point—if it had gotten to the point that you're going to press the case to the point that you're going to cut off 125 million dollars in the education system to the higher education institution in North Carolina, or any other state, there would be a great deal of interest on the part of the secretary.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

He'd want to make damned sure that we knew what we were talking about and we had full legal support for what we were doing.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. Is what happened—well, when I mentioned Gerry's deposition earlier, what happened on after that deposition was that Pratt threw out all the claims and required a new—the writing of a new criterion. A set of criterion, from which revised plans, and revised the last plans—

PETER HOLMES:

Well, obviously by that point, then Pratt was getting to see—the criterion was obviously unacceptable to the plaintiffs in the case. The plaintiffs went in to Pratt and said, "Look, we gave OCR timetables. You did initially in your case. They've been generally following the timetables, but they're off on the substance and the criteria that they're laying down out there..." Here is a guy—and all of a sudden, all of a sudden the judge starts issuing orders on the substance, the policy criteria. Correct?

WILLIAM LINK:

Right.

PETER HOLMES:

The judge—that issue hasn't been litigated before the judge at all. You're, in effect—he, in effect—he, in effect, turned over the administration of the Federal Civil Rights program to the plaintiffs in the case.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah, that's right.

PETER HOLMES:

And that's not right. That was not the proper way to handle this. And, or at least I don't think it was. Maybe as it turned out maybe it was right. I don't recall that by the time I left I felt very comfortable with us, in both the elementary and secondary area and the higher education area, establishing our own criteria, pursuing it as best we could and not worrying whether it's acceptable to the plaintiff's attorneys or not. And to the court. It had obviously reached a point, by the time that Gary gave his deposition, or soon thereafter, that the plaintiffs got—persuaded the court that the criteria weren't sufficient.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

We had one civil rights lawyer suggest to us that—now, this is what we were confronted with, suggest to us that the way you desegregate the Maryland State Higher Education System is that you, in effect—you, in effect—or for that matter North Carolina system—is that you require the state to set up geographic areas, from which the institutions would be served. In other words, somebody at Greensboro couldn't go to UN Chapel Hill, or what have you. All the blacks and the whites in the Greensboro area, if they wanted to go in the state system in North Carolina, there choice was N.C. State Greensboro. Now, that was a serious proposal, a suggestion. Would that have eliminated the racial liability of the institutions? It certainly would have. But it certainly, I mean, the issue of choice in a higher education institutions was very well established. And we're going to see more of it, I guess, from some of the new initiatives in the education area. Of course, the issue of free choice in elementary and secondary education have been struck down by the Supreme Court early on as contradictory to—or as presenting a barrier to the effective elimination of racial identifiabilities. Well, you know, you had ideas ranging from that, "Let's zone the states and kids in those zones have to go to this higher education institution", to doing nothing. It was all over. We'll see what—this will be an interesting Supreme Court decision that comes up.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. My perception later is that OCR and LDF are working hand and glove, past your administration, I mean during the Carter administration. What you're describing here is some distance between your office and the plaintiff's. Is that accurate?

PETER HOLMES:

Some distance? They're in my office all the time. There wasn't any distance between us at all. [Laughter] I mean, they were there all the time. As I said, I spend most of my time being deposed and giving depositions in connections with the Adam's Case. I don't know. I mean, I think it's an interesting thing to analyze. What is higher education—if you had a closer, a closer relationship between the LDF, and the Carter administration, and the Civil Rights operation, it would result in a more effective enforcement of higher education desegregation. Well, I mean, they were more comfortable with Democrats, than they were with Republicans.

WILLIAM LINK:

A very peculiar situation, nonetheless.

PETER HOLMES:

I mean what's the issue? Is the issue politics? Is the issue whether it's a Republican or Democrat that runs the Office for Civil Rights? The issue should be: Are we achieving our objectives in terms of higher education and desegregation. Whatever those objectives might be.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

And, you know, if there was a comfortable relationship I would hope that it would be shown substantively in what was accomplished in higher education and desegregation. I gather you're telling me, and I don't know about myself because I haven't looked at the record, but I gather from what your telling me that there wasn't any more progress in that area than there was with it.

WILLIAM LINK:

Oh no, I don't think so. One of the basis of the UNC case in the administrative hearings was what was essentially an excessive cozy relationship between LDF and OCR. Not in your period, but in the period of '77 to '79.

PETER HOLMES:

That was an issue that was brought up?

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes. This is a follow —

PETER HOLMES:

I mean, I don't crit—now, nothing's wrong with a cozy relationship. If there's a cozy relationship between the civil rights community and the enforcement agency in terms of defining reasonable criteria in, you know, in setting forth policies, that they are going to accomplish legal objectives. If you know what those legal objectives are, nothing's wrong with that. I mean, we worked very closely with the civil rights community in terms of local school, elementary and secondary school enforcement. We worked very closely with women's groups, Chicano groups, black groups, Jewish groups, with regard to Higher Education Affirmative Action in the policies and the guidelines that we issued. There's no problem with a cozy relationship. The proof is in the pudding. What does the relationship translate into in terms of effective criteria. And reasonable criteria. In the whole area of higher education desegregation, and I'm beginning to repeat myself, nothing—these issues just weren't clearly defined.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. And no problem working with advocacy—advocate groups, such as these, because they provided a lot of information, I guess.

PETER HOLMES:

Oh, heaven's no. Never. Never any problem working with the advocacy groups. None whatsoever. I didn't particularly like the advocacy groups, as a result of the Adam's order, you know, setting my daily schedule for me.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

As to what I could do and what I couldn't do, which it almost came to. Okay? But that was an issue separate and apart from sitting down with some of these representatives of the advocacy groups and saying, "Now look, what should be the proper approaches and criterias in dealing with these issues?" We welcomed that. By the same token you've got to sit down with the Bill Friday's of higher education institutions and get—I mean, from the people that are responsible for running these systems, who have got the political challenges of getting a budget through the state legislature to support these systems, and what is the best way to approach it in that context.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah. By the time you left OCR were you optimistic, pessimistic, somewhere in between about the progress of desegregation of higher education?

PETER HOLMES:

Well, I think I was probably optimistic, because I'm an eternal optimist, number one. Number two, the fact of the matter is that while the enforcement may be ineffective, to quote my successor, Martin Gerry, the issue was being discussed. And the issue was being focused on. And the issues were being—attempting to be addressed. And so you were starting. You were in the early stages of a process of trying to grapple and deal with this issue. So, I was much encouraged by that. I mean the fact that you're causing the higher education system in North Carolina to think positively, hopefully, about these issues, one has to feel a sense of accomplishment. Even though there wasn't a resolution that you could wrap your arms around to the issue. There is no resolution today to the issue. I'm encouraged by the fact that what you're telling me right that A&T is attracting almost one-fifth of its student body in white students. I mean, it says something. It says, sure, it's a black institution, but it says that whites are comfortable there. And you're telling me that at N.C. State, there is twelve percent, thirteen percent black enrollment, that's demonstrative of the fact the blacks are comfortable in that setting. And so what have you, the racial biases, or prejudices are being eliminated, hopefully, by that.

WILLIAM LINK:

You mentioned earlier that your contacts with Bill Friday have been the likable person to work with and this is what everybody tells me. It's very difficult to find many enemies of Bill Friday. I think, in part, because he has a very likable personality. He also works to defuse situations where conflict becomes inevitable.

PETER HOLMES:

I think I also said he was firm. And he's also the type of guy that wouldn't hesitate to tell you that, "I think you're out of your mind, because I think you're taking a position, a policy position here for which you have no legal support." And he'll tell you that. He'd tell you that right straight to your eyes.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

And he was a good enough lawyer and had a good enough legal support, and understanding of the law as to what was required and what was not required—and we all know that in this area, I think it was pretty clearly established, that it was very, very fuzzy as to what was involved—that he would call you if you tried to press something that he felt was unreasonable. One, from the administrative assistant stand-point, or the head of the system standpoint, and two, if he felt that it had no basis of legal support. But I,

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Page 20

also too, in saying that I felt that the man recognized the legal, the basic legal issue involved—you have vestiges of the former dual higher education system, and there is an affirmative responsibility on the part of the state to address that, in some way.

WILLIAM LINK:

And so he attempted to make clear that he was not resisting? Or he was not trying to resist desegregation?

PETER HOLMES:

Oh, no. Oh, no.

WILLIAM LINK:

There were differences they were about, they concerned the best way to achieve.

PETER HOLMES:

Exactly. Right.

WILLIAM LINK:

Was he, do you think the most—I don't want to put words into your mouth—was he one of the leading university presidents that you might have had to deal with? It seems to me that would be obvious that he wouldn't have—

PETER HOLMES:

Well —

WILLIAM LINK:

You mentioned earlier there were differences between the way that he operated as a lawyer and other people who were educators.

PETER HOLMES:

Well, you're talking in this context of the higher education context.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yes, exactly.

PETER HOLMES:

I mean I had to deal with Derrick Bok at Harvard. I had to deal with the chancellor of UC Berkeley, on a higher—you know, the affirmative action issues, what have you. But if you're talking about in the context of the former dual higher education system, yes, he was pretty—he clearly stood out as—and, I guess, maybe I'm revising a little bit of what we've said before, but we had a lot of discussions with North Carolina. I don't want to say a whole lot more than we did with the other states that we were confronting on this, but in the other states, I don't know, I guess maybe it's just personal—my recollections, the impressions I have or dealings with North Carolina come more to the fore in my mind than they do with Maryland and some of the other states on these issues.

WILLIAM LINK:

I see.

PETER HOLMES:

It may have been because of the kind of guy Friday was.

WILLIAM LINK:

Yeah.

PETER HOLMES:

And it also could have been because of the veterinary school there. I mean it stood out there as a very symbolic, if you could have —

WILLIAM LINK:

That's one thing that you remember fairly clearly. At State?

PETER HOLMES:

Oh, yeah.