Utility of V. O. Key’s Black Population Density Theory in the Desegregation of Southern U.S. Public Universities 1948–1963

Abstract

Abstract:What accounts for the variation in southern state colleges and universities responses to initial desegregation? This article analyzes southern state university responses to qualified Black students’ applications to historically white public colleges. Furthermore, the study tests V.O. Key’s hypothesis in Southern Politics in State and Nation—that the most significant factor in southern political development was the relative concentration of Black population density—to determine whether this was an explanatory factor in university desegregation. A preliminary examination of each southern state’s first Black university student entrance led to four case studies that reveal university policies, legal precedents, actors, and heightened expectations influenced social and political environments that affected the level of resistance to desegregation and university policy decision-making.