RACES: Outflanking the President

As part of his continuing scheme to keep the South in his column in the 1972 election, President Nixon took an extraordinary step two weeks ago. He disavowed a school-integration plan for Austin, Texas, drafted by his own Department of Health, Education and Welfare; he ordered HEW and the Justice Department to "hold busing to the minimum required by law."

At first it seemed a profitable political stroke, for it would surely please Southerners reluctant to desegregate. But he left an opening to the right, and inevitably Alabama Governor George Wallace—the man Nixon hoped to undercut—was quick to take full...