Education: Ousting a Reformer

When Philadelphia police broke up a demonstration by black high school students in November 1967, School Superintendent Mark Shedd protested angrily to Police Commissioner Frank Rizzo. In Shedd's view, the cops were unnecessarily rough with the students and had undercut his efforts to negotiate with them about a black studies program. The commissioner strongly disagreed, and as Shedd recaHs their meeting, Rizzo told him: "If it's the last thing I do, I'm gonna get your ass."

Rizzo did. He made Shedd's "permissiveness" a major issue in his successful campaign for mayor this fall. Immediately after the election, Mayor James Tate...

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