In what would emerge as a recurring theme of segregationist resistance, these political leaders offered a drastic solution. Unwilling to let municipal spaces be integrated, they instead urged the city to abandon its public lands altogether. Talmadge, for instance, suggested the city sell its parks and playgrounds to private interests who could keep them white. The Supreme Court’s ruling, he predicted dourly, would “probably mean the end of most public golf courses, playgrounds, and things of that type.”
