Thorn in the Side of Segregation: The Short Life, Long Odds, and Legacy of the Law School at South Carolina State College

The Law School at South Carolina State College, or more commonly known as “State College,” opened on September 17, 1947 with nine African American students. It closed on May 15, 1966 when the Law School graduated its final class. The Law School was conceived when John Wrighten, an African American veteran of World War II and graduate of State College, applied for admission to the University of South Carolina (USC) School of Law on June 30, 1946. Wrighten, who was denied admission due to his race, sued the University on grounds that the rejection violated his constitutional rights under the Fourteenth Amendment. The case of Wrighten v. Board of Trustees of University of South Carolina was argued in the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of South Carolina between June 15, 1947 and July 12, 1947. J.Waites Waring, the presiding judge, ruled on July 12, 1947 that the University could either close the School of Law for refusing to admit black students, admit Wrighten to the School of Law, or create a new law school for black students at State College. If Wrighten’s suit succeeded in gaining admission to USC, 1947 would have marked the year South Carolina desegregated its first public school since Reconstruction. However, due to the implicit racism in the post-war South and state laws against the comingling of races, USC agreed to the third option. The opening of the Law School at State College was widely criticized. State leaders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), James Hinton and Modjeska Simkins, believed the new law school would be an inferior program that expanded segregation in the state. Thurgood Marshall, Wrighten’s attorney during the case, believed the developing law program would become a “monument to the perpetuation of segregation.” Despite these and other objections, the Law School at State College opened in 1947. The Law School occupied a single building that contained a library that could accommodate 50,000 volumes, offices for faculty and staff, a moot court, and a meeting place for a student-led organization that held membership with the American Law Student Association, a national club approved by the American Bar Association (ABA). The faculty of the law school graduated from historic law programs at Harvard and Howard Universities. Despite never being fully accredited, the Law School’s provisional accreditation allowed it to graduate fifty-one students between 1947 and 1966. Though the Law School was plagued by low enrollment throughout its nineteen-year existence, a factor that played a major role in its closing, the students nevertheless experienced greater interaction with their professors than their counterparts in larger, more established law programs. The alumni of the Law School at State College handled numerous major civil rights cases that enhanced civil rights liberties in South Carolina. The Law School alumni represented clients involved in sit-ins, boycotts, and civil rights demonstrations. Additionally, the alumni provided legal counsel in cases such as Gantt v. Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina (1963), Henrie Monteith’s lawsuit against the University of South Carolina (1963), and Brown v. School District No.20, Charleston, South Carolina (1963), which desegregated Clemson University, the University of South Carolina, and Charleston County grade schools respectively. These institutions were the first public schools in South Carolina to admit black students in the Jim Crow era. Furthermore, seven students who attended the Law School became judges, including Ernest A. Finney, Jr., the first black chief justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court, and Matthew J. Perry, Jr., who became the first black federal judge in South Carolina history

Mortality and pulmonary complications in patients undergoing surgery with perioperative SARS-CoV-2 infection: an international cohort study

Background: The impact of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) on postoperative recovery needs to be understood to inform clinical decision making during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. This study reports 30-day mortality and pulmonary complication rates in patients with perioperative SARS-CoV-2 infection. Methods: This international, multicentre, cohort study at 235 hospitals in 24 countries included all patients undergoing surgery who had SARS-CoV-2 infection confirmed within 7 days before or 30 days after surgery. The primary outcome measure was 30-day postoperative mortality and was assessed in all enrolled patients. The main secondary outcome measure was pulmonary complications, defined as pneumonia, acute respiratory distress syndrome, or unexpected postoperative ventilation. Findings: This analysis includes 1128 patients who had surgery between Jan 1 and March 31, 2020, of whom 835 (74·0%) had emergency surgery and 280 (24·8%) had elective surgery. SARS-CoV-2 infection was confirmed preoperatively in 294 (26·1%) patients. 30-day mortality was 23·8% (268 of 1128). Pulmonary complications occurred in 577 (51·2%) of 1128 patients; 30-day mortality in these patients was 38·0% (219 of 577), accounting for 81·7% (219 of 268) of all deaths. In adjusted analyses, 30-day mortality was associated with male sex (odds ratio 1·75 [95% CI 1·28–2·40], p\textless0·0001), age 70 years or older versus younger than 70 years (2·30 [1·65–3·22], p\textless0·0001), American Society of Anesthesiologists grades 3–5 versus grades 1–2 (2·35 [1·57–3·53], p\textless0·0001), malignant versus benign or obstetric diagnosis (1·55 [1·01–2·39], p=0·046), emergency versus elective surgery (1·67 [1·06–2·63], p=0·026), and major versus minor surgery (1·52 [1·01–2·31], p=0·047). Interpretation: Postoperative pulmonary complications occur in half of patients with perioperative SARS-CoV-2 infection and are associated with high mortality. Thresholds for surgery during the COVID-19 pandemic should be higher than during normal practice, particularly in men aged 70 years and older. Consideration should be given for postponing non-urgent procedures and promoting non-operative treatment to delay or avoid the need for surgery. Funding: National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), Association of Coloproctology of Great Britain and Ireland, Bowel and Cancer Research, Bowel Disease Research Foundation, Association of Upper Gastrointestinal Surgeons, British Association of Surgical Oncology, British Gynaecological Cancer Society, European Society of Coloproctology, NIHR Academy, Sarcoma UK, Vascular Society for Great Britain and Ireland, and Yorkshire Cancer Research

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Measurement of charged-particle multiplicities in gluon and quark jets in p(p)over-bar collisions at root s=1.8 TeV

We report the first largely model independent measurement of charged particle multiplicities in quark and gluon jets, N-q and N-g, produced at the Fermilab Tevatron in p (p) over bar collisions with a center-of-mass energy of 1.8 TeV and recorded by the Collider Detector at Fermilab. The measurements are made for jets with average energies of 41 and 53 GeV by counting charged particle tracks in cones with opening angles of θ(c)=0.28, 0.36, and 0.47 rad around the jet axis. The corresponding jet hardness Q=E-jetθ(c) varies in the range from 12 to 25 GeV. At Q=19.2 GeV, the ratio of multiplicities r=N-g/N-q is found to be 1.64± 0.17, where statistical and systematic uncertainties are added in quadrature. The results are in agreement with resummed perturbative QCD calculations