Concluding that the Charlotte - Mecklenburg district has fulfilled the purpose of its 30 - year -
old desegregation order and eliminated all vestiges of a dual system of segregated schools, a federal judge has declared the North Carolina district unitary.
Quoting Ecclesiastes that «better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof,» Judge Elliott, 84 years
old at the time, expressed his hope to end court -
ordered desegregation in the district before he died.