Sept. 17 (UPI) -- Most Americans believe racial segregation in U.S. schools -- 65 years after it was ruled unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education -- is either a very serious or moderately serious problem, and the federal government ought to do something about it, a new survey showed Tuesday.
The landmark 1954 Supreme Court ruling held that racially-segregated schools in the United States violated the Constitution.
Gallup said in a poll Tuesday, 57 percent of respondents said segregation is a "very serious" or "moderately serious" problem -- including the majority of African Americans (68 percent), Hispanics (65 percent) and whites (52 percent) . Forty-one percent answered it's "not too serious" or "not a problem at all."
The greatest difference on the question is political. Three quarters of Democrats and 57 percent of independents agreed segregation is serious, but just 35 percent of Republicans said so.
Fifty-three percent also said they think the government should intervene -- including 78 percent of African Americans, 76 of Hispanics and 43 percent of whites.
Nearly 80 percent chose magnet schools as the best method to reduce segregation, and 66 percent favored low-income housing. Sixty percent also favored redrawing district boundaries and 43 percent chose busing.
Gallup found that 54 percent agreed that school segregation is less of a problem today than it was 20 years ago.
Gallup surveyed more than 3,000 people in the United States and said the report's margin of error is 2 points.
