as one out of three ninth grade public school students ending up graduating gave way to rising frustration from the black majority towards the white-dominated government and only gave way to louder and louder calls for their demands to be met. The federal government granted $5.5 million under Title 1 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, but none of that money went to majority black schools. Police With 80% of the D.C. police force being white and 67% of the city being black, tension between police and the community rose along with tension between whites and blacks before 1968. Harsh police tactics, which started in the South in the 1960s to put a buffer on civil rights protests, left inner-city nationwide blacks more scared of police than ever. In the years leading up to 1968, there were many incidents in which D.C.'s black community held protests and turned angry against white police officers. In 1965, the same time and place as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. worked with white lawmakers to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965, two white D.C. police officers arrested a group of black boys with ages ranging from 12 to 16 for playing basketball in an alley. This prompted majority black crowds to gather around police stations around the city throwing rocks and, in some cases, firecrackers. These small, disorderly protests would happen multiple times before the end of 1965. There were three programs put in place after a long string of controversial arrests of black people by white police officers: A police run Department of Community Relations. A civilian-run Advisory Council for every precinct. A Complaint Review Board made up of civilians that would look over complaints thrown out by the police chief and see if the complaint warranted a look at a repeal by the mayor. In 1968, before the riots began, a popular black D.C. reverend said that relations between black residents and white cops had reached a "danger point." Unemployment In June 1967, the national unemployment rate was 4% for white Americans and 8.4% for non-white Americans. In D.C., non-white unemployment was over 30% for much of the 1960s, many times higher than national rates. Course of events Looting and arson On the evening of Thursday, April 4, as word of King's assassination in Memphis, Tennessee spread, crowds began to gather at the intersection of 14th and U Streets. Stokely