Separate But Equal?: The Road to Brown
The issue: Does the Constitution allow states to segregate schools or other public
facilities on the basis of race?
Introduction
The issue of whether public facilities may be
segregated based on race first arose in the context
of transportation, not education. In the 1896 case
of Plessy v Ferguson, the Supreme Court
concluded that a Louisiana law requiring whites
and blacks to ride in separate railroad cars did not
violate the Equal Protection Clause. In an opinion
that reads as though written by someone from
Mars, Justice Brown wrote that the law did not
"stamp the colored race with a badge of
inferiority" and that any such suggestion is "soley
because the colored race chooses to place that
construction on it." In a famous and eloquent
dissent in Plessy, Justice John Harlan argued,
"Our Constitution is color blind, and neither knows
nor tolerates classes among its citizens."
Cases
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada (1938)
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka
(1954)
Brown v Board of Ed. (Brown II)(1955)
Griffin v School Board of Prince Edward
Co. (1964)
Questions
1. Was it the intention of the framers and ratifiers of
the Fourteenth Amendment to end racial segregation
Beginning in the 1930s, the NAACP--under the
in public facilities?
leadership of African-American attorney Charles
2. Why do you think states such as Louisiana adopted
Hamilton Houston-- began its assault on the
the "one drop rule," classifying persons with as little as
"separate but equal" doctrine announced in
Plessy. Houston chose to concentrate his efforts one-eighth African-American ancestry as black?
3. Why do you think many of the early challenges to
on segregation in public education, where he
thought the adverse effects of the enforced racial segregated education were directed against
separation could be most easily demonstrated. In segregation in law schools and other graduate
1938, Houston persuaded the Supreme Court that programs?
4. Did Brown specifically overrule Plessy?
Missouri's refusal to provide legal education for
5. Given the basis for the Brown decision, what made
blacks within its own borders (Missouri sent its
qualified black law students to neighboring states' segregation of other types of public facilities, such as
beaches or golf clubs, unconstituional?
schools, paying the tuition) denied blacks the
6. Should the Court have ordered the immediate
equal protection of the laws. In subsequent
victories in the Court, the NAACP gave teeth to the integration of public schools in 1954, rather than
requiring integration "with all deliberate speed."?
"equal" part of separate but equal: states would
(There turned out to be a lot more deliberation than
have to ensure that separate educational
speed). What would have been the likely result of an
programs were truly equal in terms of resources,
immediate and massive integration of the public
reputation, and other measures.
schools? Would it have been any worse than the
problems associated with the long, slow march toward
integrated schools?
Charles Hamilton Houston, the African-American
7. Should federal judges have the power to order
attorney who led the NAACP's attack on racially
state official to open schools? To raise taxes to pay
segregated education.
for schools and teachers?
8. What does Mississippi University suggest about the
In 1954, the Supreme Court decided the landmark constitutionality of a female-only engineering school or
a male-only nursing school?
case of Brown v. Board of Education of
Topeka. "Racially segregated schools," the Court 9. Does the test used by the Court in the VMI case
concluded, are "inherently unequal." The Court
found support for its decision in studies that
indicated that minority students learn better in
racially mixed classrooms. The next year, in
Brown II, the Court announced a decision outlining
its plan for implementing racial desegregation in
the schools. The Court took a cautious approach,
remanding the cases to district courts with orders
to integrate the schools "with all deliberate
speed."
As it turned out, there was a lot more deliberation
than speed, and a decade after the Brown
decision, only a small percentage of black children
in the Deep South attended schools with white
children. Opposition to Brown was intense in
some places. Governors stood in schoolhouse
doors and angry whites terrorized blacks. In some
places, such as at Little Rock's Central High,
integration was only achieved after a powerful
show of force by federal troops.
In one of the school districts involved in the 1954
school desegregation cases, Prince Edward,
Virginia, county officials decided to close public
schools altogether rather than integrate. Tuition
benefits were provided to children to attend
private schools, but the only private schools
operating in the county had white-only admission
policies. In 1964, an impatient Supreme Court
found Prince Edward's closing of the public
schools to violate equal protection, and indicated
that federal courts were empowered to order the
opening of schools and to order the raising of
taxes to pay for them, if necessary. "The time for
mere deliberate speed has run out," the Court
said.
Further Reading
Lloyd Gaines
Doug Linder, Charles Hamilton Houston and
Gaines
(Draft essay profiling Charles Houston and
describing his role in the case of Missouri ex rel.
Gaines v. Canada)
Watch Youtube video:
Barack Obama (age 29) lectures about
C.H. Houston (1991)
come closer to intermediate scrutiny or strict scrutiny?
10. Could Virginia have created a female-only military
school that would have satisfied the Court's demand
for gender equality?
11. Should gender separateness ever be tolerated in
public education? What, if any, benefit might genderspecific programs have?
Linda Brown of Topeka (left), with her parents, Leola
and Oliver, and younger sister Terry.
(LIFE photo)
LINK TO DETAILED HISTORY OF
BROWN v BOARD OF EDUCATION
Related Links
From National Constitution Center (Plessy)
African American History site (Plessy)
Colored Reflections
National Historic Site
Thurgood Marshall
Issue: Racial Segregation in Public Schools