School integration could not be left to chance, and districts must assume an "affirmative obligation" to bring about integrated schools. It reversed centuries of segregation practice in the United States. Plessy v. Ferguson, legal case in which the U.S. Supreme Court on May 18, 1896, by a seven-to-one majority (one justice did not participate), advanced the controversial separate but equal doctrine for assessing the constitutionality of racial segregation laws. Violators of the Act could have been fined ($25) or imprisoned for up to 20 days. In addition, racial imbalance was often a characteristic of only certain schools within a district. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. The burden would lie with the district to prove otherwise. In Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg, the Court announced that the discovery of a racially imbalanced school would trigger close scrutiny review by the courts, and the burden would lie with the district to prove that the racial imbalance was not the result of current or past practices. Taken together, the two cases effectively ended legal segregation in graduate and professional education. The U.S. Supreme Courts decision in Brownv. Updated: May 10, 2023 | Original: November 9, 2009. The decision in Plessy v. Ferguson was the first major inquiry into the meaning of the equal-protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which prohibits the states from denying equal protection of the laws to any person within their jurisdiction. It also upheld the national debt, but exempted federal and state governments from paying any debts incurred by the former Confederate states. Alone in the minority was Justice John Marshall Harlan, a former slaveholder from Kentucky. Omissions? Harlan argued in his dissent that segregation ran counter to the constitutional principle of equality under the law: The arbitrary separation of citizens on the basis of race while they are on a public highway is a badge of servitude wholly inconsistent with the civil freedom and the equality before the law established by the Constitution, he wrote. Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/fourteenth-amendment. But in Keyes v. Denver (1973), the Court held that evidence of discrimination in one part of the district justified a conclusion of district-wide discriminatory practice. Separate but equal was a legal doctrine in United States constitutional law, according to which racial segregation did not necessarily violate the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which nominally guaranteed "equal protection" under the law to all people. (1896), which had maintained that separate but equal facilities for African Americans and whites were constitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. They argued that the law in question violated Thirteenth Amendment, prohibiting slavery, and Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees the same rights to all citizens of the United States, and the equal protection of those rights against the deprivation of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. Southern schools were segregated, but they had similar buildings, equivalent equipment, and equally qualified and equally paid teachers. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. In giving Congress power to pass laws to safeguard the sweeping provisions of Section One, in particular, the 14th Amendment effectively altered the balance of power between the federal and state governments in the United States. Chief Justice Warren, who authored the unanimous opinion of the Court in Brown I, echoed Douglas's concerns in a 1954 speech to the American Bar Association, proclaiming that "Our American system like all others is on trial both at home and abroad, the extent to which we maintain the spirit of our constitution with its Bill of Rights, will in the long run do more to make it both secure and the object of adulation than the number of hydrogen bombs we stockpile.". Samuel F. Phillips, F.D. On June 7, 1892, Plessy bought a ticket on a train from New Orleans bound for Covington, Louisiana, and took a vacant seat in a whites-only car. Over the next few years, segregation and Black disenfranchisement picked up pace in the South, and was more than tolerated by the North. This all meant that it would be hard to prove a system-wide discriminatory practice warranting district-wide judicial intervention. After the state Supreme Court affirmed the district courts ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari, and oral arguments were heard on April 13, 1896. In, The combination was a clear message that the Court would no longer tolerate states dragging their feet when it comes to desegregation of schools, and in subsequent years, the Court added that the North will be subject to the same scrutiny as the South when it comes to their discriminatory policies. The phrase separate but equal comes from part of the Courts decision that argued separate rail cars for whites and African Americans were equal at least as required by the Equal Protection Clause. As a result, restrictive Jim Crow legislation and separate public accommodations based on race became commonplace. Chief Justice Warren conferred the responsibility of implementing desegregation on local school authorities and the courts which originally heard school segregation cases. Homer Plessy, who was seven-eighths white and one-eighth African American, purchased a rail ticket for travel within Louisiana and took a seat in a car reserved for white passengers. A fence separates the two yards. In his dissent Justice Harlan also wrote: The present decision, it may well be apprehended, will not only stimulate aggressions, more or less brutal and irritating, upon the admitted rights of colored citizens, but will encourage the belief that it is possible, by means of state enactment, to defeat the beneficent purpose which the people of the United States had in view when they adopted the recent amendments of the Constitution.. The state then quickly created a separate law school for Blacks, but the Supreme Court ruled in Sweatt v. Painter (1950) that, because the new institution could not possibly provide a legal education equal to that which Sweatt had been denied, the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires that [Sweatt] be admitted to the University of Texas Law School.. By this decision the Supreme Court unanimously declared that racial segregation of children in public schools violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The change in courts perception of the segregation and its decision in Brown I was influenced by UNESCO's 1950 Statement, The Race Question, as well as an article by Gunnar Myrdal, An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy (1944), denouncing previous attempts at scientifically justifying racism. In support of his opinion justice Fenner cited a number of precedents: the precedent from the Massachusetts Supreme Court was used to address the argument that segregation perpetuated race prejudice, the decision famously stated: This prejudice, if it exists, is not created by law, and probably cannot be changed by law; the precedent from Pennsylvania stated: To assert separateness is not to declare inferiority. Until these remnants of the state's old segregated college system were eliminated, Mississippi had not met its obligations under the Fourteenth Amendment. On the same day, the Court also ruled in another case, McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, that the University of Oklahomas requirement that a Black graduate student sit in a row of classroom seats designated for Black students and at separate Black tables in the schools library and cafeteria did not amount to a separate but equal accommodation. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal; segregation in public education is a denial of the equal protection of the laws.. Amendment XIV, Constitution Center.Akhil Reed Amar, Americas Constitution: A Biography (New York: Random House, 2005).Fourteenth Amendment, HarpWeek.10 Huge Supreme Court Cases About the 14th Amendment, Constitution Center. The ruling provided legal justification for segregation on trains and buses, and in public facilities such as hotels, theaters, and schools. This law suit asked for the school district to reverse its policy of racial segregation. After the Compromise of 1877 led to the withdrawal of federal troops from the South, Democrats consolidated control of state legislatures throughout the region, effectively marking the end of Reconstruction. Corrections? The Court cited the psychological harm that segregation had on black children. They were directed to attempt to enroll their children in the closest neighborhood schools in the fall of 1951, and they were all refused the enrollment and directed to the segregated schools. 2023, A&E Television Networks, LLC. The Court held that Louisianas law did not violate either the Thirteenth or Fourteenth Amendments. Congress defeated a bill that would have given federal protection to elections in 1892, and nullified a number of Reconstruction laws on the books. The most famous line from Justices Harlan opinion states Our Constitution is color-blind and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. Harlans dissent became the driving force behind the unanimous decision of the Court in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. This decision became the cornerstone of the social justice movement of the 1950s and 1960s. On its face the plan seemed like a sound approach to achieving educational equality. Separate But Equal Doctrine In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that racially segregated public facilities were legal, so long as the facilities for Black people and whites. On its face the plan seemed like a sound approach to achieving educational equality. Implementation of the "separate but equal" doctrine gave constitutional sanction to laws designed to achieve racial segregation by means of separate and equal public facilities and services for African Americans and whites. Virginias Schools offered students the freedom to annually choose the school they would attend. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. Homer Plessy, a person of mixed race, was deliberately chosen as a Plaintiff in order to support the contention that the law could not be consistently applied because it failed to define white and colored races. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). The U.S. Supreme Court case of Brown v. Board of Education combined five cases: Brown itself, Briggs v. Elliott (filed in South Carolina), Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County (filed in Virginia), Gebhart v. Belton (filed in Delaware), and Bolling v. Sharpe (filed in Washington, D.C.). On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court of the United States unanimously ruled that segregation in public schools is unconstitutional. President Johnson made clear his opposition to the 14th Amendment as it made its way through the ratification process, but Congressional elections in late 1866 gave Republicans veto-proof majorities in both the House and Senate. . The case stemmed from an 1892 incident in which African American train passenger Homer Plessy refused to sit in a car for Black people. The doctrine held that so long as segregation laws affected white and Black people equally, those laws did not violate the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits states from deny[ing] to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. In practice, separate but equal was a sham; the treatment and facilities accorded to Black citizens ranged in quality from inferior to barbaric. What is the relationship between Jim Crow laws and the separate but equal doctrine? Segregated facilities reflected the public will in Louisiana. Ruling on appeal in the 1925 case Gitlow v. New York, the Court stated that the due process clause of the 14th Amendment protected the First Amendment rights of freedom of speech from infringement by the state as well as the federal government. For these reasons they asked the Court to strike down segregation under the law. The U.S. Supreme Court changes history on May 18, 1896! The United States and the Soviet Union were both at the height of the Cold War during this time, and U.S. officials, including Supreme Court Justices, were highly aware of the harm that segregation and racism played on America's international image. 2023, A&E Television Networks, LLC. Study with Quizlet and memorize flashcards containing terms like What was Charles Hamilton Houston's strategy for challenging the "separate but equal" doctrine established by Plessy v Ferguson?, What case was condemned as a "legal lynching" after an all-white jury sentenced nine young black men to death in 1931?, Which organization was started by A. Philip Randolph in 1925, and was used by him . Terms in this set (3) How did the Supreme Court justify the doctrine in Plessy v. Ferguson? The phrase separate but equal itself comes from the Separate Car Act of 1890 (though the wording in the actual law was equal but separate). Plessy v. Ferguson was important because it essentially established the constitutionality of racial segregation. This clearly repudiated the Supreme Courts notorious 1857 Dred Scott decision, in which Chief Justice Roger Taney wrote that a Black man, even if born free, could not claim rights of citizenship under the federal constitution. Plessy v. Ferguson was a landmark 1896 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation under the separate but equal doctrine. Historians believe the clause was intended to ensure the federal government would not repudiate its debts, as some former Confederate states had done. Separate but equal was a legal doctrine in United States constitutional law, according to which racial segregation did not necessarily violate the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which nominally guaranteed "equal protection" under the law to all people. Section Two of the 14th Amendment repealed the three-fifths clause (Article I, Section 2, Clause 3) of the original Constitution, which counted enslaved people as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of apportioning congressional representation. Mr. Brown was assigned to be a named Plaintiff because the NAACP believed that his claim would be better received by the Supreme Court Justices. Just like Plessy v. Ferguson,Brown v. Board of Educationdid not get to the Supreme Court by accident;the whole case was built as a test case in the wake of significant political and social changes. Despite the predictions Justice Harlan made about the aggression that would follow from the decision in this case, no great national protest followed. Plessy v. Ferguson was the first major inquiry into the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment's (1868) equal-protection clause . The Act made railroads provide two or more passenger coaches for each passenger train, or to divide the passenger coaches by partition to secure separate accommodations and to prohibit passengers from entering accommodations other than those to which they have been assigned on the basis of their race. The Court declared that Louisiana law was a reasonable exercise of the States police power, enacted for the promotion of the public good. Legal Definition of separate but equal : the doctrine set forth by the U.S. Supreme Court that sanctioned the segregation of individuals by race in separate but equal facilities but that was invalidated as unconstitutional see also Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka and Plessy v. Ferguson. Writing the majority opinion in that 1954 case, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote that the doctrine of separate but equal has no place in public education, calling segregated schools inherently unequal, and declaring that the plaintiffs in the Brown case were being deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.. In its pages African American studies intellectuals, community activists, and national and international political leaders come to grips with basic issues confronting black America and Africa. The fifth and final section of the 14th Amendment (Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article) echoed a similar enforcement clause in the 13th Amendment. The Court's separate but equal decision in Plessy v. Ferguson on that date upheld state-imposed Jim Crow laws. Segregation with the sanction of law, therefore, has a tendency to retard the educational and mental development of negro children and to deprive them of some of the benefits they would receive in a racially integrated school., In the conclusion, Warren wrote: We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of separate but equal has no place. The law required that all railroads operating in the state provide equal but separate accommodations for white and African American passengers and prohibited passengers from entering accommodations other than those to which they had been assigned on the basis of their race. The doctrine of separate but equal supported the idea of races being separate, so long as they received equal facilities and treatment to that which the whites had or received. Extensive testimony supported the contention that legal segregation resulted in both fundamentally unequal education and low self-esteem among minority students. In, Finally, in 1992, the Court suggested that it would remain invested in local policies until all effects of past discriminatory behavior were eliminated. [Last updated in January of 2022 by the Wex Definitions Team], Separate but equal refers to the infamously racist decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in, See the following for summaries, holdings, and aftermaths of separate but equal in, The case arose out of the incident that took place in 1892 in which Homer Plessy (seven-eighths white and one-eighth black) purchased a train ticket to travel within Louisiana and took a seat in a car reserved for white passengers. Then, on May 18, 1896, the Supreme Court delivered its verdict in Plessy v. Ferguson. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. White and Black students were forbidden from attending the other groups schools, for example, but white students schools were given far more resources. In 1891 a group of Creole professionals in New Orleans formed the Citizens Committee to Test the Constitutionality of the Separate Car Law. The Supreme Court established the "separate but equal" doctrine in the 1896 case of Plessy v. Ferguson, reasoning that state-mandated segregation did not violate the 14th Amendment as long as the separate facilities provided for whites and blacks were basically equal. Harlan had opposed emancipation and civil rights for freed slaves during the Reconstruction erabut changed his position due to his outrage over the actions of white supremacist groups like the Ku Klux Klan. Get HISTORYs most fascinating stories delivered to your inbox three times a week. different races. It also provided sufficient funds to educate all white children in the area, while it provided funding for only half of school-aged African American children. The first of these decisions involved a freedom of choice program introduced in Virginia. as well as the right to privacy and other fundamental rights not mentioned elsewhere in the Constitution. In the North, however, school segregation was rarely the result of local or state law, nor was it the result of explicit district policy. Finally, in 1992, the Court suggested that it would remain invested in local policies until all effects of past discriminatory behavior were eliminated. Board of Education of Topeka (1954). The impact is greater when it has the sanction of the law; for the policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as denoting the inferiority of the negro group. Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), Russell Lee/Library Of Congress/Getty Images, Plessy v. Ferguson: Background and Context, Supreme Court Ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson, PBS: The Supreme Court The First Hundred Years, https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/plessy-v-ferguson. https://www.britannica.com/topic/separate-but-equal. 1986 Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal, Warren said. (The state Supreme Court had ruled earlier that the law could not be applied to interstate travel.) Nearly a century later, Congress used this authority to pass landmark civil rights legislation, including the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. 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