LAD #39: Brown V. Board of Education

Brown V. Board of Education

• Marked the start of the Civil Rights Movement, in 1954
• Helped to establish the precedent that "separate but equal" was not equal
• In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in Plessy V. Ferguson that racially segregated public facilities were legal as long as they were equal
• Jim Crow laws were established to carry out the court's decision in the previous case
• Oliver Brown filed a suit against the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1951) after his daughter, Linda, was denied entrance to Topeka’s all-white elementary schools
• The US district court in Kansas ruled that the "separate but equal" pledge still held, but were willing to admit that the separation led to a "sense of inferiority"
• When a total of five cases had been made, the issue was taken to the Supreme Court
• On May 17, 1954, the court ruled that the schools were in fact unequal, but little was done
• The case was reopened for a second part in 1955
• 1957: President Eisenhower deployed federal troops, and nine students—known as the "Little Rock Nine"—were able to enter the school under armed guard
• Brown V. Board of Education sparked several other Civil Rights movements, such as the Montgomery bus boycott 
• Ultimately justices ruled unanimously that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional 

  

  The Supreme Court Brown V. Board of Education can obviously be easily related back to the case Plessy V. Ferguson.  Both dealt with cases of discrimination and segregation, but differed in the outcomes.  Without the court's decision of "separate but equal" in Plessy V. Ferguson, there would have been no need for the following case.