...Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. the Topeka Board of Education In the 1896 case of Plessy v. Ferguson the Supreme Court decided that having ”separate but equal” accommodations for Whites and Colored did not violate the 14th Amendment (Wolff, 1997). This allowed states to continue segregation as they saw fit. The Plessy v. Ferguson case was centered on the segregation of railroad cars but the final ruling supported that all “separate but equal” accommodations were allowed by the constitution and was therefore allowed in restaurants, busses, and even schools. In 1954 the Supreme Court decided that “separate but equal” was not acceptable in the case of Brown v. the Topeka Board of Education. They determined that segregation went against the 14th Amendment (Wolff, 1997). This class action suit was filed by 13 parents for their 20 children. The plaintiff named was Oliver L. Brown, the father of third grader Linda who had walk six blocks to get to her school bus stop for her segregated school one mile away even though there was a school only seven blocks away from her home ("Brown V. Board Of Education", ). Although there were several cases fighting for similar things at the time this case is the most well-known. This class action suit was originally filed in 1951 even though the final decision was not made until 1954. The Supreme Court heard the case several times in 1953, paying special attention to the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause and whether or not it prohibited...
Words: 671 - Pages: 3
...Brown v. Board of Education Ronald Still Embry Riddle Aeronautical University Brown v. Board of Education Background The Supreme Court case of Brown v. Board of Education dates back to 1954, the case was centered on the Fourteenth Amendment and challenged the segregation of schools solely on the basis of race. The Brown case was not the only case of its time involving school segregation, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was leading the push to desegregate public schools in the United States (Gold, 2005). Brown v. Board of Education was a consolidation of four cases that had made their way through the court system. It was 1950 and Linda brown was just seven years old, she lived in Topeka, Kansas and was African American descent (she was black). Each mourning Linda traveled 21 blocks and crossed through a dangerous railroad yard to get to school. Her journey to school took an hour and twenty minutes. White children who lived in the same neighborhood only traveled 7 blocks in a considerably less amount of time (Gold, 2005). Linda’s father Oliver filed a lawsuit against the Topeka Board of Education arguing that he wanted the same conditions for his daughter (Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 2009). The case was heard by three judges in Federal District Court, and they ruled against the plaintiffs, the case went to Circuit Court of Appeals and then to the U.S Supreme Court (Topeka, Kansas: Segregation in the Heartland). ...
Words: 1762 - Pages: 8
...Everything began with a third-grader student named Linda Brown who was an African American and had to walk a mile to get to a colored school, while she lived about seven block away from an all-white school. This commanded the awakening of a nation to combat segregation. According to the book “American Government roots and reform”, explains that Brown v. Board of education (1954) case consisted on the U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that school segregation is inherently unconstitutional because it violates the fourteen Amendment ‘s that guarantee equal protection.” This shows that African American kids were discriminated as well their rights were violated. Furthermore, the article “Land mark: Brown v. Board of education “ explains that in reality Brown v. Board of education consisted on five lawsuits against school district in Kansas, Virginia and the district of Columbia involving public schools system that mandates separate schools from blacks and whites. While the cases were different in nature, however they made the same claim: separate is not equal. Arguing the case before the Supreme Court were, for the Petitioners who were predominantly parents of student of color. They claimed that their children were not receiving an equal education. According to the article “Brown v. board of education,” “The district court found that the facilities provided for colored students were largely equal to those provided to white student. Reasoning that it was required to follow U.S. Supreme...
Words: 746 - Pages: 3
...Brown v. Board of Education: A Historic Court Case For a large part of the 1900’s, racial segregation could be seen in almost all public places. This included the public schools system. For years, black children had to go to separate schools because of the color of their skin. This began to change in 1954 with the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, which declared that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. Linda Brown and her younger sister were two black children who lived in Topeka, Kansas. Their all-black school was several miles away, and each day, they had to walk through a dangerous railroad switchyard to get to their bus stop. There was another school that was closer to their house and...
Words: 613 - Pages: 3
...Professor Course Date Brown vs. Board of Education The Brown vs. Board of Education case was a colossal influence on desegregation of schools in the United States of America. It created a milestone of equal opportunities in schools among the blacks and whites. The ruling of this case took place in 1954 and it ruled in favor of Mr. Brown. It is among one of the important cases ever heard on racial prejudice in the American history. The Brown vs. Board of Education case is about a young third grader girl in Kansas, Topeka city named Linda Brown (Dudley 48). Linda was subjected to trekking one mile through a railway switchyard daily in order to reach her black elementary school despite there being a white school seven blocks away from her home. Browns father attempted to find a chance in the white school to get her enrolled there since the black elementary school was far from home but the principal of the white school rejected Linda’s enrollment because she was black and the school was a white school. Mr. Brown and other parents reported the incident to the head of Topeka’s National Association for Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). The head of NAACP Mr. McKinley Burnett had really waited for such an opportunity so as to challenge racial segregation problem in court as segregation cases were very rampant in the United States schools. This was the right opportunity as Mr. Burnett and NAACP took legal action by taking the case to the District court. Brown lost the case to the state...
Words: 1494 - Pages: 6
...Desegregation Desegregation was crucial part of American history which effected the lives of thousands of African Americans. The Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Topeka Board of Education in 1954 was one of the most revolutionary court ordered decision that pushed forward the process of desegregation. Segregation can be defined as; “to cause or force the separation of or to separate or set apart from others or from the general mass.” ( Merriam-Webster) This very unfortunate series of events happened across the United States mainly because of a court ruling in 1896 of Plessy v. Ferguson. Desegregation of school across the United States was certainly a task, that was not in its complete phase until the 1970s. The Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson involved Homer Plessy, who was 1/8 African American and 7/8 Caucasian which meant in the state of Louisiana he was considered Black. Plessy bought a first class ticket to ride on the railway in Louisiana, and took a seat in the all white rail road cart. He was then asked to leave his seat and sit in the “colored” cart because he was consider African American. Plessy refused and was immediately arrested. His case ended up in the US Supreme Court which ultimately proclaimed that Plessy's rights were not discredited because, the separate location provided to blacks were just as equal to those provided to the whites. This event adopted the “separate but equal” doctrine in the constitutional law. It was determined that all public...
Words: 2119 - Pages: 9
...Brown v. Board of Education Brown v. Board of education case took place in 1954. It is one of the most important cases in the American history of racial prejudice. The U.S. Supreme Court recognized separate schools for blacks and whites unconstitutional. This decision became an important event of struggle against racial segregation in the United States. The Brown case proved that there is no way a separation on the base of race to be in a democratic society. Brown v. Board of education is not a case just about education and children, it is a case of everybody being equal. Brown v. Board of Education was a beginning for American people to understand that separate but equal is not the same. The Brown case revealed this. It was the reason why blacks and whites do not have separate accomodations any more. Separate and equal does not exist any more, Brown v. Board of eduacation made everyone equal. The first case in which African American challenged the doctrine of separate but equal in the United States public education system was in Boston Massachusetts in 1849. Prior to Brown v. Board (1954), from 1881 to 1949 there were eleven cases initiated to try an integrate schools in Kansas. The schools that the African American children attended were not equal to their white counterparts. Most of the time the African American students had to travel farther than white students to get to their schools. The schools for African Americans were run down with-of-date...
Words: 2495 - Pages: 10
...The Significance of the Brown V. Topeka Board of Education Ruling of 1954 Tamara Smith Colorado Technical Institute The Significance of the Brown V. Topeka Board of Education Ruling of 1954 The Supreme Court case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was, and still is considered to be a landmark case which stated state laws which had allowed the establishing of different public schools for African American and white pupils to be against the constitution. The verdict overruled the 1896 decision of Plessy v. Ferguson decision, a ruling that permitted state-sponsored segregation, provided it applied to public education. The Brown V. Topeka decision ruled that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal (CRMVet.org, n.d., p. 1954, para. 3)." Because of this decision, racial segregation was decreed to be in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. The Brown V. Topeka Board of Education ruling would lead the way for desegregation and became a vital triumph in the civil rights movement. At the time of the Brown ruling, much of the southern United States was segregated. Racial segregation was hardly a fresh occurrence; almost all African Americans had been subject to slavery prior to the Civil War. Nor was racial segregation a new concept, but one that has occurred as early (and likely earlier) as the days of the Tang Dynasty. Under segregation, signs were posted showing African...
Words: 1108 - Pages: 5
...Nicole Cummings POSU 343 Signature Assignment October 16, 2014 Brown vs. Board of Education The court case docketed Brown vs. Board of education was a culmination of several individuals seeking constitutional justice for their civil liberties. These brave individuals changed the course of history. This landmark case changed racial segregation in schools and allowed equal education to all regardless of race. Although the Declaration of Independence declared that all men were created equal, it wasn’t for many years after the ending of slavery that equal rights were strengthened and the effects of slavery were abolished. Amendments to the constitution were put into effect to equal out the balance of the laws due to racial segregation, but despite these amendments African-Americans were rarely given the equal treatment as their white counterparts. Many states, especially in the south, made segregation a legal practice. What became known as Jim Crow Laws, were regulations that enabled separate bathrooms, busses, and schools simply based on the color of their skin. Many people disagreed with these unjust laws, but only few made their opinion known in court. One of the first cases to be heard regarding unmerited segregation was brought to the Supreme Court by a gentleman by the name of Homer Plessy. Mr. Plessy refused to give up his seat on the train to a white man and was therefore arrested. He knew that this arrest violated the 14th amendments “equal protection clause”...
Words: 2475 - Pages: 10
...equality. Some of the main cases are Plessy V. Ferguson and Brown V. Board of Ed. After the Plessy V. Ferguson case it was agreed upon that every school would stay separate, but had to be equal, and this created the Plessy Doctrine. How could it be equal if they were separate? Even though they were supposed to be equal, the resources and education were dramatically different. Later in 1954 Linda Brown’s father decided he was not going...
Words: 1557 - Pages: 7
...Brown V Board Of Education May 17, 1954 was a date that had an impact on the board of education and our lives. There was an African American girl named Linda Brown, she was a normal girl in the third grade. Linda went to a school that was a mile away even though there was an all white elementary school, seven blocks away. Her father, Oliver Brown, tried to enroll her in the white elementary school, but the principal of the school refused to let her in due to her race. Mr. Brown then took this problem to the NAACP ( National Association for the Advancement of Colored People), they agreed to help him. As this case became more known it was then later brought up to supreme court. Other cases have led up to this case, these cases included, Sweat v. Painter (1950) and McLaurin v. Oklahoma Board of Regents of Higher Education (1950). The cases leading up to Brown Vs Board of Education featured African American people dealing with segregation problems. Brown argued segregation is seen as antithetical to our whole culture. If a particular class of people are forced to stay in their own neighborhoods, have their own schools, parks, stores, restaurants, movie theaters, and not welcome in 'mainstream' places, they are not equal as citizens. This is a violation of the 'equality' provisions of the 14th amendment. One of the most basic founding principles of the US is that we have only one class of citizenship, every citizen is entitled to exactly the same rights and privileges of citizenship...
Words: 494 - Pages: 2
...On May 17, 1954, in the case of Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka, the U.S. Supreme Court ended federally sanctioned racial segregation in the public schools by ruling unanimously that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." A groundbreaking case, Brown not only overturned the precedent of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), which had declared "separate but equal facilities" constitutional, but also provided the legal foundation of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Although widely perceived as a revolutionary decision, Brown was in fact the culmination of changes both in the Court and in the strategies of the Civil Rights Movement. (see case summaries below) The Supreme Court had become more liberal in the years since it decided Plessy, largely due to appointments by Democratic Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman. Though still all-white, the Court had issued decisions in the 1930s and 1940s that rendered racial separation illegal in certain situations. Now consolidated under the name Brown v. Board of Education, the five cases came before the Supreme Court in December, 1952. The lead attorney on the case, Thurgood Marshall, and his colleagues wrote that states had no valid reason to impose segregation, that racial separation — no matter how equal the facilities — caused psychological damage to black children, and that "restrictions or distinctions based upon race or color" violated the equal protection clause of...
Words: 317 - Pages: 2
...did not enjoy many of the same rights that whites did. As the decade went along, segregation became a hotly debated topic, particularly segregation in schools. Since the Supreme Court case Plessy v Ferguson in 1896, the nation had operated under the doctrine of “separate but equal” (Potter 3/31). Then in 1954, a new Supreme Court case called Brown v Board of Education, was ruled on regarding segregation in schools. The opinion of the court was delivered by Chief Justice Earl Warren who said, “We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate education facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore, we hold that the plaintiffs and other similarly situated . . . are . . . deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment” (Brown Decision, 1954). When the Brown v Board of Education decision was announced, it looked like it would be a major victory in the fight to end segregation. Unfortunately for Civil Rights leaders, southern states were not happy about the decision. They were so unhappy about it in fact that, “In 1956, 19 Senators and 77 members of the House of Representatives signed the ‘Southern Manifesto,’ a resolution condemning the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education” (Southern Manifesto, 1956). The Southern States believed that...
Words: 826 - Pages: 4
...Brown v Board of Ed. Topeka Kansas (1954) by Alexes Mercado http://www.watson.org/~lisa/blackhistory/early-civilrights/brown.html The 14th Amendment states: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. In the early 1950's, racial segregation in public schools was normal all across America. Although all the schools were supposed to be equal, most black schools were far inferior in comparison to the all white schools. There was a black third grade girl named Linda Brown from Topeka, Kansas. She had to walk one mile through a railroad switchyard just to get to her school all black school. Yet, there was an all white elementary school only seven blocks away from her home. When her father, Oliver Brown, attempted to enroll Linda in the white elementary school, the principal would not allow it. Frustrated, Mr. Brown then went to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People or the “NAACP. The NAACP was eager to assist the Browns, as it had long wanted to challenge segregation in public schools. Other parents joined the Browns in their complaint...
Words: 1266 - Pages: 6
...Education In civil rights in America was a major thing back in the 1950’s as African Americans wanted to have a better education and wanted to have a good life. The African Americans started protesting to get a better education and the world known one is Brown vs Board of Education in 1954 when she won the court case and got all “white schools” to be illegal from that day forward. Firstly, teaching had a crucial impact in post-1945 civil rights history. Much time and effort was spent on training the belief being that in a vote based system it was just right and reasonable that all individuals paying little mind to skin shading must have the privilege to good teaching. This issue of social equality and training stood out as truly interesting...
Words: 860 - Pages: 4
