Brown v. Board of Education (1954, 1955)
The case that came to be
known as Brown v. Board of Education was actually the name given to five
separate cases that were heard by the U.S. Supreme Court concerning the issue
of segregation in public schools. These cases were Brown v. Board of
Education of Topeka, Briggs v. Elliot, Davis v. Board of
Education of Prince Edward County (VA.), Boiling v. Sharpe, and Gebhart
v. Ethel. While the facts of each case are different, the main issue in
each was the constitutionality of state-sponsored segregation in public
schools. Once again, Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP Legal Defense and
Education Fund handled these cases.
Although it acknowledged
some of the plaintiffs’/plaintiffs claims, a three-judge panel at the U.S.
District Court that heard the cases ruled in favor of the school boards. The
plaintiffs then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
When the cases came before
the Supreme Court in 1952, the Court consolidated all five cases under the name
of Brown v. Board of Education. Marshall personally argued the case before the
Court. Although he raised a variety of legal issues on appeal, the most common
one was that separate school systems for blacks and whites were inherently
unequal, and thus violate the "equal protection clause" of the
Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Furthermore, relying on
sociological tests, such as the one performed by social scientist Kenneth
Clark, and other data, he also argued that segregated school systems had a
tendency to make black children feel inferior to white children, and thus such
a system should not be legally permissible.
Meeting to decide the
case, the Justices of the Supreme Court realized that they were deeply divided
over the issues raised. While most wanted to reverse Plessy and declare
segregation in public schools to be unconstitutional, they had various reasons
for doing so. Unable to come to a solution by June 1953 (the end of the Court's
1952-1953 term), the Court decided to rehear the case in December 1953. During
the intervening months, however, Chief Justice Fred Vinson died and was
replaced by Gov. Earl Warren of California. After the case was reheard in 1953,
Chief Justice Warren was able to do something that his predecessor had not—i.e.
bring all of the Justices to agree to support a unanimous decision declaring
segregation in public schools unconstitutional. On May 14, 1954, he delivered
the opinion of the Court, stating that "We conclude that in the field of
public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate
educational facilities are inherently unequal. . ."
Expecting opposition to
its ruling, especially in the southern states, the Supreme Court did not
immediately try to give direction for the implementation of its ruling. Rather,
it asked the attorney generals of all states with laws permitting segregation
in their public schools to submit plans for how to proceed with desegregation.
After still more hearings before the Court concerning the matter of
desegregation, on May 31, 1955, the Justices handed down a plan for how it was
to proceed; desegregation was to proceed with "all deliberate speed."
Although it would be many years before all segregated school systems were to be
desegregated, Brown and Brown II (as the Courts plan for how to
desegregate schools came to be called) were responsible for getting the process
underway.
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