1892
The Supreme Court of the United States: the highest court in the country. Your job: decide the constitutionality of cases. But is that what they are really doing? Can we trust that your decisions are fair? Two important cases from history can help answer this question. An 1896 United States Supreme Court case, Plessy v. Ferguson, separated facilities and schools based on race. In another case in 1954, Brown v. Board of Education, the court reversed its decision and said that separating was not equal. These two cases teach two lessons about the United States Supreme Court. Plessy shows that our justice system has sometimes failed to establish justice. Brown shows that although the Court rules fairly, justice is not guaranteed.
Many events led to Plessy v. Ferguson. For example, after Congress withdrew federal troops from the south in 1877, conditions for blacks deteriorated. The government pushed blacks down. The government took steps to prevent blacks from voting immediately.
They embarked on electoral taxes, “grandfather clauses.” They also segregated into trains, parks, schools, restaurants, theaters, swimming pools, and even cemeteries. If blacks broke these segregation laws, they would probably end up in prison or dead!
The case of Plessy v. Ferguson was a very important case in American history because he enforced segregation even by making it legal, and he made segregation a concrete reality for the people of the United States. It started with a man named Homer Plessy. Plessy was 7/8 white and only had 1/8 drop of black blood in him, but under Louisiana law, he was considered black. In 1890, Louisiana passed a law stating that “all railroad companies carrying passengers in their cars in this state shall provide equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races, providing two or more passenger cars for each passenger train or dividing the passenger cars by a partition to ensure separate accommodations “. Plessy believed the law was unfair and so he defied it by refusing to leave the white railroad car. He was arrested and put on trial. In this lawsuit, he argued that the Separate Automobile Law violated the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution. But he was found guilty. Plessy then appealed the decision to the Louisiana Supreme Court. Once again his case was confirmed. Plessy appealed again in 1896 to the Supreme Court of the United States. Homer Plessy was found guilty once again. The impact of the court’s decision was harsh. It created a reality that was a nightmare for many. Their lives would change drastically. They would be officially separated and considered at the bottom of society.
Plessy v. Ferguson was the law of the land until 1954, when it was finally successfully overturned by Brown v. Board of Education. In 1954, a girl named Linda Brown in Topeka, Kansas, had to walk 5 miles to school. He had no recess and was unable to play with any of the other children who were all white. His parents filed a case with the US Supreme Court saying there is no way black and white can receive the same education if they separate. The court ruled that separating is not the same.
The amount of time between Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown vs. The Board of Education shows how long it took to get justice for blacks from the Supreme Court. It amazes me that our government can even question whether blacks have a right to justice. It should be basic knowledge for us to know that it is wrong to treat people so unfairly. Just to prove my point, here are some questions to ask yourself: Are blacks human beings like whites? Do blacks and whites have feelings and needs? And finally, the only difference between blacks and whites is that they have a different complexion? I am confused as to why so many people, including our Supreme Court justices, would not answer yes to all of these questions. How could someone with intelligence think that it was acceptable to treat blacks differently?
Fortunately, the Court came to its senses in Brown v. Board of Education. However, just because the US Supreme Court ruled that separate is not equal does not mean that blacks are automatically treated equally. After Brown v. The Board of Education happened, there had to be a Civil Rights Movement, in which many people participated to push society to change. Two people who led the Civil Rights Movement were Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. We must recognize that it was not just those people, there were others who worked and helped the same cause. There were many ways they impacted the Civil Rights Movement. They gave speeches, wrote letters, led marches, held meetings, and many other strategies. They also endured physical and mental difficulties. Only through the Civil Rights Movement was Brown’s promise truly realized. These people were poor, rich, upper class, lower class, black, some white, short and tall. Basically, there was a wide range of different types of people. Not everyone automatically changed their mood when the United States Supreme Court ruled that separate is not equal. There were still a lot of people who were racist and wanted to keep black people in an inferior position.
