Brown V. Board Of Education Case Analysis

Legal segregation started in 1896 in the cases of Plessy v. Ferguson, where the Supreme Court felt that “separate but equal” was not violating the 14th Amendment. But was overturned because of the case Brown v. Board of Education. “Brown v. Board of Education (1954), now acknowledged as one of the greatest Supreme Court decisions of the 20th century, unanimously held that the racial segregation of children in public schools violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment,” (McBride, 2006). Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas was one of the most historical court cases in the United State, particularly pertaining to the education system. There were many states that had laws establishing separate schools for both white
After the class action suit lost the state level case, Mr. Brown referred to the Plessy v. Ferguson case and decided to take their case to the Supreme Court. Twelve African American parents joined Mr. Brown and the NAACP to fight segregation of schools. “August 1951, the NAACP files an appeal of the Kansas ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. Joining in the appeal are cases from Delaware, Washington, D.C., Virginia and South Carolina. The case is now known as Brown v. Board of Education” (CNN Library, 2015). Mr. Brown and the NAACP’s attorneys argued that there should not be a segregation law in the education system unless there were evidence showing that African American students were different from other students. Mr. Brown’s attorneys argued that separate but equal could never be equal, because that just being separated made African American people feel inferior. Mr. Brown attorneys stated that the thirteenth, fourteenth, and the fifteenth amendment supported his argument. The Board of Education argument was that the “separate but equal” was still working fine and there is no reason to fix or change it. The Board of Education also argued that the idea of changing the “separate but equal” law would make people very upset and would blame it on the
The Untied States Supreme Court finally ruled on May 17, 1954 on the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. The overturned provisions of the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision that allowed for “separate but equal” public locations even including public schools in the United States. The decision held that racial segregation of public places even schools was violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, that stated "no state shall make or enforce any law which shall ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws" (McBride, 2006). Acknowledging that separate public school facilities are constitutionally unequal, in the argument in the case of Brown v. Board of Education helped break the segregation. With this ruling it help provide the American Civil Right Movement and essentially integration all across the United States. “A year later, the Court published implementation guidelines requiring federal district courts to supervise school desegregation ‘on a racially nondiscriminatory basis with all deliberate speed’” (History Staff,