Brown v Board of Education (1954)

Decision

- In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Brown. The Court found the practice of segregation unconstitutional and refused to apply its decision in Plessy v. Ferguson to "the field of public education." - The Court noted that public education is central to American life and the very foundation of good citizenship

Summary

- In the early 1950s, Linda Brown was a young African American student in the Topeka, Kansas school district. Every day she and her sister had to walk to the bus stop to their all-black Monroe School. Linda Brown tried to gain admission to the Sumner School, which was closer to her house, but her application was denied by the Board of Education of Topeka because of her race since that school was for white children only. - Under the laws of the time, many public facilities were segregated by race because the Plessy v. Ferguson case, which was decided by the Supreme Court in 1896, classified segregation as a matter of social equality which was out of the control of the justice system which established the "separate but equal" doctrine

Case

- The Browns felt that the decision of the Board violated the Constitution. They sued the Board of Education of Topeka, alleging that the segregated school system deprived Linda Brown of the equal protection of the laws but the court ruled not in favor of the Browns because they found that the schools were substantially equal in their buildings, transportation, curricula, and educational qualifications of teachers. - The Browns then appealed their case to the Supreme Court, claiming that the segregated schools were not equal and could never be made equal.

Constitution Amendment

14th Amendment (equal protection)