Comparison Of Plessy Vs. Ferguson And Brown V. Board Of Education

In the United States, equal rights have always been a social issue that minority groups have struggled with throughout time and are still fighting up to today. During the 19th and 20th century, there were documented cases of inequality among races and many of these disputes were brought to court. There were two cases, Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) and Brown v. Board of Education (1955), that attempted to address the inequality among races. In this essay, I will be attempting to portray the shift in underlying legal principles that have switched from these two cases and suggest two theories, the weakening of legal rules and historical idealist account that could account for the change. Within four decades, the Supreme Court overturned their ruling of “separate but

Although Plessy had the appearance of white man, he was required by law to sit in the blacks-only carriage. However, Plessy refused to move to a blacks-only carriage and argued that this segregation law stigmatized blacks "with a badge of inferiority” and that it violated his rights under the Fourteenth Amendment (McBride). The Fourteenth Amendment forbids the state from denying “…any person within their jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” (McBride) However, the Supreme Court argued in this case that the Fourteenth Amendment meant equality in political and civil rights and not social rights (McBride). The ruling of Plessy v. Ferguson, “separate but equal” meant that segregation was constitutional because it provides “equal opportunity” to all. Wiki This legitimized the state laws re-establishing racial segregation that were passed in the American South in the late 19th century after the end of the Reconstruction Era. However, this ruling created a racial hierarchy in southern states in the United States. This ruling was later challenged in Brown v. Board of