Separate but equal was a legal doctrine in American constitutional law that justified segregation. It is when a person or a certain group of people are segregated or treated differently even though they are supposed to be treated the same. It was used to separate Caucasians and African Americans throughout the 20th century. Specifically African Americans were mistreated due to slavery then later things like Jim Crow Laws, White Supremacy, etc. Major court cases played a role in the Separate But Equal era. The Plessy vs. Ferguson was about a new railroad in Louisiana and how it was required for them to segregate the seat and make specific sections for Whites and Colored people. The colored community in New Orleans were outraged so they decided to test the rule. On June 7, 1982, a man name Homer Plessy was arrested for refusing to move …show more content…
People say that type of segregation broke the “Equal Protection Clause” from the 14th Amendment. The 14th Amendment states that no state can deny somebody who is within jurisdiction the equal protection of laws. The case went to U.S. District court in Kansas and it was agreed that public school segregation was damaging towards colored children and it upheld the Separate but Equal doctrine. The court’s decision did not achieve school desegregation but it sparked the civil rights movement in the United States. The NAACP stand for National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. They originated in New York City by white and black activists. It was in response to the mistreatment of African Americans in America. In the Early 1950’s the NAACP worked on and challenged segregation laws in public schools. In the early years of the NAACP era, they focused on anti-lynching. They won many legal court cases during the 1950s and 1960s. Today the NAACP has more than 2,000 branches and about a half a million members