(a) The history of the Fourteenth Amendment is inconclusive as to its intended effect on public education. Segregation of white and Negro children in the public schools of a State solely on the basis of race, pursuant to state laws permitting or requiring such segregation, denies to Negro children the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment - even though the physical facilities and other "tangible" factors of white and Negro schools may be equal. 483 (1954) (USSC+)ĪPPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF KANSAS* The Warren Court stayed this course for the next 15 years, deciding cases that significantly affected not only race relations, but also the administration of criminal justice, the operation of the political process, and the separation of church and state.īrown v. Proponents of judicial activism believed the Supreme Court had appropriately used its position to adapt the basis of the Constitution to address new problems in new times. However, minority groups and members of the civil rights movement were buoyed by the Brown decision even without specific directions for implementation. Supporters of judicial restraint believed the Court had overstepped its constitutional powers by essentially writing new law. In addition to the obvious disapproving segregationists were some constitutional scholars who felt that the decision went against legal tradition by relying heavily on data supplied by social scientists rather than precedent or established law. Just over one year later, on May 31, 1955, Warren read the Court's unanimous decision, now referred to as Brown II, instructing the states to begin desegregation plans "with all deliberate speed."ĭespite two unanimous decisions and careful, if vague, wording, there was considerable resistance to the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Ferguson and served as a catalyst for the expanding civil rights movement during the decade of the 1950s.Īrguments were to be heard during the next term to determine just how the ruling would be imposed.
This historic decision marked the end of the "separate but equal" precedent set by the Supreme Court nearly 60 years earlier in Plessy v. State-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment and was therefore unconstitutional. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v.
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