The Supreme Court rejects the separate but equal doctrine
Washington, D.C.
1954
The U.S. Supreme Court’s two decisions in Brown v. Board of Education were the culmination of years of effort by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and numerous individuals who courageously served as plaintiffs in cases filed around the United States. The primary target of this effort was the court’s 1896 ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson that essentially provided the legal basis for “Jim Crow” laws by upholding the separate but equal doctrine. The key battleground for that challenge would be segregated schools. —Read the article by Kim J. Askew.
Image: Linda Brown and family, by Carl Iwasaki. Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.