brown vs board of education discussion questions

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Brown v. Board of Education

By: History.com Editors

Updated: February 27, 2024 | Original: October 27, 2009

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka was a landmark 1954 Supreme Court case in which the justices ruled unanimously that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional. Brown v. Board of Education was one of the cornerstones of the civil rights movement, and helped establish the precedent that “separate-but-equal” education and other services were not, in fact, equal at all.

Separate But Equal Doctrine 

In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that racially segregated public facilities were legal, so long as the facilities for Black people and whites were equal.

The ruling constitutionally sanctioned laws barring African Americans from sharing the same buses, schools and other public facilities as whites—known as “Jim Crow” laws —and established the “separate but equal” doctrine that would stand for the next six decades.

But by the early 1950s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ( NAACP ) was working hard to challenge segregation laws in public schools, and had filed lawsuits on behalf of plaintiffs in states such as South Carolina, Virginia and Delaware.

In the case that would become most famous, a plaintiff named Oliver Brown filed a class-action suit against the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, in 1951, after his daughter, Linda Brown , was denied entrance to Topeka’s all-white elementary schools.

In his lawsuit, Brown claimed that schools for Black children were not equal to the white schools, and that segregation violated the so-called “equal protection clause” of the 14th Amendment , which holds that no state can “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

The case went before the U.S. District Court in Kansas, which agreed that public school segregation had a “detrimental effect upon the colored children” and contributed to “a sense of inferiority,” but still upheld the “separate but equal” doctrine.

Brown v. Board of Education Verdict

When Brown’s case and four other cases related to school segregation first came before the Supreme Court in 1952, the Court combined them into a single case under the name Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka . 

Thurgood Marshall , the head of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, served as chief attorney for the plaintiffs. (Thirteen years later, President Lyndon B. Johnson would appoint Marshall as the first Black Supreme Court justice.)

At first, the justices were divided on how to rule on school segregation, with Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson holding the opinion that the Plessy verdict should stand. But in September 1953, before Brown v. Board of Education was to be heard, Vinson died, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower replaced him with Earl Warren , then governor of California .

Displaying considerable political skill and determination, the new chief justice succeeded in engineering a unanimous verdict against school segregation the following year.

In the decision, issued on May 17, 1954, Warren wrote that “in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place,” as segregated schools are “inherently unequal.” As a result, the Court ruled that the plaintiffs were being “deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.”

Little Rock Nine

In its verdict, the Supreme Court did not specify how exactly schools should be integrated, but asked for further arguments about it.

In May 1955, the Court issued a second opinion in the case (known as Brown v. Board of Education II ), which remanded future desegregation cases to lower federal courts and directed district courts and school boards to proceed with desegregation “with all deliberate speed.”

Though well intentioned, the Court’s actions effectively opened the door to local judicial and political evasion of desegregation. While Kansas and some other states acted in accordance with the verdict, many school and local officials in the South defied it.

In one major example, Governor Orval Faubus of Arkansas called out the state National Guard to prevent Black students from attending high school in Little Rock in 1957. After a tense standoff, President Eisenhower deployed federal troops, and nine students—known as the “ Little Rock Nine ”— were able to enter Central High School under armed guard.

Impact of Brown v. Board of Education

Though the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board didn’t achieve school desegregation on its own, the ruling (and the steadfast resistance to it across the South) fueled the nascent  civil rights movement  in the United States.

In 1955, a year after the Brown v. Board of Education decision, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus. Her arrest sparked the Montgomery bus boycott and would lead to other boycotts, sit-ins and demonstrations (many of them led by Martin Luther King Jr .), in a movement that would eventually lead to the toppling of Jim Crow laws across the South.

Passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 , backed by enforcement by the Justice Department, began the process of desegregation in earnest. This landmark piece of civil rights legislation was followed by the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968 .

Runyon v. McCrary Extends Policy to Private Schools

In 1976, the Supreme Court issued another landmark decision in Runyon v. McCrary , ruling that even private, nonsectarian schools that denied admission to students on the basis of race violated federal civil rights laws.

By overturning the “separate but equal” doctrine, the Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education had set the legal precedent that would be used to overturn laws enforcing segregation in other public facilities. But despite its undoubted impact, the historic verdict fell short of achieving its primary mission of integrating the nation’s public schools.

Today, more than 60 years after Brown v. Board of Education , the debate continues over how to combat racial inequalities in the nation’s school system, largely based on residential patterns and differences in resources between schools in wealthier and economically disadvantaged districts across the country.

HISTORY Vault: Black History

Watch acclaimed Black History documentaries on HISTORY Vault.

History – Brown v. Board of Education Re-enactment, United States Courts . Brown v. Board of Education, The Civil Rights Movement: Volume I (Salem Press). Cass Sunstein, “Did Brown Matter?” The New Yorker , May 3, 2004. Brown v. Board of Education, PBS.org . Richard Rothstein, Brown v. Board at 60, Economic Policy Institute , April 17, 2014.

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Brown v. Board of Education Discussion Prompts and Pause Points

Before the movie:.

What do you think of when you hear the word “racism”? ( Tap prior knowledge ) What do you think segregation means? ( Predict )

During the Movie (Pause Points):

Stop at the following times in the movie and ask questions or prompt a discussion to keep students focused and to assess their understanding before moving on:

Timecode 1:20 : In what ways did segregation affect Black people’s daily lives? ( Make inferences; Identify cause/effect )

Timecode 2:49: How did local laws undermine the 14th amendment and what did “separate but equal” mean? ( Make connections )

Timecode 3:32 : Why was it important for the NAACP to expose inferior conditions in Black schools? ( Make connections )

Timecode 4:40 : How did Brown’s case against the Board of Education change history? ( Identify cause/effect )

After the Movie:

Look at the four related movies at the bottom of the page. Explain how each is connected to the Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka topic. ( Make connections )

What is the connection between segregation and racism? ( Make inferences )

BrainPOP recommends reading  the movie description that appears on the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka Topic Page to your class. Then show the movie once through without pausing.  Watch it again, this time using the discussion prompts.

*BrainPOP’s Discussion Questions and Prompts align to CCSS Speaking and Listening Standards . 

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Teacher’s Guides

American Bar Association “Dialogue on Brown v. Board of Education.” http://www.abanet.org/brown/brownvboard.pdf The story of the Brown v. Board of Education case, lesson plans and discussion questions, suggestions for having an honest discussion about Brown and other race issues

Association for the Study of African American Life and History 2004 Black History Month Kit: Before Brown, Beyond Boundaries: Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of Brown v. BOE of Topeka. Trenton, N.J.: Africa World Press, 2004. http://www.asalh.com/main_pages/bhm.htm This kit includes a poster, CD, curriculum guides, articles, and essays that explore life before the Brown v. Board of Education case, the individual cases, and the lasting impact of the Supreme Court decision

The Brown Foundation and the National Park Service “In Pursuit of Freedom & Equality: Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.” http://brownvboard.org Activity booklet for young children including hidden object searches, word searches and mazes, simple explanations of the problems created by segregation, and “Panel 10”, an online exhibition about the children and families who were involved in the Topeka case

Library of Congress: The Learning Page From Jim Crow to Linda Brown: A Retrospective of the African American Experience from 1897 to 1953. Dunn, Agnes, and Eric Powell. Va: Stafford County School Public Schools. http://memory.loc.gov/learn/lessons/97/crow/crowhome.html Lesson based on primary source analysis and group discussion, links to African American collections at the Library of Congress, teacher’s guide to resources, African American Odyssey —an online exhibition

National Archives and Record Service “Teaching With Documents Lesson Plan: Documents Related to Brown v. Board of Education. ” http://www.archives.gov/digital_classroom/lessons/ brown_v_board_documents/brown_v_board.html Printable images of the actual court documents, photographs, lesson plans, standards correlation, document analysis worksheet, Brown v. Board of Education timeline (1857 Dred Scott Case—1954 Brown v. Board of Education ), biographies of key figures

Southern Poverty Law Center “ BROWN V. BOARD : Classroom Activities and Resources.” http://www.tolerance.org/teach/expand/mag/features.jsp?p=0&is=34&ar=491 Discussion questions and activities about the history of school segregation, the Brown v. Board of Education case, the state of desegregation, and ways for students to get involved with the issue

Street Law and the Supreme Court Historical Association “Landmark Cases: Brown v. Board of Education.” http://www.landmarkcases.org/brown/home.html Introduction to the case (available at two different reading levels), teaching recommendations based on time, lesson plans, full text of the majority and minority opinions, and political cartoon analysis

Teaching for Change and the Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PPRAC) Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching. Menkart, Deborah, Alana D. Murray, and Jenice L. View (eds.) Washington, D.C.: Teaching for Change and the Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PPRAC), 2004. http://www.civilrightsteaching.org This book provides lessons and articles for K-12 on how to go beyond a heroes approach to teaching about the Civil Rights Movement. Included are interactive, interdisciplinary lessons, readings, writings, photographs, graphics and interviews.

BlackPast is dedicated to providing a global audience with reliable and accurate information on the history of African America and of people of African ancestry around the world. We aim to promote greater understanding through this knowledge to generate constructive change in our society.

(1954) brown v. board of education.

December 9, 1952, Argued May 17, 1954, Decided

MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WARREN delivered the opinion of the Court.

These cases come to us from the States of Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, and Delaware. They are premised on different facts and different local conditions, but a common legal question justifies their consideration together in this consolidated opinion. n1

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – Footnotes – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

n1 In the Kansas case, Brown v. Board of Education, the plaintiffs are Negro children of elementary school age residing in Topeka. They brought this action in the United States District Court for the District of Kansas to enjoin enforcement of a Kansas statute which permits, but does not require, cities of more than 15,000 population to maintain separate school facilities for Negro and white students. Kan. Gen. Stat. § 72-1724 (1949). Pursuant to that authority, the Topeka Board of Education elected to establish segregated elementary schools. Other public schools in the community, however, are operated on a nonsegregated basis. The three-judge District Court, convened under 28 U. S. C. §§ 2281 and 2284, found that segregation in public education has a detrimental effect upon Negro children, but denied relief on the ground that the Negro and white schools were substantially equal with respect to buildings, transportation, curricula, and educational qualifications of teachers. 98 F.Supp. 797. The case is here on direct appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1253.

In the South Carolina case, Briggs v. Elliott, the plaintiffs are Negro children of both elementary and high school age residing in Clarendon County. They brought this action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of South Carolina to enjoin enforcement of provisions in the state constitution and statutory code which require the segregation of Negroes and whites in public schools. S. C. Const., Art. XI, § 7; S. C. Code § 5377 (1942). The three-judge District Court, convened under 28 U. S. C. §§ 2281 and 2284, denied the requested relief. The court found that the Negro schools were inferior to the white schools and ordered the defendants to begin immediately to equalize the facilities. But the court sustained the validity of the contested provisions and denied the plaintiffs admission to the white schools during the equalization program. 98 F.Supp. 529. This Court vacated the District Court’s judgment and remanded the case for the purpose of obtaining the court’s views on a report filed by the defendants concerning the progress made in the equalization program. 342 U.S. 350. On remand, the District Court found that substantial equality had been achieved except for buildings and that the defendants were proceeding to rectify this inequality as well. 103 F.Supp. 920. The case is again here on direct appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1253.

In the Virginia case, Davis v. County School Board, the plaintiffs are Negro children of high school age residing in Prince Edward County. They brought this action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia to enjoin enforcement of provisions in the state constitution and statutory code which require the segregation of Negroes and whites in public schools. Va. Const., § 140; Va. Code § 22-221 (1950). The three-judge District Court, convened under 28 U. S. C. §§ 2281 and 2284, denied the requested relief. The court found the Negro school inferior in physical plant, curricula, and transportation, and ordered the defendants forthwith to provide substantially equal curricula and transportation and to “proceed with all reasonable diligence and dispatch to remove” the inequality in physical plant. But, as in the South Carolina case, the court sustained the validity of the contested provisions and denied the plaintiffs admission to the white schools during the equalization program. 103 F.Supp. 337. The case is here on direct appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1253.

In the Delaware case, Gebhart v. Belton, the plaintiffs are Negro children of both elementary and high school age residing in New Castle County. They brought this action in the Delaware Court of Chancery to enjoin enforcement of provisions in the state constitution and statutory code which require the segregation of Negroes and whites in public schools. Del. Const., Art. X, § 2; Del. Rev. Code § 2631 (1935). The Chancellor gave judgment for the plaintiffs and ordered their immediate admission to schools previously attended only by white children, on the ground that the Negro schools were inferior with respect to teacher training, pupil-teacher ratio, extracurricular activities, physical plant, and time and distance involved in travel. 87 A. 2d 862. The Chancellor also found that segregation itself results in an inferior education for Negro children (see note 10, infra), but did not rest his decision on that ground. Id., at 865. The Chancellor’s decree was affirmed by the Supreme Court of Delaware, which intimated, however, that the defendants might be able to obtain a modification of the decree after equalization of the Negro and white schools had been accomplished. 91 A. 2d 137, 152. The defendants, contending only that the Delaware courts had erred in ordering the immediate admission of the Negro plaintiffs to the white schools, applied to this Court for certiorari. The writ was granted, 344 U.S. 891. The plaintiffs, who were successful below, did not submit a cross-petition. – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

In each of the cases, minors of the Negro race, through their legal representatives, seek the aid of the courts in obtaining admission to the public schools of their community on a nonsegregated basis. In each instance, they had been denied admission to schools attended by white children under laws requiring or permitting segregation according to race. This segregation was alleged to deprive the plaintiffs of the equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment. In each of the cases other than the Delaware case, a three-judge federal district court denied relief to the plaintiffs on the so-called “separate but equal” doctrine announced by this Court in Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537. Under that doctrine, equality of treatment is accorded when the races are provided substantially equal facilities, even though these facilities be separate. In the Delaware case, the Supreme Court of Delaware adhered to that doctrine, but ordered that the plaintiffs be admitted to the white schools because of their superiority to the Negro schools.

The plaintiffs contend that segregated public schools are not “equal” and cannot be made “equal,” and that hence they are deprived of the equal protection of the laws. Because of the obvious importance of the question presented, the Court took jurisdiction. n2 Argument was heard in the 1952 Term, and reargument was heard this Term on certain questions propounded by the Court. n3

n2 344 U.S. 1, 141, 891.

n3 345 U.S. 972. The Attorney General of the United States participated both Terms as amicus curiae. – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

[2] Reargument was largely devoted to the circumstances surrounding the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868. It covered exhaustively consideration of the Amendment in Congress, ratification by the states, then existing practices in racial segregation, and the views of proponents and opponents of the Amendment. This discussion and our own investigation convince us that, although these sources cast some light, it is not enough to resolve the problem with which we are faced. At best, they are inconclusive. The most avid proponents of the post-War Amendments undoubtedly intended them to remove all legal distinctions among “all persons born or naturalized in the United States.” Their opponents, just as certainly, were antagonistic to both the letter and the spirit of the Amendments and wished them to have the most limited effect. What others in Congress and the state legislatures had in mind cannot be determined with any degree of certainty.

An additional reason for the inconclusive nature of the Amendment’s history, with respect to segregated schools, is the status of public education at that time. n4 In the South, the movement toward free common schools, supported  by general taxation, had not yet taken hold. Education of white children was largely in the hands of private groups. Education of Negroes was almost nonexistent, and practically all of the race were illiterate. In fact, any education of Negroes was forbidden by law in some states. Today, in contrast, many Negroes have achieved outstanding success in the arts and sciences as well as in the business and professional world. It is true that public school education at the time of the Amendment had advanced further in the North, but the effect of the Amendment on Northern States was generally ignored in the congressional debates. Even in the North, the conditions of public education did not approximate those existing today. The curriculum was usually rudimentary; ungraded schools were common in rural areas; the school term was but three months a year in many states; and compulsory school attendance was virtually unknown. As a consequence, it is not surprising that there should be so little in the history of the Fourteenth Amendment relating to its intended effect on public education.

n4 For a general study of the development of public education prior to the Amendment, see Butts and Cremin, A History of Education in American Culture (1953), Pts. I, II; Cubberley, Public Education in the United States (1934 ed.), cc. II-XII. School practices current at the time of the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment are described in Butts and Cremin, supra, at 269-275; Cubberley, supra, at 288-339, 408-431; Knight, Public Education in the South (1922), cc. VIII, IX. See also H. Ex. Doc. No. 315, 41st Cong., 2d Sess. (1871). Although the demand for free public schools followed substantially the same pattern in both the North and the South, the development in the South did not begin to gain momentum until about 1850, some twenty years after that in the North. The reasons for the somewhat slower development in the South (e. g., the rural character of the South and the different regional attitudes toward state assistance) are well explained in Cubberley, supra, at 408-423. In the country as a whole, but particularly in the South, the War virtually stopped all progress in public education. Id., at 427-428. The low status of Negro education in all sections of the country, both before and immediately after the War, is described in Beale, A History of Freedom of Teaching in American Schools (1941), 112-132, 175-195. Compulsory school attendance laws were not generally adopted until after the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, and it was not until 1918 that such laws were in force in all the states. Cubberley, supra, at 563-565. – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

In the first cases in this Court construing the Fourteenth Amendment, decided shortly after its adoption, the Court interpreted it as proscribing all state-imposed discriminations against the Negro race. n5 The doctrine of  “separate but equal” did not make its appearance  in this Court until 1896 in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson, supra, involving not education but transportation. n6 American courts have since labored with the doctrine for over half a century. In this Court, there have been six cases involving the “separate but equal” doctrine in the field of public education. n7 In Cumming v. County Board of Education, 175 U.S. 528, and Gong Lum v. Rice, 275 U.S. 78, the validity of the doctrine itself was not challenged. n8 In more recent cases, all on the graduate school level, inequality was found in that specific benefits enjoyed by white students were denied to Negro students of the same educational qualifications. Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, 305 U.S. 337; Sipuel v. Oklahoma, 332 U.S. 631; Sweatt v. Painter, 339 U.S. 629; McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, 339 U.S. 637. In none of these cases was it necessary to re-examine the doctrine to grant relief to the Negro plaintiff. And in Sweatt v. Painter, supra, the Court expressly reserved decision on the question whether Plessy v. Ferguson should be held inapplicable to public education.

n5 Slaughter-House Cases, 16 Wall. 36, 67-72 (1873); Strauder v. West Virginia, 100 U.S. 303, 307-308 (1880):

“It ordains that no State shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law, or deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. What is this but declaring that the law in the States shall be the same for the black as for the white; that all persons, whether colored or white, shall stand equal before the laws of the States, and, in regard to the colored race, for whose protection the amendment was primarily designed, that no discrimination shall be made against them by law because of their color? The words of the amendment, it is true, are prohibitory, but they contain a necessary implication of a positive immunity, or right, most valuable to the colored race, — the right to exemption from unfriendly legislation against them distinctively as colored, — exemption from legal discriminations, implying inferiority in civil society, lessening the security of their enjoyment of the rights which others enjoy, and discriminations which are steps towards reducing them to the condition of a subject race.”

See also Virginia v. Rives, 100 U.S. 313, 318 (1880); Ex parte Virginia, 100 U.S. 339, 344-345 (1880).

n6 The doctrine apparently originated in Roberts v. City of Boston, 59 Mass. 198, 206 (1850), upholding school segregation against attack as being violative of a state constitutional guarantee of equality. Segregation in Boston public schools was eliminated in 1855. Mass. Acts 1855, c. 256. But elsewhere in the North segregation in public education has persisted in some communities until recent years. It is apparent that such segregation has long been a nationwide problem, not merely one of sectional concern.

n7 See also Berea College v. Kentucky, 211 U.S. 45 (1908).

n8 In the Cumming case, Negro taxpayers sought an injunction requiring the defendant school board to discontinue the operation of a high school for white children until the board resumed operation of a high school for Negro children. Similarly, in the Gong Lum case, the plaintiff, a child of Chinese descent, contended only that state authorities had misapplied the doctrine by classifying him with Negro children and requiring him to attend a Negro school. – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

In the instant cases, that question is directly presented. Here, unlike Sweatt v. Painter, there are findings below that the Negro and white schools involved have been equalized, or are being equalized, with respect to buildings, curricula, qualifications and salaries of teachers, and other “tangible” factors. n9 Our decision, therefore, cannot turn on merely a comparison of these tangible factors in the Negro and white schools involved in each of the cases. We must look instead to the effect of segregation itself on public education.

n9 In the Kansas case, the court below found substantial equality as to all such factors. 98 F.Supp. 797, 798. In the South Carolina case, the court below found that the defendants were proceeding “promptly and in good faith to comply with the court’s decree.” 103 F.Supp. 920, 921. In the Virginia case, the court below noted that the equalization program was already “afoot and progressing” (103 F.Supp. 337, 341); since then, we have been advised, in the Virginia Attorney General’s brief on reargument, that the program has now been completed. In the Delaware case, the court below similarly noted that the state’s equalization program was well under way. 91 A. 2d 137, 149. – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

In approaching this problem, we cannot turn the clock back to 1868 when the Amendment was adopted, or even to 1896 when Plessy v. Ferguson was written. We must consider public education in the light of its full development and its present place in American life throughout the Nation. Only in this way can it be determined if segregation in public schools deprives these plaintiffs of the equal protection of the laws.

Today, education is perhaps the most important function of state and local governments. Compulsory school attendance laws and the great expenditures for education both demonstrate our recognition of the importance of education to our democratic society. It is required in the performance of our most basic public responsibilities, even service in the armed forces. It is the very foundation of good citizenship. Today it is a principal instrument in awakening the child to cultural values, in preparing him for later professional training, and in helping him to adjust normally to his environment. In these days, it is doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed in life if he is denied the opportunity of an education. Such an opportunity, where the state has undertaken to provide it, is a right which must be made available to all on equal terms.

We come then to the question presented: Does segregation of children in public schools solely on the basis of race, even though the physical facilities and other “tangible” factors may be equal, deprive the children of the minority group of equal educational opportunities? We believe that it does.

In Sweatt v. Painter, supra, in finding that a segregated law school for Negroes could not provide them equal educational opportunities, this Court relied in large part on “those qualities which are incapable of objective measurement but which make for greatness in a law school.” In McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, supra, the Court, in requiring that a Negro admitted to a white graduate school be treated like all other students, again resorted to intangible considerations: “. . . his ability to study, to engage in discussions and exchange views with other students, and, in general, to learn his profession.” Such considerations apply with added force to children in grade and high schools. To separate them from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone. The effect of this separation on their educational opportunities was well stated by a finding in the Kansas case by a court which nevertheless felt compelled to rule against the Negro plaintiffs:

“Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a detrimental effect upon the colored children. The impact is greater when it has the sanction of the law; for the policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as denoting the inferiority of the negro group. A sense of inferiority affects the motivation of a child to learn. Segregation with the sanction of law, therefore, has a tendency to [retard] the educational and mental development of negro children and to deprive them of some of the benefits they would receive in a racial[ly] integrated school system.” n10

Whatever may have been the extent of psychological knowledge at the time of Plessy v. Ferguson, this finding is amply supported by modern authority. n11 Any language In Plessy v. Ferguson contrary to this finding is rejected.

n10 A similar finding was made in the Delaware case: “I conclude from the testimony that in our Delaware society, State-imposed segregation in education itself results in the Negro children, as a class, receiving educational opportunities which are substantially inferior to those available to white children otherwise similarly situated.” 87 A. 2d 862, 865.

n11 K. B. Clark, Effect of Prejudice and Discrimination on Personality Development (Midcentury White House Conference on Children and Youth, 1950); Witmer and Kotinsky, Personality in the Making (1952), c. VI; Deutscher and Chein, The Psychological Effects of Enforced Segregation: A Survey of Social Science Opinion, 26 J. Psychol. 259 (1948); Chein, What are the Psychological Effects of Segregation Under Conditions of Equal Facilities?, 3 Int. J. Opinion and Attitude Res. 229 (1949); Brameld, Educational Costs, in Discrimination and National Welfare (MacIver, ed., 1949), 44-48; Frazier, The Negro in the United States (1949), 674-681. And see generally Myrdal, An American Dilemma (1944). – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of “separate but equal” has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore, we hold that the plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions have been brought are, by reason of the segregation complained of, deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. This disposition makes unnecessary any discussion whether such segregation also violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. n12

n12 See Bolling v. Sharpe, post, p. 497, concerning the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Because these are class actions, because of the wide applicability of this decision, and because of the great variety of local conditions, the formulation of decrees in these cases presents problems of considerable complexity. On reargument, the consideration of appropriate relief was necessarily subordinated to the primary question — the constitutionality of segregation in public education. We have now announced that such segregation is a denial of the equal protection of the laws. In order that we may have the full assistance of the parties in formulating decrees, the cases will be restored to the docket, and the parties are requested to present further argument on Questions 4 and 5 previously propounded by the Court for the reargument this Term. n13 The Attorney General of the United States is again invited to participate. The Attorneys General of the states requiring or permitting segregation in public education will also be permitted to appear as amici curiae upon request to do so by September 15, 1954, and submission of briefs by October 1, 1954. n14

n13 “4. Assuming it is decided that segregation in public schools violates the Fourteenth Amendment

“(a) would a decree necessarily follow providing that, within the limits set by normal geographic school districting, Negro children should forthwith be admitted to schools of their choice, or

“(b) may this Court, in the exercise of its equity powers, permit an effective gradual adjustment to be brought about from existing segregated systems to a system not based on color distinctions?

“5. On the assumption on which questions 4 (a) and (b) are based, and assuming further that this Court will exercise its equity powers to the end described in question 4 (b),

“(a) should this Court formulate detailed decrees in these cases;

“(b) if so, what specific issues should the decrees reach;

“(c) should this Court appoint a special master to hear evidence with a view to recommending specific terms for such decrees;

“(d) should this Court remand to the courts of first instance with directions to frame decrees in these cases, and if so what general directions should the decrees of this Court include and what procedures should the courts of first instance follow in arriving at the specific terms of more detailed decrees?” n14 See Rule 42, Revised Rules of this Court (effective July 1, 1954). – – – – – – – – – – – – End Footnotes- – – – – – – – – – – – – –

It is so ordered.

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Brown v. Board of Education

May 17, 1954: The 'separate is inherently unequal' ruling forces Eisenhower to address civil rights

Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a detrimental effect upon the colored children. . . . We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. 

In 1954, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote this opinion in the unanimous Supreme Court decision  Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. Citing a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, the groundbreaking decision was widely regarded as one of America's most consequential legal judgments of the 20th century, setting the stage for a strong and lasting US Civil Rights Movement. Thurgood Marshall, lead counsel on the case, would go on to become a Supreme Court Justice himself.

The Brown decision reverberated for decades. Determined resistance by whites in the South thwarted the goal of school integration for years. Even though the court ruled that states should move with “all deliberate speed,” that standard was simply too vague for real action. Neither segregationists, who opposed to integration on racist grounds, nor the constitutional scholars who believed the court had overreached were going away without a fight.

President Eisenhower didn't fully support of the Brown decision. The president didn't like dealing with racial issues and failed to speak out in favor of the court's ruling. Although the president usually avoided comment on court decisions, his silence in this case may have encouraged resistance. In many parts of the South, white citizens' councils organized to prevent compliance. Some of these groups relied on political action; others used intimidation and violence.

Despite his reticence, Eisenhower did acknowledge his constitutional responsibility to uphold the Supreme Court’s rulings. In 1957, when mobs prevented the desegregation of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, Governor Orval Faubus saw political advantages in using the National Guard to block the entry of African American students to Central High. After meeting with Eisenhower, Faubus promised to allow the students to enroll—but then withdrew the National Guard, allowing a violent mob to surround the school. In response, Eisenhower dispatched federal troops, the first time since Reconstruction that a president had sent military forces into the South to enforce federal law.

In explaining his action, however, Eisenhower did not declare that desegregating public schools was the right thing to do. Instead, in a nationally televised address , he asserted that the violence in Little Rock was harming US prestige and influence around the world and giving Communist propagandists an opportunity “to misrepresent our whole nation.” Troops stayed in Little Rock for the entire school year, and in the spring of 1958, Central High had its first African American graduate.

But in September 1958, Faubus closed public schools to prevent their integration. Eisenhower expressed his “regret” over the challenge to the right of all Americans to a public education but took no further action, despite what he had done the year before. There was no violence this time, and Eisenhower believed that he had a constitutional obligation to preserve public order, not to speed school desegregation. When Eisenhower left the White House in January 1961, only 6 percent of African American students attended integrated schools.

Eisenhower and integration

Eisenhower urged advocates of desegregation to go slowly. believing that integration required a change in people's hearts and minds. And he was sympathetic to white southerners who complained about alterations to the social order—their “way of life.” He considered as extremists both those who tried to obstruct decisions of federal courts and those who demanded that they immediately enjoy the rights that the Constitution and the courts provided them.

On only one occasion during his presidency—in June 1958—did Eisenhower meet with African American leaders. The president became irritated when he heard appeals for more aggressive federal action to advance civil rights and failed to heed Martin Luther King Jr.’s advice that he use the bully pulpit of the presidency to build popular support for racial integration. While Eisenhower’s actions mattered, so too did his failure to use his moral authority as president to advance the cause of civil rights.

Eisenhower's record, however, included some significant achievements in civil rights. In 1957, he signed the first civil rights legislation since Reconstruction, providing new federal protections for voting rights. In most southern states, the great majority of African Americans simply could not vote because of literacy tests, poll taxes, and other obstacles. Yet the legislation Eisenhower eventually signed was weaker than the bill that he had sent to Capitol Hill. Southern Democrats secured an amendment that required a jury trial to determine whether a citizen had been denied his or her right to vote—and African Americans could not serve on juries in the south. In 1960, Eisenhower signed a second civil rights law, but it offered only small improvements. The president also used his constitutional powers, where he believed that they were clear and specific, to advance desegregation, for example, in federal facilities in the nation's capital and to complete the desegregation of the armed forces begun during Truman’s presidency. In addition, Eisenhower appointed judges to federal courts whose rulings helped to advance civil rights. This issue, which divided the country in the 1950s, became even more difficult in the 1960s.

The attorney: Thurgood Marshall

NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall argued Brown v. Board of Education before the Supreme Court, and during a quarter-century with the organization, he won a total of 29 cases before the nation's highest court. In 1961, Marshall was appointed to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit by President Kennedy, and in 1965, he became the highest-ranking African American government official in history when President Johnson appointed him solicitor general. Now arguing on behalf of the federal government before the court—Marshall won the majority of those cases as well. In 1967, Johnson nominated Marshall to sit on the court, discussing him with Attorney General Ramsey Clark in a conversation captured on the Miller Center's collection of secret White House tapes:

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The Supreme Court Decision That Changed America: Brown v. Board of Education

Finally, the justices overturned jim crow, tossing out ‘separate but equal’ standard.

On December 13, 1952, the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court met to consider five cases they had heard argued earlier that week. Those cases raised the most explosive topic any of the jurists would ever have to rule on: whether the Constitution allowed American public school districts to continue to use racial criteria to segregate facilities. Opening the discussion, Chief Justice Fred Vinson admitted, “The situation is very serious and very emotional.”

This was no theoretical matter. In the South, 17 states required public schools to separate students by race, and Kansas, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Arizona permitted school segregation by law. But the country had begun to rethink segregation. In 1947, California had repealed a law mandating separate schools for Asians. The next year, President Harry Truman issued an executive order ending racial segregation in the armed forces and Arkansas desegregated its state university.

The justices had long relied on predecessors’ 1896 decision in Plessy v. Ferguson , which said that it was not a violation of the guarantee of equal protection of the law to consign people of different races—for which read Whites and others—to separate facilities, provided those facilities were equal. But the justices had begun to take baby steps away from the court’s historic pattern of defending school segregation. In the mid-1930s civil rights activists had begun litigating the question of whether educational facilities assigned blacks were in fact equal. These efforts led initally to cases that involved graduate education—not nearly as hot-button a topic as integrating primary and secondary schools would have been.

That tactic generated the first Supreme Court ruling against racial segregation in education. The 1938 decision found that Missouri was not giving equal treatment—and therefore was violating the Constitution—when the state university law school refused to admit a qualified African American, even though the institution offered to pay his tuition at a law school in an adjacent state. In 1950 the court held unconstitutional the Texas policy of maintaining separate, racially segregated law schools, because not only did the school for Whites boast a greater variety of courses and a better library but also enjoyed a superior reputation and “standing in the community.” The same day, the justices embraced an even broader reading of “equal” by holding unconstitutional a University of Oklahoma policy forcing a Black doctoral candidate to sit at a separate table when in a classroom, library, or cafeteria.

The justices knew that any ruling on segregation in grades K-12 would detonate in ways that decisions on post-baccalaureate education did not. So incendiary was the prospect that at that December 1952 meeting the justices decided not to rule on the issue. Without a formal vote, they set the five cases for rehearing in 1953. However, discussion revealed that four justices were ready to ban racial school segregation and four others found the Constitution to permit school segregation, while one—Felix Frankfurter—would ban segregation only in Washington, DC.

Three months before the cases were to be argued again, Chief Justice Vinson died of a heart attack. President Dwight Eisenhower gave California Governor Earl Warren an interim appointment to the Court, allowing him to step immediately into the role of chief justice in time to hear the desegregation cases; Warren’s Senate confirmation, by acclamation, came five months later.

Vinson had favored segregation, infusing Warren’s appointment with huge impact. As governor Warren had spurred California’s repeal of its law dictating separate schools for Asians, and as a justice he could be counted as a fifth vote against segregation, making a majority.  

But Warren wanted the Supreme Court to strike down school segregation with a unified voice. He opened the conference after the 1953 re-arguments by saying, “There is great value in unanimity and uniformity, even if we have some differences.” He painted the question of continuing segregation as a moral one, precedent be damned.  

“The basis of the principle of segregation and separate but equal rests upon the basic premise that the Negro race is inferior,” Warren told colleagues. “I don’t see how we can continue in this day and age to set one group apart from the rest and say that that they are not entitled to exactly the same treatment as all others.”

Warren’s reasoning closely reflected the oral argument the lead lawyer for the students pressing for integrated schools had made to the court. The NAACP’s Thurgood Marshall, later the Supreme Court’s first African-American member, had told the justices that if they found continued school segregation allowable “the only way to arrive at this decision is to find that for some reason Negroes are inferior to all other human beings.”

Not every justice agreed. “Segregation is not done on the theory of racial inferiority, but of racial differences,” Stanley Reed, the most adamant resister, argued to his colleagues. “It protects people against the mixing of races.” But Warren was able to convince Reed and the other dissenters that, since a majority was going to hand down a contentious ruling deeming school segregation unconstitutional, it would be best for the nation if there were no public disagreement.  

That call for unanimity was so compelling that when the decision came on May 17, 1954, Justice Robert H. Jackson left his hospital bed to be with his colleagues in the courtroom.  

To underline the ruling’s national nature and make clear that it was not a regional jab at the South, the High Court cited as the first case one brought on behalf of Kansas schoolgirl Linda Brown. Local authorities had barred her from attending her neighborhood elementary; thus the historic title Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka .

Warren wrote the opinion, a mere 13 paragraphs long and devoid of Latinate legalisms. The issue could no longer be whether educational opportunities being offered Black and White students in segregated schools were equal—in the cases before the court, facilities and programs were in fact equal or making significant strides in that direction—but whether separation itself violated the 14th Amendment promise of equal protection under the law. Warren insisted that school segregation by its nature was unequal, inflicting particular harm on children: “To separate them from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way that is unlikely ever to be undone.” As evidence, Warren unconventionally cited not legal precedent but results of seven sociological and psychological studies showing that Negro children in segregated schools did in fact feel that blacks were inferior.

Warren’s decision acknowledged “a great variety of local conditions” and asked the litigants to recommend how to achieve integration. In May 1955 the chief justice announced the High Court’s second Brown decision, calling for school desegregation to proceed “with all deliberate speed” but telling lower courts overseeing compliance to recognize that they “may find that additional time is necessary to carry out the ruling.”

Change began. However, so many localities resisted that integration was still being fought in 1970. That year President Richard Nixon, declaring Brown “right in both constitutional and human terms,” created a Cabinet-level committee to put federal muscle behind its mandate. But Brown did generate one immediate impact. As lawyer-journalist-professor Roger Wilkins phrased it, the decision was a ringing rebuke to a cultural smear that African Americans had had to grow up with—that they were inherently inferior.  

“For me, May 17, 1954 was a second Emancipation Day,” Wilkins declared. 

This SCOTUS 101 column appeared in the April 2021 issue of American History

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Background and case

What is the significance of Brown v. Board of Education ?

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Brown v. Board of Education

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• Table Of Contents

What did the Supreme Court decide in Brown v. Board of Education ?

In Brown v. Board of Education , the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that racial segregation in public schools violated the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The 1954 decision declared that separate educational facilities for white and African American students were inherently unequal.

Brown v. Board of Education is considered a milestone in American civil rights history and among the most important rulings in the history of the U.S. Supreme Court. The case, and the efforts to undermine the Court's decision, brought greater awareness to the racial inequalities that African Americans faced. The case also galvanized civil rights activists and increased efforts to end institutionalized racism throughout American society.

After the Brown v. Board of Education decision, there was wide opposition to desegregation, largely in the southern states. Violent protests erupted in some places, and others responded by implementing “school-choice” programs that subsidized white students’ attendance at private, segregated academies , which were not covered by the Brown ruling.

When was Brown v. Board of Education decided?

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Brown v. Board of Education on May 17, 1954. The case had been argued before the Court on December 9, 1952, and reargued on December 8, 1953.

Who was the attorney for the plaintiffs in Brown v. Board of Education ?

In Brown v. Board of Education , the attorney for the plaintiffs was Thurgood Marshall . He later became, in 1967, the first African American to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

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Brown v. Board of Education , case in which, on May 17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously (9–0) that racial segregation in public schools violated the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution , which prohibits the states from denying equal protection of the laws to any person within their jurisdictions. The decision declared that separate educational facilities for white and African American students were inherently unequal. It thus rejected as inapplicable to public education the “ separate but equal ” doctrine, advanced by the Supreme Court in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), according to which laws mandating separate public facilities for whites and African Americans do not violate the equal protection clause if the facilities are approximately equal. Although the 1954 decision strictly applied only to public schools, it implied that segregation was not permissible in other public facilities. Considered one of the most important rulings in the Court’s history, Brown v. Board of Education helped inspire the American civil rights movement of the late 1950s and ’60s.

In the late 1940s the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) began a concentrated effort to challenge the segregated school systems in various states, including Kansas. There, in Topeka , the NAACP encouraged a number of African American parents to try to enroll their children in all-white schools. All of the parents’ requests were refused, including that of Oliver Brown. He was told that his daughter could not attend the nearby white school and instead would have to enroll in an African American school far from her home. The NAACP subsequently filed a class-action lawsuit. While it claimed that the education (including facilities, teachers, etc.) offered to African Americans was inferior to that offered to whites, the NAACP’s main argument was that segregation by its nature was a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause. A U.S. district court heard Brown v. Board of Education in 1951, and it ruled against the plaintiffs. While sympathetic to some of the plaintiffs’ claims, it determined that the schools were similar, and it cited the precedent set by Plessy and Gong Lum v. Rice (1927), which upheld the segregation of Asian Americans in grade schools. The NAACP then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In October 1952 the Court consolidated Brown with three other class-action school-segregation lawsuits filed by the NAACP: Briggs v. Elliott (1951) in South Carolina , Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County (1952) in Virginia , and Gebhart v. Belton (1952) in Delaware; there was also a fifth case that was filed independently in the District of Columbia , Bolling v. Sharpe (1951). As with Brown , U.S. district courts had decided against the plaintiffs in Briggs and Davis , ruling on the basis of Plessy that they had not been deprived of equal protection because the schools they attended were comparable to the all-white schools or would become so upon the completion of improvements ordered by the district court. In Gebhart , however, the Delaware Supreme Court affirmed a lower court’s ruling that the original plaintiffs’ right to equal protection had been violated because the African American schools were inferior to the white schools in almost all relevant respects. In Bolling v. Sharpe (1951), a U.S. district court held that school segregation did not violate the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment (the equal protection clause was not relevant since the Fourteenth Amendment only applies to states). The plaintiffs in Brown , Biggs , and Davis appealed directly to the Supreme Court, while those in Gebhart and Bolling were each granted certiorari (a writ for the reexamination of an action of a lower court).

Brown v. Board of Education was argued on December 9, 1952. The attorney for the plaintiffs was Thurgood Marshall , who later became the first African American to serve on the Supreme Court (1967–91). The case was reargued on December 8, 1953, to address the question of whether the framers of the Fourteenth Amendment would have understood it to be inconsistent with racial segregation in public education. The 1954 decision found that the historical evidence bearing on the issue was inconclusive.

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Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools

Moving equity: 70 years post brown vs. board | panel discussion.

Brown vs. Board of Education–the pivotal Supreme Court decision that declared school segregation within the United States unconstitutional–turns 70 years old today (May 17th, 2024). At the time of SCOTUS’ 1954 ruling in the Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, seventeen (17) states across the country had laws on the books requiring schools and other public facilities to be racially segregated. The high court’s decision in Brown vs. Board purported that segregation in the nation’s public schools was “inherently unequal.”

This afternoon’s panel, “Moving Equity: 70 Years Post Brown vs. Board” interrogates this contemporary moment which finds many of America’s schools to still be largely segregated. Why has there been so much resistance to the Brown decision? Why does school segregation persist 70 years after this landmark Supreme Court decision? What are the steps that students, educators, parents/caregivers, and activists can take to bring about desegregated schools? What does it mean to fight for equity on behalf of our Black, Indigenous, and Latinx children, students with disabilities and multilingual learners who still have not received equality in their education experiences? How do we fulfill the hope of Brown vs. Board?

To answer these questions and lead our final discussion of the day, we have gathered a stellar panel of social justice leaders and equity advocates:

Equity Now Conference Panel Conversation

Panel participants.

• Dr. Khalil G. Muhammad , Director of the Institutional Antiracism and Accountability Project at Harvard’s Kennedy School | Moderator
• Dr. Gholdy Muhammad , Professor of Curriculum & Instruction at the University of Illinois at Chicago & Author | Panelist
• Chancellor Lester Young , Chancellor of New York State Board of Regents | Panelist
• Zakiyah Shaakir-Ansari , Co-Executive Director of the New York State Alliance for Quality Education (ACE) | Panelist 
• Natasha Capers , NYC Coalition of Education Justice (NYCEJ) | Panelist
• Bryson Rose , Adult Coach at IntegrateNYC | Panelist 

Return to the Equity Now Conference Home Page

National Archives News

National Archives Panel Examines Legacy of Brown v. Board on 70th Anniversary

By Cara Moore Lebonick | National Archives News

WASHINGTON, May 22, 2024 – On May 16, in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Supreme Court Brown v. Board of Education decision, the National Archives in Washington, DC, hosted a panel discussion on the lasting impact of the historic legal decision.

From left: Panelists Randall Kennedy and Sheryll Cashin with moderator Michael Powell during the National Archives’ celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Supreme Court Brown v. Board of Education decision, at the Archives in Washington, DC, May 16. National Archives photo by Susana Raab.

The panel included Sheryll D. Cashin, of Georgetown Law School, and Randall L. Kennedy, of Harvard Law School, both former law clerks of Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the NAACP attorney who argued the case before the Supreme Court. The Honorable Michael K. Powell, President and Chief Executive Officer, NCTA—The Internet and Television Association, served as moderator for the event.

Archivist of the United States Dr. Colleen Shogan opened the event with welcoming remarks.

“The Brown decision was a pivotal moment in our nation’s history, laying the groundwork for the Civil Rights Movement and our ongoing pursuit of a more perfect union,” Shogan said. “At the National Archives we hold the records of this case and all other Supreme Court decisions. So, I’m glad we can bring together this panel of esteemed jurists who personally knew Justice Marshall to help us explore the impact and legacy of this watershed decision.”

The landmark 1954 case altered the landscape of education in the United States, determining that providing separate education facilities for children based on race led to unequal access. The resolution served as a precedent in advancing civil rights cases.

Powell offered a brief summary of the historical context leading up to the court decision, reminding the audience of the legal settings of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments before asking the panelists about legal circumventions that resulted from the time.

Kennedy and Cashin discussed the Reconstruction Era and violent resistance, debating what “legal protection under law” can mean and where social issues can be tried. They examined legal precedents and individual influences to set the stage for Justice Marshall’s impactful rise.

“The most striking aspect of this opinion is that this is the most honored race-relations opinion delivered by the Supreme Court of the United States and is also an opinion that declines to candidly grapple with racism,” said Kennedy.

The panelists also discussed debate surrounding legal cases and circumstances, who set and moved them, and the violence that came after the ruling in some parts of the country.

“The biggest lasting legacy of Brown is that it captured the imagination of young Black people to say, ‘Hey, I’m free. I should be able to participate in whatever institutions the state is sponsoring on an equal basis,’ and that generation is willing to go in a thousand places within six, seven years—thousands of sit-ins all over the place, demanding to be free,” said Cashin.

“The court didn’t tell the country how to do it, and the years that followed were pretty bloody, pretty violent, the resistance pretty amazing,” added Powell.

A question-and-answer session with the audience followed the discussion.

The celebration of the Brown decision’s anniversary will continue June 24–28, when the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library will host the Civil Rights Conference: Brown v. Board of Education Decision 70th Anniversary .

Visit the National Archives Catalog online to view archival holdings related to Brown v. Board of Education . 

View the discussion on the National Archives YouTube Channel .

Use the National Archives’ resource DOCSTeach , for more information about teaching about Brown v. Board of Education with online documents .

This program was made possible in part by the National Archives Foundation through the generous support of Verizon .