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Plessy v. Ferguson
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Plessy v. Ferguson was an 1896 United States Supreme Court decision upholding a Louisiana law requiring racially segregated railway cars, ruling that state mandated segregation did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection so long as the separate facilities provided were equal. The decision, with Justice John Marshall Harlan dissenting alone, established the 'separate but equal' doctrine that provided constitutional cover for segregation laws across the American South for the following half century, until the Supreme Court unanimously overruled it in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.
Facts
Key ProvisionDecided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1896, it upheld a Louisiana law requiring racially segregated railway cars, holding that state-mandated racial segregation did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause so long as the separate facilities provided were equal. This established the separate but equal doctrine that legally sanctioned segregation across the United States until Brown v. Board of Education overturned it in 1954. 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Rejected Here
Brown expressly overturned Plessy's separate but equal doctrine as applied to public education.
Associated With
This source names United States directly: "Ferguson was an 1896 United States Supreme Court decision upholding a Louisiana law requiring racially segregated railway cars, ruling that state mandated segregation did not violate the Fourteenth..."
Influenced
Plessy v. Ferguson's 'separate but equal' doctrine stood as constitutional law until Brown v. Board of Education unanimously overruled it in 1954.
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