18 mayo 1896 año - Plessy v. Ferguson

Descripción:

A landmark Supreme Court decision that declared racial segregation to be constitutional provided the designated facilities were "separate but equal."

The case was over the constitutionality of the Separate Car Act, a law passed in Louisiana requiring separate cars for blacks and whites on railroads. Homer Plessy, a barely mixed-race man (⅞ white, ⅛ black), classified as a black under Louisiana law, tried to board the white-only car. After he refused to leave, he was arrested and brought to court. After several appeals, his case was brought to the SCOTUS. The Court decided in a 7-1 ruling that although the 14th Amendment guaranteed political equality for all races in the US, it could not guarantee social or any other form of equality. They claimed that as long as the designated areas were equal, there was no way to show that the segregation implied black inferiority. The lone dissenter, John Marshall Harlan, declared that "Our constitution is color-blind," and that in the future people would look at the decision to be as bad as the Dred Scott Decision, a prediction that became true.