Brown Vs Board of Education

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Brown Versus The Board of Education The Brown versus Board of Education decision was an immense influence on desegregation of schools and a milestone in the movement for equality between the blacks and whites that continues today. The Brown versus Board of Education case was not the first of its type. Since the early 50's, five separate cases were filed dealing with the desegregation of schools. In all but one of these cases, the schools for whites were finer than the schools for the blacks. The black people argued that this situation was not right and unconstitutional (Dudley, 1). When the civil war ended in 1865, Congress passed the 14th amendment that stated that all people born in the United States are considered citizens. The 14th amendment also states that individual states cannot make laws to take away a person's right to life, liberty, or property. Segregation laws made it legal to keep races apart as long as each race had its access to equal facilities, which was known as "separate but equal." This gave hope to some black parents that their son or daughter could get an equal education. One of the first lawsuits was in 1849 because five year old, Sara Roberts, had to walk past five Boston Elementary schools for whites only to get to the school she could attend. Sara's father filed a lawsuit against Boston, which was ruled that Boston had the right to segregate schools, and he had lost his case. However, in 1855, a law to end segregation in public schools was passed in Boston (Good, 26). Another suit was filed in 1896 when Homer Plessy, an African American, boarded a train in the front. The conductor told Homer to move to the back and when he refused and was arrested. "In court Plessy argued that the rail... ... middle of paper ... ...gation from Brown v. Board of Education to Martin Luther Jr.'s dream of equality in 1963 to Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, the people in the United States go to school together, work together, and live together, making the United States a better place to live. Dudley, Mark. Brown v. Board of Education (1954). New York: Twenty-First Century Books, 1994. Fireside, Harvey and Sarah Fuller. Brown v. Board of Education, Equal Schooling For All. New Jersey: Enslow Publishers Inc., 1994. Patterson, James. Brown v. Board of Education, A Civil Rights Milestone and its Troubled Legacy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. Good, Diane. Brown v. Board of Education, Cornerstones of Freedom. Canada: Scholastic Inc., 2004. Tushnet, Mark. Brown v. Board of Education : The Battle. United States. Mark Tushnet, 1995.

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