LAD #37: Brown Vs. Board of Education

Summary: The court case started with a black elementary school girl from Topeka who had to walk to her low quality school every day even though it was further away than the white school. Her father contacted the NAACP to challenge segregation in court.

The NAACP lost the early battles due to the court's decision to uphold Plessy V. Ferguson, but later on in a review, the court overturned the Plessy case. It was decided in 1954 that the black children were not receiving equal education as the white children and thus separate but equal was not equal by any standards.

Though the victory was groundbreaking for the desegregation of schools, a long journey remained to desegregate the whole United States, including public facilities. Still, the case provided a precedent that gave the NAACP and black people leverage to achieve their ends.