The Contradictions Of The Legacy Of Brown V Board Of Education Topeka 1954

On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court ruled that separate school facilities were inherently unequal and thus unconstitutional and illegal. Today, 50 years after this landmark decision, much debate surrounds the efficacy of the ruling, particularly for its impact on the education of children of color in U.S. schools. In reality, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, was never solely about education; neither did the case include only plaintiffs from Topeka. Both points are important to note as we reflect on the legacy of Brown a half century after the ruling. This journal offers articles, an interview, book reviews and a media review around this area.

After slavery ended, former slaves gained greater access to education, and free schools became available to children and adults. Over time, free schooling for African Americans in the South began to decrease, and the South became completely segregated. To make matters worse, in the court case Plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court ruled that segregation was legal. Believing the ruling was unconstitutional, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) hired lawyers like Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall to fight against segregation in schools. The NAACP started to look for African American parents who had children in public schools that were not equal to white schools. The five cases that make up Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, were heard by the Supreme Court. The Court s 1954 ruling completely changed the direction of American education.

Publisher Description

Examines the case of an African American girl whom the Board of Education refused admission into school.

This title will inform readers about Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, segregation in public schools, those involved in the case, and the law applied after the ruling--the fourteenth amendment. Vivid details, well-chosen photographs, and primary sources bring this story and this case to life. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Core Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.

The Brown v. Board of Education decision comes to mind whenever the topic of landmarks of the American civil rights movement is discussed. The 1954 Supreme Court decision declared it unconstitutional to segregate public school students, opening the door for many other civil rights advances after that. This thoughtful and informative book details the history of the case as well as its impact on the quickly changing America of the 1950s and 1960s. The book also describes how schools and civil rights have changed since this important Supreme Court case.

The road to civil rights in the United States went down many paths, but one of the most important ones involved schools. For years, African Americans were forced to study in separate, inferior schools, sentencing many of them to a life of poverty without hope of upward mobility. This volume allows readers to examine how that outlook changed in the middle of the twentieth century. Readers will learn why the old system went unchallenged for so long and how the schools in the United States finally opened their doors to all.