hey there and welcome back to heimler's
history in this video we're going to
look at yet another one of your required
supreme court cases for the ap
government curriculum namely brown v the
board of education so if you're ready to
get them brain cows milked then let's
get to it so as always let's begin with
the facts of the case what we call brown
versus the board of education was
actually a series of cases consolidated
into one and all of them had to do with
racial segregation in school so as the
result of jim crow laws in the south
many states had separate schools for
white children and black children and
this was justified based on the supreme
court's ruling in another landmark case
from 1896 called plessy v ferguson which
established the separate but equal
doctrine what that meant is that the
court ruled that racial segregation in
public facilities was indeed
constitutional as long as the separate
facilities were equal so the case that
we're considering brownfield the board
of education came about because a black
family tried to get their daughter
enrolled in a white school that was
close to their house but they were
denied admission and thus were required
to bust their daughter to a much more
distant black school lower courts heard
this case and upheld the president said
in plessy and on appeal the case came
before the supreme court so what was the
constitutional principle at stake well
brown and the other advocates argued
that racial segregation in schools was a
violation of the equal protection clause
of the 14th amendment the lawyer for
brown thurgood marshall argued using new
findings in social science about racism
saying that even if separate facilities
were equal in terms of funding etc the
very fact of separation was inherently
equal to separate black children from
white children marshall argued did
damage to the psyche of black children
and instilled in them an inferiority
that was not easily shed so in light of
that what was the decision well as i've
told you in other videos it is a rare
thing for the supreme court to overturn
existing precedent but in this case by
unanimous decision that is exactly what
they did the court agreed that separate
facilities violated the equal protection
clause of the 14th amendment thus
overturning the precedent said in plessy
v ferguson in his written opinion chief
justice earl warren said this to
separate black children from others of
similar age and qualifications solely
because of their race generates a
feeling of inferiority as to their
status in the community that may affect
their hearts and minds in a way unlikely
ever to be undone we conclude that in
the field of public education the
doctrine of separate but equal has no
place separate educational facilities
are inherently unequal okay now why does
this case matter well it matters first
of all because it was a massive judicial
victory for the burgeoning civil rights
movement the movement which really began
picking up steam in the 1950s sought all
kinds of legislative and judicial acts
which would acknowledge the equality of
black and white americans and the brown
case was a massive step in that
direction however as you can probably
imagine many of the southern states for
whom school segregation was the norm
resisted integration mightily
unfortunately these states were given
some license to do so because of the
vague wording of the supreme court's
decision the court ordered that schools
be integrated with quote all deliberate
speed and while we understand exactly
what they meant by that like do it now
southerners found just enough latitude
in that phrase to stall all right let's
go let's get those schools integrated
now well when it comes to speed we would
like to obey the dictate to the supreme
court and be very deliberate about it so
y'all let us alone while we go put some
real time into figuring out how fast we
can rightly go anyway while the brown
decision was in fact a great victory on
paper it was quite a while before
schools were integrated but that's a
video for another time okay that's what
you need to know about brown v the board
of education i've got videos right here
on all the other required cases if you
need them if you need help getting an a
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