May 18, 1896Primary sourceWell documented
Plessy v. Ferguson and 'Separate but Equal'
On the timeline · around May 18, 1896 ·
What happened
In Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), the Supreme Court upheld a Louisiana law requiring separate railway cars for Black and white passengers, ruling that 'separate but equal' facilities were constitutional. Justice John Marshall Harlan alone dissented, declaring that 'our Constitution is color-blind.'
Why it matters
Plessy gave legal cover to the whole apparatus of Jim Crow segregation across the South for the next half-century — until it was overturned by Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.
Sources
- US National Archives. Plessy v. Ferguson (milestone document) (1896) · Primary source