Brown+v.+Board


 * SETTING THE STAGE** - **[|Participate in The Road to Justice activity]**

Make a bulleted list of the basic facts of the cases brought to the Supreme Court
 * BASIC FACTS OF THE CASES (more than one) (check video, [|Link 1], [|Link 2], [|Link 3])**


 * segregation by making African Americans go to one school and whites go to another.
 * African Americans were prohibited from attending the local high school
 * The School African Americansd could go to had a deficient curiculum.
 * Schools for African Americans were grossly inadequate in terms of buildings, transportation and teachers salaries.

List the major arguments of the plaintiffs
 * MAIN ARGUMENTS OF THE PLAINTIFF (for integration) (check [|Link 1])**


 * Equal protection of the law did not allow for racial segragatin.
 * The fourteenth amendment allowed the government to prohibit and discriminatory state action based on race, including segregation in public schools.
 * The Fourteenth Amendment did not specify whether the states would be alloed to establish segregated education..
 * Psychological testing demonstrated the harmful effects of segregation on the minds of African American children.

Whites were making a good faith effort to equalize the two education systems. But because black children were still living with the effects of slavery, it would take some time before they were able to compete with white children in the same classroom. Chief justice Fred Vinston died and President Dwight Eisenhower appointed Earl Warren as chief justice. His leadership in producing a unanimous decision to overturn //Plessy// changed the course of American history.
 * MAIN ARGUMENTS OF THE DEFENDANTS (for segregation) (check [|Link 1])**
 * The Constitution did not require white and African American children to attend the same schools.
 * Social separation of blacks and whites was a regional custom; the states should be left free to regulate their own social affairs.
 * Segregation was not harmful to black people.
 * THE CHANGE IN THE COURT (leading to a decision) (check** [|**Link 1**]**)**

Earl Warren wrote the decision for the Court. He agreed with the civil rights attorneys that it was not clear whether the framers of the Fourteen Amendment intended to permit segregated public education.
 * THE COURT DECISION (in your own words) (check** [|**Link 1**] **and Link 2)**

**ENFORCING THE DECISION (discuss "with all deliberate speed) (Check [|Link 1] ** **)** The //Brown// decision declared the system of legal segregation unconstitutional. But the Court ordered onley that the states end segregation with "all deliberate speed."

Fifty years after the //Brown// decision, the movement has come to include racial and ethnic minorities, women, people with disabilites and other groups, each demanding equal opportunity.
 * THE IMPACT and LEGACY ** **(Check** [|**Link 1**]**)**