Supreme Court Cases on Race Essay

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Cummings v. Board of Education (1899), Berea College v. Kentucky (1908), and Gong Lum v. Rice (1927) were three Supreme Court cases that followed Plessy v. Ferguson and that led to the segregation of schools and the establishment of the separate but equal doctrine that Plessy v. Ferguson set in motion. In Cummings v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court ruled that a Georgia county school board was perfectly within its rights to close a school for blacks but maintain the school for whites when the county had to make a decision about how to save on finances. In Berea College v. Kentucky (1908), the Supreme Court ruled that Kentucky was perfectly within its rights to require segregation within the private college Berea. In Gong Lum v. Rice (1927), the Supreme Court ruled that Mississippi could discriminate based on race and enforce segregation against Asians in its schools. All three of these cases showed that the problem of racism was institutionalized via Supreme Court rulings in the wake of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) (Chapter 5).

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Five Supreme Court cases that show the evolution and direction of school desegregation after the passage of Brown v. Board of Education (1954) are: 1) Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, 2) North Carolina v. Swann (1971), 3) Keyes v. School District No. 1 Denver, Colorado (1973), 4) Bradlev v. School Board. 412 US. 9, and 5) Board of Oklahoma City v. Dowell 111S. Ct. 630 (1991). The first Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education saw the Supreme Court approving busing as a way to integrate schools in districts that had operated a dual system based on racial prejudice. The second, North Carolina v. Swann (1971), saw the Supreme Court asserted that state policies and statutes must allow for school authorities to implement desegregation policies. The third, Keyes v. School District No. 1 Denver, Colorado (1973), saw the Supreme Court began to ease off the gas pedal and did not really build on the earlier desegregation ruling but continued to acknowledge a difference between de facto and de jure segregation (Chapter 5). In the fourth and fifth case examples, the Supreme Court essentially ruled that it was going to back off the issue: in Bradlev v. School Board.

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412 US. 9, the Court was deadlocked and thus made no ruling; in Board of Oklahoma City v. Dowell 111S. Ct. 630 (1991), the Court said the federal courts did not need to continue to monitor desegregation policies among schools, suggesting that it was no longer an issue the courts were going to be concerned about. Thus, the Court started off strong, enforcing desegregation—but by the 1990s the Court was basically willing to step back and stop giving an opinion on the matter.

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Five Supreme Court decisions that show the direction that affirmative action took after the Bakke decision of 1978 are: 1) Fullilove v. Klutznick [448 US. 448 (1980)], 2) Firefighters v. Stotts [467 Us. 561(1984)], 3) Johnson Transportation Agency [107 S. C1. 1442 (1987)], 4) Citv of Richmond. Virginia v. JA. Croson Co. (109 S. Ct. 706), and 5) Adarand Contractors v. Pena {l15 S. Ct. 2097 (J995J1. The first, Fullilove v. Klutznick, saw the Supreme Court upholding a law passed by Congress that required state and local governments applying for grants to show that at least 10% of contracts would be given to minorities. The second, Firefighters v. Stotts, saw the Court stepping back a bit by rejecting a federal court order barring Firefighters from laying off black workers because of white seniority. The third, Johnson Transportation Agency, saw the Court affirming that affirmative action applied to sex as well as race and that it was not wrong to promote a woman because she was a woman though her application scores were lower than other applicants who were male. Fourth, Citv of Richmond. Virginia v. JA. Croson Co., basically reversed the earlier Fullilove ruling and was seen as another step back by the Court away from advocating for affirmative action. Fifth, Adarand Contractors v. Pena, saw the Court backing even further away from affirmative action by applying the same ruling as in the fourth to federal programs and saying that there need not be a strict set-aside rule to ensure the 10% of contracts going to minorities.

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