"Plessy v. Ferguson": History of the Separate But Equal Doctrine

Plessy v. Ferguson is an 1896 United States Supreme Court decision that resulted in a “separate but equal” doctrine that upheld racial segregation laws. Homer Plessy, the plaintiff in the case, was a Creole man who was one-eighth Black. After his arrest in 1892 for riding in a train car designated for whites only, Plessy and the Citizens’ Committee of New Orleans (a civil rights organization) took the case to the Supreme Court of Louisiana and then the US Supreme Court. Ultimately, the court determined that so long as separate facilities were equal in quality, they did not violate the US Constitution.

Many consider the decision a manipulation of the Fourteenth Amendment, which granted citizenship and protections under the law to every person “born or naturalized in the United States.” Southern state legislatures used the “separate but equal” doctrine of Plessy v. Ferguson to justify preserving the Black Codes (laws that governed the movements of Black individuals) they had established during the Reconstruction Era (roughly 1865–1877) following the Civil War.

The United States Supreme Court case of Plessy v. Ferguson challenged racial segregation laws in the US and fueled future civil rights cases in the civil rights movement.

• In 1890, the State of Louisiana had enacted the Separate Cars Act. This Louisiana law promoted the racial segregation of railroad cars—separate cars for white and for Black folks.
• The Citizens’ Committee recruited Homer Plessy. In New Orleans, a group of Black and white Creole organizers called the Citizens’ Committee made plans to combat the injustice of the Separate Cars Act. Shoemaker Homer Plessy—a Creole man who was one-eighth Black and seven-eighths white—agreed to work with the Committee to challenge the state law in an orchestrated civil rights test case.
• In 1892, Plessy boarded a train car designated for whites only. Although Plessy could have passed as white, he bought a first-class train ticket, boarded an Easy Louisiana Railroad train in New Orleans, and sat in a railroad car designated for white passengers only. Authorities immediately warned him to exit the whites-only car and return to a separate car reserved for Blacks. Plessy refused. A detective that the Citizens’ Committee had hired was responsible for detaining Plessy. The Committee wanted to ensure Plessy’s arrest was for violating the Separate Car Act specifically, rather than another offense.
• The case went to court in Louisiana. After Plessy’s arrest, the Supreme Court of Louisiana reviewed the case. Judge John H. Ferguson oversaw the Plessy v. State of Louisiana trial and ruled that the East Louisiana Railroad company’s policies of segregation did not infringe on Black passengers’ equal protection of the laws. However, Ferguson did concede that the state-sanctioned segregation laws only met the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause for trains traveling within state borders.
  
• Plessy and the Citizens’ Committee appealed the state’s ruling. The defendant challenged judge Ferguson’s decision and the $25 fine the state had asked Plessy to pay. The Louisiana Supreme Court steamrolled this first appeal on the basis of several precedents from other states. In Plessy’s second appeal, the famous activist Albion Tourgee represented him. Tourgee was a Civil War veteran and literary figure who argued that the US Constitution was “color blind.” The attorney said the Plessy case represented a dangerous misrepresentation of the Thirteenth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment.
• In 1896, the case went to the Supreme Court of the United States. The Supreme Court ruled against Plessy in an overwhelming seven-to-one decision, resulting in a “separate but equal” doctrine. According to the court, racial segregation of railroad cars was legal as long as railway companies provided separate accommodations with equal public facilities. The majority of the court aligned with Justice Henry Billings Brown, who believed that the states must retain “police power” and form reasonable laws to govern their citizens. Justice John Marshall Harlan held the dissenting view against the majority opinion. Harlan challenged Justice Brown and the population to look past their prejudiced beliefs to realize that the white man was not racially superior to Black people or any other race.
  
• The Plessy decision impacted society. The ruling against Plessy gave precedent for future Jim Crow laws to spread throughout the South. Disenfranchised and impoverished southern citizens sought refuge from the Jim Crow system by immigrating to northern and midwestern states.
• Future legislation overturned Plessy v. Ferguson. Despite the court rulings of Dred Scott v. Sandford in 1857 and Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, both of which upheld segregation, future court decisions would overturn these rulings. One decision was Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, which determined that the segregation of public schools was unconstitutional. This victory for the civil rights movement led to other landmark cases. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (which prohibited specific types of discrimination, including on the basis of race) and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (which prohibited states from implementing discriminatory voting practices) were further victories against segregation.

There’s a lot of information that history textbooks don’t cover, including the ways in which systems of inequality continue to impact everyday life. With the MasterClass Annual Membership, get access to exclusive lessons from Angela Davis, Dr. Cornel West, Jelani Cobb, John McWhorter, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Nikole Hannah-Jones, and Sherrilyn Ifill to learn about the forces that have influenced race in the United States.