Plessy v. Ferguson Essay

Picture this: a world with no color. Would racism still exist? Or would people be discriminated based on other things such as height, weight, or the sound of their voice? We may never know the answer to these questions. Racism is still alive in the United States, but it is not as severe and oppressive as it was during the era of the Jim Crow laws. The 13th amendment freed the slaves in the United States, however, not many white Americans agreed with this. The 13th amendment did not shield the African Americans from oppression, “The segregation and disenfranchisement laws known as ‘Jim Crow’

In June 1892 Homer A. Plessy bought a first-class ticket on the East Louisiana Railroad and sat in the car designated for whites only. Plessy was of mixed African and European ancestry, and he looked white. Because the Citizens Committee wanted to challenge the segregation law in court, it alerted railroad officials that Plessy would be sitting in the whites only car, even though he was partly of African descent. Plessy was arrested and brought to court for arraignment before Judge John H. Ferguson of the U.S. District Court in Louisiana. Plessy then attempted to halt the trial by suing Ferguson on the grounds that the segregation law was unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson is known for having established the precedent of “separate but equal.” The case originated in Louisiana and was specifically made to the separate passenger cars that were for the black and white races. The Supreme Court, in this case, upheld the right of Louisiana to separate the races and “this decision provided the legal foundation to justify many other actions by state and local governments to socially separate blacks and whites” (Zimmerman, 1997). It was not until the famous Brown v. Board of Education case in 1954 that the highest court in the land outlawed the principal of segregation and the concept of “separate but equal.”

These cases all involve discrimination, disrespect, and judgment: Plessy v. Ferguson, Brown v. Board of Education, and Loving v. Virginia. We all are different in different ways and we all don't look alike but that shouldn't change how we see each other as people . Being colored or being white doesn't mean anything it's just the skin that God gave you. It doesn't tell you who you are or who you have to be. It's up to you how you act and treat others. “We may have all come on different ships, but we’re in the same boat now.” —Martin Luther King, Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. one of the worlds biggest most known activist helped change our ways from what they were to what they are right now. He helped show that it's ok to be different and in the end all come together as one.

African Americans were never treated the same as other Americans. One day a black man who looked white named Homer Plessy got sick of sitting in a Jim Crow car so he decided to purchase a first class ticket in the white’s only section on the train. Plessy told the conductor that he was 1/8 black and he refused to move from the car. Removed from the train Plessy was in jail overnight and was released on a 500 dollar bond. Homer Plessy protested that his 13th and his 14th amendments rights were violated. This case became known as Plessy v. Ferguson. This case upheld the constitutionality of segregation under the “separate but equal” doctrine.

In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Jim Crow Laws and Segregation during the trial of Plessy vs. Ferguson. Homer Plessy, the plaintiff, was considered a free white man, despite having a distant relative from Africa. He challenged segregation when he purchased a

The Court ruled in favor of the appellant, and the decision is described as follows:

By a seven to one vote the United States Supreme Court agreed with the Louisiana law and therefore Homer Plessy was convicted for having violated the law. Justice Henry Brown, the man who wrote the opinion of the Court said that, “A statute which implies merely a legal distinction between the white and colored races – has no tendency to destroy the legal equality of the two races… The

1) How did the majority opinion in the Supreme Court’s 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision legally shape race

The next critical Supreme Court ruling on the issue of civil rights was in 1892 with the Plessy v. Ferguson case. Homer Adolph Plessy was a shoemaker from the state of Louisiana. Although Plessy was seven eighths white and only one eighth black. According to the law in Louisiana, he was still required to use the facilities designated as "colored". In an attempt to challenge the law, Plessy, with the support of civil rights activists, bought a ticket for the first class coach on the East Louisiana Rail Road. Plessy boarded and sat down in the first class coach. Just after the train departed the station the conductor confronted Plessy. The conductor asked him if he was black, Plessy told him he was and that he refused to leave the coach. The train was stopped; Plessy was arrested and formally charged at the fifth street police station.

The Plessy versus Ferguson case started with an incident where an African American passenger on a train, Homer Plessy, broke Louisiana law by refusing to sit in a Jim Crow car, a separate cart on the train where African Americans had to sit. This

Plessy petitioned the United States Supreme Court to review the case on the ground that the Louisiana statute deprived Plessy of his rights as a citizen of the United States and denied him the equal protection of the laws. The Supreme Court ruled 8 to 1 that the statute did not deprive Plessy of any rights recognized by the

The petition alleges that the preventable death of the daughters of Ms. Gonzales and the damage they suffered violate her rights to life and to the safety of the person enshrined in Article I, her right to privacy and family life provided in article V, his right to protection of the family, provided in article VI, his right to protection of motherhood and childhood, in accordance with article VII and his right to the inviolability of the home, provided in article IX of the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man (hereinafter, "the American Declaration"). The petitioners add that the fact that the United States did not investigate Ms. González's complaint or provide her with a remedy violates her right to justice, enshrined in Article XVIII, as well as her right to obtain a quick decision from the courts. authorities, provided for in Article XXIV. Finally, the petition maintains that the fact that the United States did not ensure the substantive rights provided for in the articles listed violates Ms. Gonzales' right to equality, as provided in Article II. In response to the petition, the State argues that the petitioners' complaints are inadmissible because the alleged victim did not exhaust domestic

Some parents of the people that segregated black people taught their children that these people weren’t smart they were smelly don’t trust them all of these things weren’t true ,but that’s what they were taught from a young age. These conflicts really started to happen in 1863 when president Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves. In the 1960s there was a little black girl who went to school during this time, and her white teacher even said “Lincoln should have never freed the slaves.’’ Then again those people were taught those things

In 1892, Homer Plessy was a passenger in a railroad and who refused to sit in a Jim Crow car. He brought before Judge John H. Ferguson of the Criminal Court from New Orleans, who upheld the state law. The law was challenged in the Supreme Court on grounds that it conflicted with the 13th and 14th Amendments. Although, the Supreme Court had ruled in 1896, Plessy v Ferguson inculcated the “separate but equal” doctrine and passed laws entailing the segregation of races, arguing that Jim Crow laws were constitutional. The case was devastating for African Americans allowing the oppression of an entire race. The Supreme Court system in practice was separate and unequal;