hi i'm clint smith and this is crash course black american history and today we're going back to the courtroom if you've been watching this series it's probably starting to feel like a pretty familiar place because a lot of history has played out here while many black americans were being kept from voting because of domestic terrorism and jim crow laws the courtroom became a place where unfair practices could be challenged today we're going to talk about one of the most important cases in u.s history the supreme court case brownlee board of education let's start the show [Music] because black people often didn't have representation in their state or congressional bodies it sometimes made changing laws through legislation difficult but the courts were one avenue through which black americans were able to fight for their citizenship rights and feel like they had a chance when the constitution was amended to include the reconstruction amendments aka the 13th 14th and 15th amendments black americans were formerly made citizens of the united states and citizenship is important because it affirms that you have access to rights and resources in your country but many white americans weren't okay with black americans becoming citizens they benefited from black americans not having the same protections and resources that they did and so white americans created jim crow laws that implemented segregation and hindered black americans right to vote we'll talk more about the civil rights movement and the fight to vote in a few more episodes but segregation is an important place to start segregation wasn't just morally bad but also discreetly or maybe not so discreetly assured that black americans wouldn't be able to access all of the practical and material benefits of their citizenship and this sets the stage for brownview board of education access to public school education was definitely one of those citizenship rights that black americans were entitled to but white americans used jim crow laws and the plessy v ferguson decision which stated that separate but equal schools made segregation okay to justify keeping the races separate but the reality was that separate was rarely equal many schools for black students were severely underfunded had outdated materials and were just generally dilapidated schools for white students on the other hand often had drastically better resources the injustice was clear and black americans started organizing to get their black students the education and resources that they deserved the national association for the advancement of colored people had their eyes on the issue of school segregation way back in the 1930s when they commissioned the margold report the report ran over 200 pages and half of them dealt directly with segregation in schools during that time the naacp had some small victories for equal education in public colleges and universities but when it came to elementary and secondary schools segregationists just wouldn't budge but brownview board of education happened in the 1950s so why are we talking about the 1930s well things in the courts can take a long time and the naacp was playing the long game the execution of their plan took about 20 years starting with the leadership of charles hamilton houston a harvard graduate and the director of the naacp's legal strategy and ending with the legal prowess of his mentee thurgood marshall in 1952 the naacp brought five different cases on school segregation from different states south carolina virginia kansas delaware and the district of columbia the naacp's lawyers presented legal arguments on how unconstitutional segregation and separate but equal were these five cases were combined into brown v board of education and went to the supreme court in 1953. let's go to the thought bubble oliver brown was an assistant pastor who lived in an integrated neighborhood in topeka kansas in september of 1950 oliver brown went to his local elementary school the sumner school and tried to enroll his daughter linda the principal said that she would not be allowed to attend because she was black and the school did not accept black students the principal also said that state laws allowed for segregation so basically sorry not sorry since linda couldn't go to her local school which was only a few blocks away from her home she had to attend the all-black school but it involved a two-hour commute via bus and car this led to a very sleepy linda brown and a very upset oliver brown different historians will tell you different things about what happened next some say that brown went to the naacp and became part of the lawsuit others say that the entire act of going to the local school in the first place was at the naacp's urging either way while there were eventually 12 other plaintiffs as part of the naacp's case oliver brown on behalf of his daughter became its lead plaintiff and even though we associate the brown name with desegregation linda brown was never actually able to attend the sumner school because by the time the ruling was handed down she was in junior high thanks thoughtbubble thurgood marshall was the chief attorney for the plaintiffs marshall was a victim of but also a victor over segregated education himself after graduating with honors from lincoln university he was unable to attend the university of maryland law school because he wasn't white undeterred he attended howard university school of law instead which had become the first black law school in the nation in 1869. he graduated first in his class he later went on to become the head of the naacp legal defense and education fund and ultimately he would be appointed by lyndon b johnson as the first black american supreme court justice but we're getting ahead of ourselves back to marshall's naacp days marshall and his team argued before the supreme court that segregated schools were unconstitutional and that separate but equal had to go and the court finally agreed with them and on may 17th 1954 the supreme court unanimously held that segregated public schools violated the equal protection clause in his decision chief justice earl warren said quote we conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of separate but equal has no place separate educational facilities are inherently unequal therefore we hold that the plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions have been brought are by reason of the segregation complained of deprived of the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the 14th amendment this was a huge victory for black americans but enforcing the ruling was a different story after brown v board overturned separately equal in schools riots and violence erupted all over the country why protesters terrorize black communities throughout the south especially in south carolina georgia and mississippi in texas and florida white vigilante groups burn crosses to terrorize black residents some scholars have argued that even though a budding civil rights movement propelled brownview board to victory the backlash against the case accelerated the civil rights movement as black americans were increasingly harassed and abused by angry segregationists some school districts even decided to close all of their schools rather than allowing black children to integrate them for example in 1959 the prince edward county school system of virginia completely shut down so that white students didn't have to go to school with black students many white parents sent their children to segregated private schools and black children either had to go to school in another county which was just unfeasible for so many families or not go to school at all and it wasn't until 1964 and another unanimous supreme court case griffin the county school board of prince edward county that the prince edward county schools reopened some black children missed out on five years of their education five years so while it would be easy to look at brown v board as an example of america changing for the better and the supreme court doing what's right simply because it was right it's also important to look at the broader context that animated that decision at this time tensions between the u.s and the soviet union were at their peak and the cold war was an omnipresent force in both american and global politics many top officials in the u.s government including justices on the supreme court were acutely cognizant of how segregation and images of violence and terror enacted against black people harmed the united states reputation and their ability to say that american democracy was the greatest in the world chief justice earl warren said in a 1954 speech to the american bar association that our american system like all others is on trial both at home and abroad the extent to which we maintain the spirit of our constitution with its bill of rights will in the long run do more to make it both secure and the object of adulation than the number of hydrogen bombs we stockpile so while it was about black children's right to an education it also was about much more than that just think about it jim crow was so deeply entrenched in american society that people would rather shut down an entire school system for years rather than allow black children to attend essentially jim crow and separate but equal policies were used to diminish the quality of the black american citizenship experience we all know that a quality education can improve economic outcomes so when so many black americans were prevented from having access to the resources they needed for a quality education it perpetuated the community's economic despair what's more brownview board also had some pretty drastic unintended consequences as the ruling was being implemented across the country tens of thousands of black teachers and principals lost their jobs black children were now beginning to attend white schools but those white schools didn't want black teachers the idea of a black teacher or principal being in a position of authority over white students was just a non-starter for many white parents another unsettling part about this is that while brown v board attempted to get rid of segregation in american schools because of policy decisions around education housing and zoning the sad truth is that schools today are segregated as they were in the late 1960s clearly there's still a lot of work to do thanks for watching i'll see you next time crash course is made with the help of all these nice people and our animation team is thought cafe crash course is possible with the help of all the people who bought the 2021 crash course lerner coin and by all our patrons on patreon thank you to all our patrons and supporters for making crash course possible you