Problems: 1) Ruling of the Plessy v. Ferguson court case of 1896 - had approved of segregated schooling. ‘Separate but Equal’. 2) By the early 1950’s only 16 states required children to be integrated at school and this was often ignored by schools within those states. 3) There were few schools where blacks could learn a profession - there were 4 black law schools compared to 16 white and 0 black medicine schools compared to 15 white. 4) Quality of education within Jim Crow Schools was poor, poor buildings, lack of resources and teachers who had not had much of a further education themselves. This ensured that it was difficult for young black Americans to break out of the cycle of poverty.
Brown versus Topeka (1954) NAACP - took Topeka, school board of Kansas to court as a test case, NAACP and Oliver Brown argued that his daughter Linda Brown, a 7 year old, should be sent to her nearest school which was a few blocks away rather than the all black one several kilometres away. NAACP were represented by Thurgood Marshall. Chief Justice Earl Warren of the Supreme court delivered his verdict on 17th May 1954. He ruled that in the field of public education the doctrine of separate but equal had no place. He argued that separate facilities meant unequal ones and that states should set up an education system where black and white children attended the same schools. This was to be done with ‘all deliberate speed’
Little Rock As a result of the Brown ruling states had to integrate. The town of Little Rock, Arkansas decided that it would integrate schools a bit at a time. The central high school would integrate its first black student on 3rd September 1957. The evening before, governor of Arkansas, Orville Faubus announced that it would be impossible to keep law and order if black children started at the school. 4th September 1957 nine black children led by Elizabeth Eckford arrived at the school, a large crowd barred their way. Faubus also sent state troopers to make sure that the children did not get in.
Black people in Little Rock took Faubus to court and he was forced to remove the state troopers. Eisenhower then sent 1,000 paratroopers to Little Rock to protect the black children on their way to school.
After Little Rock integration rapidly increased in some states although by 1962 there had been no integration in Alabama, South Carolina an d Mississippi.
