Reflections on the Brown decision after fifty years.

ON MAY 17, 1954, THE U.S. SUPREME COURT RULED IN BROWN V. BOARD of Education of Topeka that separate educational facilities for blacks and whites were "inherently unequal." The unanimous opinion, delivered by Chief Justice Earl Warren, overturned the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case on the grounds that so-called separate but equal facilities were in violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The decision was based in part, however, on reasoning drawn from psychology, the observation that such facilities generated "a feeling of inferiority" among black children. The Court the following year (May 31, 1955) ordered that steps be taken to desegregate the schools, beginning immediately, but despite the blockbuster nature of the Brown decision, the justices commanded only that the process move "with all deliberate speed," a phrase filled with ambiguity. White southerners mounted every defense they could imagine against meaningful change in race relations. Hence more than a decade passed before most southern schools really began to attempt to conform to the law of the land. None of the major actors who had instituted the case on behalf of Linda Brown, the black child denied admission to a more conveniently located "white" school in Topeka, Kansas, and none of those who opposed the case, could have foreseen the full influence of the decision that ensued, nor the multitudinous ways that the decision ultimately affected attitudes and practices far removed from the issue of public schools.

On the fiftieth anniversary of what may well be the most famous Supreme Court decision in the nation's history, the Journal of Southern History asked seven historians to reflect on the case from a variety of perspectives, attempting to put the decision in historical context and contemplating its larger legal, political, cultural, and human consequences. It is clear now that the Brown decision neither began nor ended the civil rights movement, and scholarship has revealed the struggle, mainly by southern blacks but also by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, to address the issue in the years before 1954. And surely now we recognize the importance of such legislation as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and of a series of later Court decisions and Justice Department rulings. The South of 2004 could hardly have been imagined by southerners of either race in 1954. Yet despite the changes for the good, there have been unintended consequences, ranging from black teachers losing their positions as schools desegregated to massive white flight that resulted in resegregation of schools momentarily desegregated. Though few people today would question the moral tightness of ending legal segregation, some of both races question such related issues as affirmative action, and the South today is also more complex following the influx of Latino and Asian immigrants. Certainly the issues surrounding the Brown decision remain vital to the South and the nation. The Journal of Southern History very rarely has special issues or solicits articles addressing a common theme, but the extraordinary significance of the Brown decision and the perennial issue of race in the South seemed to demand special attention. We sought a diversity of viewpoints and approaches, and we commend the following reflections to your attention.