On May 17, 1954, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the
unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas.
State-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th Amendment and was therefore unconstitutional. This historic decision marked the end of the "separate but equal" precedent set by the Supreme Court nearly 60 years earlier and served as a catalyst for the expanding civil rights movement during the decade of the 1950s.
The National Archives and Records Administration’s
(NARA) has a
resource site dedicated to Brown v. Board of Education.
The NARA Lesson Plan on Brown v. Board of Education is also included on that web site.
PowerPoint Presentation entitled: “The Fiftieth Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, A Teaching Opportunity”. Presented by Rolland Kidder, Executive Director of the Robert H. Jackson Center, and John Twinam, History Teacher at Jamestown High School, at the 2003 Law, Youth and Citizenship Conference in Albany.
Here are some additional links on Brown versus the Board
of Education:
Mr. Chief Justice Warren delivered the opinion of the Court:
http://afroamhistory.about.com/library/blbrown_v_board.htm
The appeal from the United States District Court for the
District of Kansas:
http://www.nationalcenter.org/brown.html