"Laws permitting, and even requiring, their separation in places where they are liable to be brought into contact do not necessarily imply the inferiority of either race to the other... If one race be inferior to the other socially, the Constitution of the United States cannot put them upon the same plane." — Justice Henry Billings Brown, Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896
Brown's reasoning established which constitutional doctrine?
- A
Racial classifications required strict judicial scrutiny
- B
Private discrimination violated the Thirteenth Amendment
- C
Federal civil rights laws preempted state segregation statutes
- Dcheck_circle
Separate but equal facilities satisfied the Fourteenth Amendment
Explanation
Plessy enshrined "separate but equal," allowing states to mandate segregation as long as facilities were nominally equal — a doctrine that stood until Brown v. Board (1954).