Plessy V. Ferguson

Plessy v. Ferguson was a landmark 1896 U.S.

Supreme Court decision that upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation under the doctrine of "separate but equal.

" The case stemmed from an incident in 1892 when Homer Plessy, who was of mixed race, refused to sit in a "whites only" car on a train.

The Court ruled that segregation was permissible as long as the separate facilities provided to different races were equal in quality.

This decision provided legal justification for segregation laws across the United States, particularly in the South.

It wasn't explicitly overturned until Brown v.

Board of Education in 1954, which addressed segregation in schools. Plessy v.

Ferguson remains a significant case in American legal history, symbolizing the era of Jim Crow laws and institutionalized racism.