| dc.description.abstract | Chief Justice Earl Warren called it one of the most significant rulings of his tenure. This decision which outlawed public school segregation, greatly accelerated a major social revolution that is still in progress. Closely involved with the principle issue were problems connected with some of the basic conflicts in America. The power struggle between state and national governments, judiciary and legislature, and majority and minority groups was clearly apparent throughout the school segregation cases. The importance of the Brown decision lies as much in the manner in which these secondary issues were resolved as in the disposition of the primary problem. The purpose of this study was to attempt a narrative history or why and how this decision was made. Prior to 1954 there were indications that the Court could have decided otherwise. Despite the certainty of hindsight, there was no clearcut inevitability about the outcome. The procedure followed in this study was to examine the original records of the four trial courts, the oral argument before the Supreme Court in 1952 and 1953, the written briefs of the parties to the cases, the primary decision in Hay, 1954, and related earlier cases. A series of personal interviews with some of the individuals closely involved, including three Justices of the Supreme Court, contributed valuable insights. In addition much of the secondary literature on the decision was examined in order to evaluate the most significant interpretations of the key issues in the school segregation cases. Although the Brown opinion has been the subject of a voluminous body of writing, there has been no previous effort to develop a synthesis of the many interpretations concerning it. Most of this literature can be found in law journal articles and social science studies. Two book-length studies approach the school segregation cases from different viewpoints. Albert P. Blaustein and Clarence C. Ferguson, Jr., in Desegregation and the Law (New Brunswick, N.J., 1957), focus on legal theory and history, while Daniel H. Berman, in It Is So Ordered: The Supreme Court Rules School Segregation (New York, 1966), emphasizes Supreme Court procedures. Because the journal literature is so extensive, it was necessary to limit this study to the Hay 1954 decision. Furthermore the reaction to and the consequences of the Brown decision are other aspects which have not yet been thoroughly examined. | en_US |
