Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.
In this historic 1954 legal case, public school segregation is declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. The unanimous verdict was read by Chief Justice Earl Warren. This complete issue of The New York Times, on May 18, 1954, publishes the entire decision of the Court on an inside page, and includes the reactions of African American leaders.
Future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, pictured in the middle of the front page photo, played a major role in this monumental case where, relying on principles established in the 14th Amendment, it was argued that a racially separate educational infrastructure could never be equal.
To avoid desegregating its public schools, Prince Edward County, Virginia, closed them and they were not reopened until September 2, 1964.
Though change would arrive, it came not “with all deliberate speed” as the Court’s lesser-known Brown II verdict specified the following year. Only then, would it be appreciated that laws alone could not create morality or impose social justice.