Plessy Vs. Ferguson

The case of Plessy v. Ferguson of 1896 is unique, in that it involves a man who is only 1/8 black being prosecuted for it. Homer Plessy was almost fully white, and had very fair skin. He bought a train ticket in a whites only car and was arrested and sent to trial for violating segregation laws in an 1890 Louisiana Statute.



The moral question was asked, can states legally and rightfully use "separate but equal" as a viable way to live American lives? Obviously separate but equal was anything but equal. Sure, you would have a whites only fountain and a blacks only fountain, but like we discussed and saw in class, often times only a whites only fountain would even have refrigerated water. Points such as this are the reason that separate but equal is an unsuccessful tactic.

The eventual ruling was that "separate but equal" was fair, which it obviously was not at the time. In the same case that some colored and white water fountains were unequal, the same went for most segregated things such as the train cars in the Plessy v. Ferguson trial. It wasn't until many years later that "separate but equal" was deemed unconstitutional and was eventually overturned by Brown v. Board of Education, but this wasn't for half a century until 1954.