i think we elect. and and that's one does support with please join me in thanking ruth weissmy name is colleen sh. i'm the archivist of the united states. and i want to welcome to the national archives, of course, as the archivist of the united states. my job is to preserve, protect and share our nation's records with 13 and a half billion records here at the national archives. we certainly have a lot of stories to share and to tell. but the story of our nation really begins upstairs with the declaration of independence, when in the course of human events, it becomes for one

people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them to and to assume among powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and nature's entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation, and notice what words appear in the first paragraph of the declaration, separate and equal. separate, but was a cruel play on those words of. the declaration and brown board reclaimed those words, so i can't take credit for that insight. it comes from my friend danielle allen, who is a political and a philosopher philosopher at harvard. and it comes from a conversation that i had with her on the of the declaration of independence. she wrote a very thoughtful book

about the declaration. and i was privileged enough to interview her about that book. and that insight came and always stuck with me about the importance of those words. the brown decision was certainly a part of a pivotal point in our nation's history with victory, justice marshall laid the groundwork for the civil rights movement and our ongoing pursuit of a more perfect union. he spent the rest of his life building upon that foundation. as he said in one of his last major speeches, nearly 40 years after brown. the legal system can force open doors and sometimes even knock walls, but it cannot build bridges. that belongs to you and me afro and white, rich and educated and illiterate. our fates are together here at the national archives. we hold the records of the five

cases that constitute brown and the many rights cases that came after it. so i'm glad we've come together this evening to hear from two jurists who personally clerked for justice marshall to explore the impact and legacy brown through the lens of 70 years of history. it will be a great conversation and really a fitting conversation to have here at the national archives. want to thank the national archives founder for their generous support and also for verizon for sponsoring this program and bringing us together this evening. now i'm going to turn over to our national archives founder and chair secretary. thank you.

thank you, dr. shogun. by the way, today, the first anniversary of dr. shogun's service as our national archivist. the first woman to hold that post and she's doing a tremendous job. let me also acknowledge william minor, who is counsel for, the archives board, also riley temple riley is a former member of the board and was very instrumental in helping to secure a number of our speakers for tonight's program. and so riley we thank you. and william, we thank you. and to the other members of the archives board. we thank you for your leadership. my name is rodney slater and i am the chair, the president of the national archives foundation and board the is the nonprofit

perfect partner of the national archives. and for over 30 years, we have the incredible work and the important mission of this agency to provide public access to its vast holdings and to increase civic engagement with the citizens of our country. programs like tonight afford us an opportunity not only point to big events like this particular case, but also some of the untold stories of individuals who were involved and who have been involved in moving our nation forward. as we seek to become a more perfect union. before on with my comments about, the specific court decision tonight that we'll celebrate, i'd like to introduce an individual by the name of kenneth miller. mr. miller was a young student

in july of 1952. his mother louise miller actually sued the district of columbia board of education because he needed the assistance of being admitted to kendal school for the. mr. is with us tonight along with his wife carol and other members of his family. and we'd like to just acknowledge him and the members of the family. again programing like this allows us to focus on big cases like this. one of the most important cases

decided the united states supreme court, but also individuals, some known and some unknown and tell their stories and to acknowledge them and to lift up that we might be inspired by their example. tonight, we celebrate the 70th anniversary of landmark court decision brown v board of education and we discuss its legacy the importance of this decision for it was 70 years ago tomorrow that the united states supreme court chief justice earl warren delivered the unanimous the unanimous ruling indicating a critical turning point in our nation's history. it signal an end of legalized racial segregation in schools of the united overruling the quote,

separate but equal principle set forth in the 1896 supreme court case, plessy versus ferguson. the would like to also thank for its support of the national archives its mission again to engage our citizenry and to tell the unstoppable untold stories and sometimes familiar stories of how our nation has come be the nation that it is today. i now have the pleasure of introducing tony lewis. tony lewis is the vice president of public policy at verizon. tony is responsible for shaping and advancing verizon's public policy, and he directs verizon's philanthropic activities in. this region of the u.s. he serves on various boards, including site for children, the alvin ailey american dance theater, johns hopkins

university, carey school business and kipp. kipp, as you, is a network of high performing college preparatory charter schools which serve under-resourced communities across washington d.c. mr. lewis is the chairman of the board, directors of the washington nationals youth baseball academy and the former chairman of the board directors of the greater washington board of trade. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming tony lewis to the podium. thank you, mr. secretary. good evening. everyone. yes? you made a wonderful choice of being here this evening. you can already tell how special this is going be, especially me. because, mr. secretary. me. that is one i can write home

about. i want to quickly say a big thank you on behalf of arisa, but i want to start with this. the thought of only being a creature of the present and the past, what's troubling i longed for a future to with hope in it the desire to be free awakened. my determined to act, to think and, to speak. that was frederick douglass. those words true to me when i read them this because of what we're experiencing tonight here, this partnership this opportunity for verizon to stand before you and partner with this historic place is all based on the fundamentals, the values that we hold as americans, the opportunity to connect our

around the world with this amazing place, with all of the data that you've heard about, and as mr. secretary said, engage. one of my favorite words, because if a rise in what we do day in, day out is fine ways to ensure that you, our customers, our consumers, our friends and family and neighbors have the opportunities to engage in the ways that you want and need to and to have the opportunities to see this information to experience information and to take this information in in any place that you'd like in any form that you like as much as you'd like. so there is no better partnership for us than this partnership with the archives. i want to thank the entire staff for the opportunity to do this. they are marvelous. i wish you could meet them all. and we're looking forward to many, many more opportunities to

experience these types of monumental opportunities to celebrate something important as this decision, which literally placed me in this position to speak to you tonight. thank you. and so next, i have an opportunity to introduce heroes. and i literally mean heroes. it's my pleasure to introduce our distinguished panel. we are joined two individuals who served law clerks with supreme court justice thurgood marshall. cheryl dickerson, is the cormack waterhouse of law civil rights and social justice at georgetown law. she is a frequent speaker, contributor and writer and, an author of four books. her recent book, white space,

black hood, examines the role of residential segregation in producing racial inequality. randall elkins is the michael r klein professor at harvard law school, where he teaches courses on contracts, criminal law and the regular notion of race relations. mr. kennedy writes for a wide range of scholarly and general interest publications and has authored several books himself, including race, crime and the law, for which he was awarded the 1998 robert f kennedy book award. and moderating tonight's panel is the honorable michael k, president and ceo of insight to the internet and television association. chairman powell is the former of the federal communications commission and currently serves as the chairman of the mayo clinic board of chairman the william and mary foundation

board and vice chairman of america's promise alliance. please welcome the panel. the stage. wow, what a great crowd. good evening. evening. welcome to tonight's program. on the eve of one of the most monumental supreme court decisions in the history of united states, brown board of education, and i am pleased, honored to have the opportunity to discuss important case and its history with two of the most distinguished professors in this field, randall kennedy from harvard law and sheryll cashin to my alma georgetown university law center. all right, so we have a limited amount of time and a lot to

cover. so i do want to get started. so we to set the stage in the years following terrible civil war in the united states and a very short period of time the united. adopts three monumental constitu tional amendments. the 13th amendment abolishing slavery. the 14th amendment providing the equal protection of the laws and the 15th amendment guaranteeing the right to vote. you can imagine. this didn't necessarily go over in parts of the country. and since we're at the archives, i think i understand history is important. so help understand what was going on in this period and what were some of the ways that states were working to circum what was this new muscular air of federal authority in the intervention of their daily lives? i wanted to the man who taught me race and race racism in

america. love this part. thank you. well, it's wonderful to be here. this evening. so you're asking about the reconstruction era and what happened so. it was a civil war which. put an end to slavery. and then the the that prosecuted the civil war. the republican party was successful. spearheading three constitutional amendments. you mentioned the 13th amendment does away with slavery the 14th amendment, does a variety of things. one of the things that the 14th amendment does is for the first time in american history, determine is a citizen of the united states. in 1857, the supreme court of the united states in dred scott, sanford said that african americans could not be under any circumstances, citizens of the

states. well, the 14th amendment changed that. and the 14th amendment also stipulated that all states had to provide all persons the equal protection of the laws. and then there was the 15th amendment. the 15th amendment said that the states could no longer exclude from the ballot on the basis of race, color or previous condition of servitude. now, that was a tremendous amount of reform, and that amount of that that reform effort triggered resistance much of it violent resistance. and, you know, the fact of the matter is, we're still in the grip of that resistance. and i think that that's the backdrop to our story here. yes. yes. can i add one thing? so. the 3040, the 14th amendment was

a comp remise a coalition of radical republicans. my heroes, thaddeus stevens, charles sumner, i learned about in your class as the first person introduced me to him. these guys were ready for. black equality. but the moderates, the moderate republicans were not. so basically what they coalesced around was suffrage. and the idea was, well, if we give the black man suffrage, they can protect their own rights through polity. and there was some debate about civil rights versus rights. right. and so not in the republican coalition was ready to accept the kind of equality like, you know, going to the same schools and those of things. so that was still contested

despite fact that we had the 13th, 14th or 15th amendment picking. i'm just picking up think that you're absolutely right to use the compromise. so the 14th amendment is very central to our concern tonight, brown versus board of education and the 14th amendment was very much a matter of compromise. so for instance, there were some people who wanted the 14th amendment to say that states would be prohibited from drawing racial distinctions. some abolitionists, for instance, who that position the congress, the framers of the 14th amendment were not willing to go that far right. and so they gave us what we currently have, which is a very ambiguous proposition the equal protection, the laws. well, that can mean a whole lot of different things. hence our dispute and we've been fighting about it ever since to this day. what, what are those four words mean? right.

five words. it's interesting, cheryl, you this this question in the compromise about social equality, which really finds its way into the predicate case of plessy. so the state of louisiana passes, a statute in which it makes it unlawful for blacks to white right. the white cars of trains or whites to ride in the black cars of trains and. homer plessy intentionally boards the white train is ultimately charged goes through a series of trials and we land in the supreme court in this relatively opinion of plessy versus ferguson. so tell us a little bit about the court and what it held. and what it found and the case, mr. plessy. so first thing i want to mention is that homer plessy didn't just do this his own. right. he lived in a neighborhood hood of activist black people. and there was a committee that

decided they wanted to do this. and they recruited homer plessy was a really interesting lead lawyer in the case. alvin tuskegee, who was you can google. and he's a really interesting figure, but a white guy who was down with black freedom. well before a lot of other people and he's the one who introduced this idea that justice should be colorblind here. so what did the supreme court hold famously, the majority held that black people could ride in the car. and so they were formally equal with whites who had the white car. and justice harlan famously dissent in that case. i'll let you add just one thing. you know, we're talking about segregation and. and segregation was a cruel and

justice. harlan, in his dissent in plessy versus ferguson, we're really does do a great diagnosis of the cruel lie of separate but. i mean, the idea was the idea behind it. and it had a real grip on the american legal imagination a long time. the idea behind it, the theory was, well, this is not a violation. the equal protection of the law, because everybody is under the same law. so in plessy versus ferguson, white people cannot be on this in the same car with black. if a white person wants to be in the ride, a black person, they can't do it. if if a black person wants to ride with a white person, they can't do it. nobody can complain. they're all under the same law. they're all being equally restricted. that was the theory. and, you know, it seems to me

that one thing that we ought to keep in mind is how powerful an idea that was. i mean. from 1896 to 1954, that's a long time. that's a long time. and, you know, if you ask question, who were some of the people who were flummoxed by that lie? well oliver wendell holmes, jr, justice oliver wendell holmes jr. louis brandeis. and the list goes on. so, i mean, this this idea was a very powerful idea. and that's one of the reasons why you know brown versus board of education is so is because the justice in 1954 really had to overcome a lot to reach that the conclusion that they reached. but i want to point out really quickly, people got to ride where they wanted to during reconstruction. you know, in new orleans this

was a clawback. right. right. people got to ride. so black people had been riding on the trains. the schools actually were integrated in new orleans during reconstruction. so it's a clawback when court decides this fake principle is particularly fake because people in new orleans had been used to mixing. right. it encourages the poorer for the proliferate notion for the next six, six decades of jim crow laws. right. this is like the beginning. but jim crow politics becomes like the game in town. so everybody is falling over themselves to say, well i'm going to segregate. i'm going to it so that black people and, white people can't play checkers. and if i if you vote for me, i will segregate the books. i learned this in your class. there were even some schools required that the books that children learn had to disagree. and so that was like the central

organizing principle in society for six decades. and it dominated politics. we'll say this, though what was the case. that first announced separate but equal? it wasn't a southern case, boston. it was. but roberts. yes yes. boston and the 18 states? yes law professor start. yes. okay. let me i teach that case. let me just say. charles sumner and robert morris, a black lawyer, and charles sumner fought, that case, they lost. but within five years, they succeeded getting the legislature in in the state legislature to repeal it. so anyway, let's move forward and move forward law. laudner. so yes, 7 to 1 decision, a single dissent, famous dissent.

i, i out one quote from that case just gives you a flavor of it. if one race being inferior to the other socially, the constitution united states cannot put them upon the same plane inherently rejecting the idea that the law would try to cure problems of social discrimination. and as cheryl pointed out, we have this enormous six decade period of jim crow laws that parents like my parents grew up in. my mother grew up in birmingham alabama. my told me many stories of not being able to stay here or drink from that water fountain. what's important to remember, that's not a generation ago. that's one generation ago. so we fast forward nearly 60 years and we're on the doorstep of brown. where the supreme court is going to be asked a new this question whether but equal is unconstitutional in the context of public schools and of course the man who will this case a

lion of the law and your former boss justice. later, thurgood marshall. before we get to the case, let's talk about him. tell us about him. what drove him in this work? how did he strategize about getting to the supreme court? he did a lot of work prior to this to set the predicate for the court case. you got to spend some time him. tell us about it. i'll be happy to talk about mr. civil rights. who in my view, is the greatest lawyer in history of the united states, a named. just quickly, though, before that, i want to pick up on a point that secretary slater mentioned at the very beginning of these proceedings because. justice marshall.

i mean, we all know justice. justice marshall was the solicitor general of the united states. justice marshall was a court of appeals judge. justice marshall was one ninth of the living american constitu ation as a justice of the supreme court. he got a lot of heat, got a lot of applause this during his lifetime, as he should have. there are other people however, there are other people who enabled marshall to do. he did. and there were other people enabled the supreme court to strike a blow for decency. and those other people often not get much attention at all. i just want to mention one. i'll mention one. i'm from south carolina. one of the cases of brown versus board education, briggs versus elliott clarendon county, carolina. it was a man named, henry briggs. henry briggs and his wife, elizabeth briggs. henry briggs, very modest man,

worked in a filling station. his wife was a maid. they became plaintiffs in. briggs versus elliott briggs as who was actually a pretty decent man, says harris. read in the paper, you're a in this case. you know, i can't i can't employ you. you're going to be a plaintiff. so take your name off of it. briggs refused. he was fired. his wife was fired. reverend delaine, who was really the spiritual guardian of the plaintiffs in that case, was run out of south carolina. these are the people that really sacrifice. and all too often we forget about them. it's people like that who are always beginning things. a case that the justices don't

begin anything, the are always there sort of ratifying things that have begun. it's these people who actually got the ball rolling and they did have a great they did have a great legal guardian. mr. civil thurgood marshall. and i'm going to be quiet. i'm going to say is it was one of the great privileges my life to be able work for him. you're here. well, how do i feel about. same here. same here. i worked for. i clerked thurgood marshall, his last active year on the court. let me just quickly answer your question. the benefit of the audience and there are other lawyers, spottswood robinson, carter, constance motley, you know, there are other people who were on this team. thurgood marshall was the chief oral advocate. i always like to tell my students that he argued 32 cases

before the supreme court and won 29 of them. many the ones that he did when when he was the chief legal for the naacp were knocking down planks and jim crow. now, how he become thurgood marshall? well, the quickest story is to i credit or academic mix who follow this story. charles hamilton houston. charles hamilton houston graduated. what's this? was he the valedictorian of his class? i know he. was on the harvard law review, but i know he's valedictorian of his class in amherst. right harvard law graduate. he was the dean of howard law school. he remade that law school into a civil rights firm. thoughts? his attitude was. if you've come to howard law

school, you will work harder than you ever had. and the role of a lawyer or a -- lawyer. that was the term then is to be of to his people. and either you're going to be of service to your people or you're going to be a parasite. and that's that was what he said. and thurgood marshall, under his tutelage, you know, he kind of played around. he was an undergrad. he got very serious in law school. he first in his class and he and charles hamilton houston kind of invent did the civil rights law firm, and they started filing cases together and it was really charles hamilton houston had this increment strategy. his thought process was that black america and -- then were ready to protest and he felt like they had to go slow to get to the point where our were

willing to be played dis were willing to challenge jim crow. so they started incrementally. they they had won victories, particularly at the graduate school, particularly involving the university of texas law school. they got the court to say that case sweat be painter. right. yes. they got the court to say that separate, inherently unequal. so the principal was there and because there were people like the briggs family, lynda brown's family and others willing to put their children the line and contest they eventually got to brown. yeah. it's interesting that he graduate education first. it's interesting in the university texas case, the holding really was that the two institutions were unequal. texas had hastily stood a black law school, not having one in an effort to cure their problem.

and the court ultimately said it wasn't equal. so we get to can i just interrupt you. this was this issue was really quite personal with justice marshall he was from baltimore, maryland. mm hmm. he goes to lincoln university predominantly, you know, historically black institution as an undergraduate. he comes back. he wants to be a lawyer. his family lived in baltimore. it would have been very easy for him to. have gone to the university of maryland law school. he could not attend the university of maryland law school because excluded blacks. that is what prompted this one. a great irony. it was a it a it was probably a good miss because then he comes to how and falls under the sway of the great charles hamilton houston. now, thurgood marshall's first big case as a civil rights lawyer is a case against the

university of maryland. mm hmm. he has a friend. he has a friend. friend who sues? and marshall succeeds in getting the courts of maryland to say, well, there's not a black in the state that's open to blacks who want to become lawyers. so you've got the white school has got to admit murray versus pearson got to admit this black student justice marshall you know decades, and decades and decades later talking about that case and would always say sweet revenge. very good. best cold. it's interesting you you note that he could not attend to

school in his neighborhood. in essence. which really is one of the foundational circumstances that brings to the fore. young linda brown, seven years old, in topeka, kansas, goes to a black school, but it's very far away from where she lives. she has to pass a white school to do it. and her father chooses to attempt to enroll her in the white. so we heard mentioned earlier this is really a consolidation multiple cases with similar circumstances. and in the case marshall goes directly at plessy yes. tell us a little bit about his theory that separate is inherently unequal that matter how good the quality of the two schools because by some it is by some analysis the schools in

kansas happened to be similar even the plaintiffs would argue they were getting a good education at the black school. but there was this belief that they're inherently unequal. well, you could assert first. so i'm going to answer with a little story. the year i clerked for justice, there was a lot of news about an effort to start a new public school academy for black boys. yeah. and this sparked a lot of conversation in chambers among code clerks in him and he basic we said you know he told this story about a separate unit in world war two which unit is going be asked to go do the most dangerous mission. and he said, you know, there's a potential budget cut. he felt like a school like this, just make black kids vulnerable,

which is going to be the first on the chopping block if there's a going to be a budget cut. and i kind of learned in that moment that you you know, he he was concerned equality, but he had a very pragmatic understanding. and this is person who went to hbcus. you know, he believed in black excellence. he believed that people could thrive with the right resources. but he was, i think, pragmatic about the reality that separate actually almost never was equal and wasn't to be equal in terms access to resources. but i also, you know, believe that he, like my parents generation. well, i mean, he was my grandfather's generation, by the way. my thurgood marshall and my grandfather mark carpenter were fraternity brothers along with langston at lincoln for alpha

phi alpha. and that helped me get job. in addition to his recommendation. so but, you know, he believed that the caste system had to be dismantled and he that the equal protection clause demand did the dismantling of a caste system. so that's my understanding. i agree all of that. i would want add, though and here's where i think the the mystification of segregation is actually still us because i think we're you know, we're you know what's wrong with it? what's with it? what's wrong with it? it was a purpose insult. mm hmm. use the word chaos. what? it was really about what it was really about. and harlan says this in his dissent in plessy versus ferguson it was about pretty white people from contaminate. mm hmm. it was a quarantining.

that's what it was about. it was not. it was unilateral. it wasn't a negotiation. it was white people. the white power structure calling the shots, putting black people only apart. but down. if you go take a look at, the statutes, you know, what do jim crow statutes actually say? one place you can take a look at this, by the way a wonderful resource here is murray's great of race in the united states in midst mid 20th century. and you read through these laws and they say things like in many of the states, go back to plessy versus ferguson. rail railcars, people cannot sit

with white people, white people cannot sit with black people. but there is an exception what's the exception serves servants. you can have maids. you can have maids. now, you know, because it was understood if it's a maid, then, you know, it's understood this person is lower. this was a this was repression. this was insult. this was a way of putting black people down. and that's why it was inherently and unavoidably. inconsistent with any sensible notion equality in america. so it was also backed by virulent, nasty. you know, in the slightest infraction, particularly by a black man of the code could get you killed.

this seems so compelling to today but it was a pretty radical proposition to put before the court. difficult to imagine how it was going to be proven. how did martial crack that they everything. well, you know, we mentioned the long period. i mean they you take a look at their brief they were various arguments. you know it shows they were up against so. the racism was so deep was so pervasive that it was actually hard to make an imprint. and so had to try various ways in which to try to reveal the unfairness. now on our side things it looks obvious. right on our side of things it seems so clearly unfair. but on that side of things it

not. and the fact of the matter is that the segregationists had a lot going for them. text the text of the constitution does not expressly forbid separate government separating on a racial basis. it just says, you know, you just got to treat everybody with you know equality, equality before the law. well, segregation says the segregation says segregation and equality before the. so the text was ambiguous. if one turns to originalism, originalism is really big, right well, if you go back, take a look at what were the framers and ratifies of the 14th amendment saying in 1868. there's a very strong argument that the majority of ratify is in framers of the 14th amendment did not intend to strike down segregation segregation or

segregated schooling. segregated schooling were segregated in the district. i believe they were. and in fact, in most states where there was public schooling and you know that that was there was a strong argument that as an originalist matter segregation. okay. not to mention segregation with respect to matrimony. and then third precedent. i mean, 1954, there had been many, many, many cases in which courts, including supreme court of the united states, had said segregation is compatible with the united states constitution. so the segregation list had a, you know that strong argument. so what got to the court so it's interesting interesting the kenneth clark doll study seemed to i don't know whether. it swayed about it. okay. so kenneth and mamie clark,

sociologists had conducted a study in the forties. right. in which they said you can go watch videos of it, which they put a black dog in a white doll in front of black children and ask questions, which is nice doll, which is the beautiful and tragically, a lot of black kids pointed to the whiter, but not all of them did. it's interesting if you actually look at the black children in the were more likely to point to white or than black children in segregated southern schools. that said, you know a large number of black kids pointing to the doll and i believe was in the briggs case. i think it was robert carter who introduce the kenneth clark study in, the briggs case at the lower level. it was either that or it's in kansas, but then it does go in south carolina as well. yeah. okay.

so you know, earl warren, former governor of former attorney general of california, was a politician and he was trying to build he wanted to unanimous opinion. and my is he found the doll study to be an empathetic to get to bring people. why that stuck other things didn't you know but the gravity of the case what he says is separate schools send the message that generates feelings of inferiority. black children that -- their development. the naacp had argued in their brief about what segregation also did to white children. it inculcated fears, feelings of superiority. they didn't talk about that,

right. but for whatever reason, that was the central the logic of why they said we can no longer have state sponsored segregate of public education. you know i think i think that legal doctrine is important and that's you know, that's that's that's how i pay my mortgage on but i don't think it's. often it's not the most important thing so you asked me, you know what it that really gets us to brown versus of education i would say things like like world two that's where i was going. yeah world war two the nazis as one puts a real stink on racism and there are lots of people who say, gosh, there are a lot of people died fighting nazi

racism. how can we fight nazi racism and have jim crow ism? i think that you know, i think that was important. you know another argument, another argument, number 42, jackie robinson, then, you know, popular people doing things in society and doing things in a fabulous way great way breaking you know breaking down barriers here and there marian anderson, i mean, i think that there are very things that are happening in society that move people move. the politicians, and then finally move jurists, i think and then, you know, that that that trials stuff is often, you know, that's the way in which people rational. right. what do they've already you know they're ready do it right.

it's like i'll say russia also was embarrassing us we we have a cold we had the cold war going on and it's getting more and more, you know. you know, this is an interesting point that justice department filed an amicus brief and the vast majority of the brief was actually related to foreign policy concerns. this is the cold war when the united is running around the world fighting with russia over whether countries will become democracies or communist countries, and what the u.s. is running into overseas is how can you come here selling democracy when you have a country that has separate but equal and become an embarrassment and a cold war or disadvantage vintage? and it's fascinating. see, the justice department comes in and says this is a foreign policy problem, which most people didn't realize realize. earl warren puts this thing together. interesting that this case was

argued in 52. the chief justice of the supreme court dies after oral argument. chief vinson, who was to be leaning toward dissenting. he dies and gives the president an opportunity to appoint a new justice who happens be earl warren and integration from california who then comes on the court and leads this consensus and this opinion remarkably concise, it's thought it was 13 pages. i looked at the it stops at 12. the internet's wrong, by the way, h.a. was wrong on this as well. a caution to everyone. randall, i saw you right that this was probably in and perhaps. but then you went on to say, but it rendered the opinion pallid. yeah.

what you mean? well, we. chief justice warren right before. you know, handing down the opinion writes a memo to his colleagues describing what he's attempting to do and he says, i want to write opinion that is brief. write an opinion that regular people can read and write. and he says he says and above all write an opinion that is non accusatory. now he wanted to write an opinion that was non accusatory in large part because he wanted to preempt opposing. there were some members of the court particular you mentioned vinson, but vinson had passed away. but then there was another member, the court justice reid from kentucky, who was very

loath to give up segregation and we warn, however, wanted a unanimous and so he wanted to write an opinion that would get what he wanted. that is to say striking down of the jury segregate with respect to public schooling. but he wanted to lessen the amount of reaction against his opinion so he writes his opinion. like you say it's a very it's a very short opinion. it's a very short opinion and it's an odd opinion in the sense that i mean here we are the national archives. we're talking about this. we're talking about what a landmark opinion it is. but if you actually just read the opinion, if you didn't know about american history, you would not really know what the fighting was all about. you would not know from reading this opinion. you would not know what segregation was about. there is no there's no just is

racism in that opinion. no is the cruelty of segregation described in opinion? no is the way in which separate but equal was in a grotesquely young fashioned way? is any of that mentioned? no, it's a very muted opinion. and one of the things, in fact, i say the most striking aspect this opinion is that this is the most honored race relations opinion delivered by the supreme court of the united states and is also opinion that declines to candidly grapple with racism. well. bring it on. bring it on. so i write about brown as one of

a trilogy. okay. first of all, a couple things i want to bring out of. the the first federal court to take on to say that separate was inherently equal was a case out of california. mendez the westminster, i believe it is, but it involved litigation involving of latino students out in california and i believe warren was attorney general at that time. right. so he and as a result of that case, they ended up changing the legislation. so warren did have some experience with governor when he was governor. he had some experience with integrating schools. so, yes, he wasn't integrated. but i will say, as attorney general, warren, the internment of people. right. so some ways i think brown is maybe his own personal.

you know, he wasn't a great liberal during japanese. so i just want to bring that out. but where i was going was that i think of brown part of a trilogy. warren three unanimous opinions. one that people don't talk about very much in a case called texas v. decided two weeks before brown i do teach this class. do you teach this case? okay all right. you didn't teach this case to, though. i had. i had discovered on my own. but it was the first case to apply the equal protection clause by the supreme to hispanic people. and basically it was a case about excluding hispanic from juries in texas. so unanimous. and he says in that case that describes the nation is is is not static it comes in all forms and the equal protection clause should be available to anyone

who's singled out for despair differ treatment then from a community he doesn't name the norm. it's whiteness. right then in brown another unanimous opinion, yes, you say it's pallid, but you know, there are there are there are a couple of notes in there that i think are very patriotic that remind me bit of of the declaration independence. it's has some values you can grab on to which is the is that you know, the he talks about the public schoolhouse the common public is so important to cultivating citizenship. i think this is as close as he can go to saying you know white folks, you need to be part of this project all need to be part of this project of learning together and having values, common values. but it's it's only after a social revolution. civil rights movement. and i think the biggest lasting legacy of brown is that it it it

captured the imagination of young black people said, hey, i'm free, i should be able to participate in whatever institute actions the state is sponsoring on an equal basis. and that generates passion, is willing to go, you know, in a thousand places within, what like six, six, seven years, you know, thousand sit ins all over the place. right. demand going to be free. but after that, social revolution, by 1967, you get another opinion by warren loving versus virginia, in which does name twice. it's the only supreme court opinion, the first and the last in which say this law is about white supremacy and we can no longer. he's basically saying we can no longer square white supremacy, racial hierarchy with the equal protection clause. then he pretends, yes, this is

revisionist. he pretends that it's not consistent with we are you know, it makes it seem like the supreme court has always been, you know, fighting that fight when fact from from founding forward until brown until the warren court the supreme court actually had acquiesced in reified reinforce forced racial hierarchy. yes. i was not putting warren chief justice warren down. chief justice warren was a great jurist and did a lot of good work. he was up some. yeah, he was as far as he could go and was a straight he was all the states and it was strategic. yes. yes. so, you know, sometimes know sometimes you can't say everything. it's on your mind. right? sometimes is actually a smart way to go. and that's what he was doing versus board versus board of

education. his opinion obtuse gation. mm hmm. and what i. but he was up against it. and i would say to people, i think nowadays when people look at brown versus board of education, they actually forget how bad were right and have forgot the constraints under which those justices were working. let me put a pin in that. i to encourage the audience. we're going to take questions if you're interested, if you are make your to the microphones. one thing that we haven't gotten into depth that i think would be incomplete is the court didn't tell country how to do it. and the that followed were pretty bloody, pretty violent. the resistance pretty amazing. they closed the schools in virginia instead of integrate national guards had to be called

out. george wallace famously on the steps. so very, very tough. and then we did get the civil rights act of 64 and 65 as a catalyst. lots of question. sir, your first. thank you so much for being here today. my name is nathan white, a recent graduate, montgomery college here in the washington d.c. area. and thank you. thank you. thank you. and i'm hoping ultimately i'm hoping ultimately to teach civil and american history and question is my question is. i'm one aspect of the one aspect of the briggs versus elliot case that i found particularly interesting was the role of judge julius, where the sparring and his relationship thurgood marshall and how judge waring

really was quite important in in making the case an attack on an attack on segregation as a whole. and i was wondering if you would be able to speak some about judge waring's role in the briggs versus elliot case, his relationship with thurgood marshall succinctly. okay. i'm just quickly, judge j. ladies waring was, a white he was part of the upper crust of charleston society. he had been a thoroughgoing segregation ernest, and then he had a total change of heart and mind and went against segregation and in he he dissented in briggs versus elliot and in an opinion that actually much more the brown

versus of education really does attack segregation. but what's so striking about this man judge waring is the turnabout because he had, you know, thoroughly in, you know, in league with the white supremacy of south carolina and then he becomes their great man. yeah. hi, my is steven lincoln spitz, born on february 12th, which is why lincoln is my middle name in chicago. i, i have a question whether or not there was evidence in the brown case in topeka that the about the facilities what stipulated that you know assuming, the facilities are equal and the reason asking that question is i was a lawyer in across the mall at the department of health, education,

welfare. we got a lawsuit claiming that the in topeka, kansas, 73, were unequal in facilities still segregated. and i personally went to the junior high schools in 1973, 74 with the facilities expert. and believe me, they were very unequal at the time. for example the science labs had individual gas, electricity, fire for in the white junior high but not none of the black junior highs. so i was wondering kind of evidence there was about the facilities in the time of the litigation in fifties in topeka. my understanding is that all the lawyers were willing to stipulate that they were equal, even if they weren't just so they get to the question of whether separation was

inherently equal. but i may i'm not sure. i think that in virtually in in the cases, the the way in which, for instance, in in kansas in south carolina and in virginia the lower courts conceded that there that the black schools had been deprived of. what was due to them? the courts conceded that what they were not willing to concede was the inherent invalid. it was the invalidity of segregation. so, you know, in south carolina, the lower court said, fine, we're going to rule in favor of the acp but in ruling in favor of the ecp, we want equalization an end to segregation but equalization they did that in kansas us they did that in they did that everywhere and you know

that is that would have provided it actually and out to the supreme court had they wanted to take it but they had finally come to the conclusion that they were, you know, they finally willing to grab the nettle and invalidate segregation. hello my name is gavin neubauer. i'm a public policy student at the university of maryland. so the fight was very interesting, personal to me. i was wondering, i wonder a lot this studying public policy law. but how does it really change the culture and it feels notable that this country a lot of it happened in the courts and a lot of it still happens in the courts. but there's always this question legitimacy because it's not passed in congress. and there's always this fight, this backlash that happens after every major case like that county in, virginia, that shut down all of its public schools and gave vouchers to white kids. and i wonder when and the

aftermath of a monumental case when all of the fighting is its peak, what fight happens after that what does it take? because it like the dust settles eventually, but i know there's an incredible fight with in smaller courts that happens afterwards. and i want to know more about that story when it comes to brown v board of education. well, that's a very quickly brown doesn't get enforced until get a social revolution that results in the civil rights act of 64 that has a title six in which the federal government can withhold funding and threatens to withhold funding from from districts unless they and that's what really gets desegregation started. so, you know, there is something to this idea that i mean, the supreme doesn't have an army. you there was massive resistance

for more than a decade right. so it took a social revolution and legislation passed by to begin to give meaning to brown. i agree with that. on the you know, the courts are very important you mentioned the word legitimate. see, hugely important. i mean, when people, for instance, there are people who suggest that, well. brown versus board of education didn't amount to much, i think they're totally wrong. on may six, 1954, it was. for states. it was constitutionally legitimate for states to purposefully and openly separate people in schooling on a racial basis. brown versus board of education comes down on may 17th. on may 18th, it is no longer legitimate for to do that. that's that's hugely important.

legitimacy matters there. it's not just the courts, though. i mean changed things. well, there was you know, there were these great lawyers that helped. there were. the students who sat in that out, there were people engaged in boycotts, helped. there was martin luther king. that was fannie lou hamer, that bayard rustin. there was malcolm x. there were people who were fighting the good in lots of different places, and that is required for society to change. it's not going to be just the courts, though. the courts are important. yes, ma'am. hello, name is sakina. i have two lighthearted one and then a serious one. the lighthearted one. would you consider, thurgood marshall, to be funny. he was beyond funny. yeah, he loved that very funny. he was the best storyteller he

could make you laugh hard. i mean tears streaming down your face it was he was delightful and then my serious question um what the climate we're in right now do you think there is a chance that brown v board of education be overturned by the supreme court? no, no. as bad as things are and i think things are actually very bad. but no, i think that i think that brown versus board of education has sunk such roots in american society that no, it not going to be uprooted, though even though though, you know,

and. one cannot be complacent. yes, one cannot be complacent. we have seen you you began with first reconstruction. we began with the first reconstruction. after all, the first reconstruction, there were black people who you know, the during the first reconstruction, the senator from mississippi was the black man. right? right. lots things changed in. the first reconstruction, it was rolled back some things can go backwards. so we cannot be complacent. i do think, however, that brown versus board of education, thank goodness remains vital. well, let me say this. the values of brown are betrayed every day in this country. yes. right. everybody in this room knows that we have separate and

savage, unequal schools and parents work really hard to avoid the low performing king, not very good schools. right. so you know, the roberts court would overturn brown. i think, you know, roberts is very proud. the progress you know he touts brown as as is as great social progress. but conserver tive justices and far right you know i would say extremists elements in this country they have reduced reduce brown to a required of four colorblindness a required that all it does is say you cannot the state cannot racial classifications right and so they read it in narrow way in which it makes it a lot harder for any state to engage in in

repair, you know, a race conscious kind of repair. right. so brown has been limited in undermine. but the fundamental principle that we will not we will not state sanctioned racial caste. i don't see that being overturned are the temple. thank you if we limiting our discussion to brown as a function of or having the desire to increase the quality of public education how would you today brown's success or failure to we're putting a lot of weight one case i think before you answer because i have more notes yesterday i read it axios article headline was school segregation surge after 70

years. the article said that the number of intensely segregated schools defined as schools that are 92 to 100% nonwhite students have tripled from 1988 to 2021, according to a ucla analysis. so in some ways we have a lot of work still do i think we do have a lot of work to do? i think that people use. i think people are a little bit too loose in their language so that article and there are many articles that say things like there's as much school segregation as know in 1954. no no i think we ought to remember exactly what it was that brown board of education was targeting.

in 1954 in south the state constitution of south, the state constitution of south carolina said that white and colored children were to be educated in different facilities. you know, forever, that what brown versus board of education was targeting. now, again, yes, there are lots of problems in the united states, but i would set forth the following proposition. there is no place in the united states today, no place in the united today where a are a government can say with proper authority that it is purposefully separating people a

racial basis that wasn't accomplished yet. it was an important accomplish schmitt and you know don't think it should be it wasn't a little thing it was a major thing it has its limits is that you know does that bring us does that bring us equality in full? of course not. but was an accomplishment. and we need to be very clear about that. so i just want to quickly say i agree with everything, randi, but and and i read that article, too, because my husband put it in my face right. axios right then. and the stat from that jumped out at me, the axios piece is that the average existence for a black or latino child in education today is one where three quarters of their peers are minority and, you know, according to civil rights

institute project out at ucla, at least half of their peers are poor often it's a lot more than that. right. and meanwhile, average experience for white and asian is the opposite. they tend to be in middle class schools, right. that are that are better in my view. that's caste system. right. it's longer like it it's no longer required in the state. but you got i got to tell you, you know, a lot of publicly sanctioned policies that encourage than discourage this type of systemic segregation. so yes, sir we're getting to the end here. let's get the last question first. thank you for a great discussion on brown it's great seeing my colleague. my name is mike. this is my colleague bellamy. i served as a dean at georgetown

law, that was the day chairman powell was a student. i in trouble. they would send me to jail. so great to see you. see you here. could you take a moment to talk about the brown? brown two, which was in 1955, the next. and i chairman paul talked about the resistance to brown and the backlash all white schools being established. and so white schools being established. the need for brown to which you talk about brown won being short brown too was rosemary is the phrase with all deliberate speed. could you please comment on the need for that justice like to tell this story of the when brown too came down and said all deliberate speed, they went the secretary got the dictionary, looked it up and said deliberate it means slow. there you have it right it slow

and we've been moving slow. last question. good evening. my name is solomon palmer and i'm just an ordinary person who serves an extraordinary god period. with that said, i've been fascinated by the unanimous decision in dred scott decision plessy, decision. but brown dissent and want to suggest also the roe that i believe in can argue based on brother ogletree. his book makes the argument that faith in it because oliver brown was a minister of, the ame church in topeka, kansas. so can we speak to for us this evening? what role faith could also that possible in determining for the first time a unanimous decision?

thank you. will let you have that one. well, sir, the of unanimity is an important aspect of brown the chief justice chief justice warren really thought that it was important. justice marshall thought it was very to have a unanimous court. there are people who are more have questioned that i think there's good reason to question it it. could it be that chief justice warren too high a price for unanimity i mean, after all, there are a lot of supreme cases that are not unanimous. but, you know, you five votes and you have the supreme court. you know. would it been better?

maybe. you know, think about this as, you know, a sort of a counterfactual. let's a supreme court instead of going the gradual lipstick route brown to for instance. just suppose the supreme court had said no we immediate d.c. segregation and just the supreme court had been very forthright and candid and clear in its denunciation segregation and let's suppose there had been some justices who would have dissented. would that have been so terrible? seems to me i could i could imagine such a scenario in which, you know, it wouldn't have been so terrible. maybe would have been a better route to have gone. i don't think that we should view unanimity as sort of untouchable it's what we got. maybe it was a good. on the other hand you know there

are a parts that are certainly plausible. you could have had another worcester versus georgia, though. you remember the. yeah, there was a famous case in which wouldn't you say that we did get that. yeah, you're right. we did. it was unanimous. let us in in this case. oh sorry, sorry. what worcester versus georgia involved the cherokee tribe out of it was one of the cherokee cases out of georgia. and chief marshall wrote a very pro cherokee opinion and sided with them and georgia ignored it. and the apocryphal story is that the president said, you know, you have your opinion, let you enforce it. right. so but we did have massive resistance. right so we're coming to the end of the evening and i just want

to give each of you a final reflection on, the legacy of this case and or the extraordinary example that thurgood marshall gave us. sheryll, demographers or you go first of, well, to think about it, just a couple of things. number one, i'd like thank very much the sponsors of this evening. it's been certainly a privilege for me and one can only applaud boards, you know, civic events, this which we get to trade ideas and trade information. so i'm very i'm very with respect to you know, if there was one thing that i'd like to leave people the thurgood marshall's name has been mentioned over and over. and it should be. it should be. if there one person if you just had to just choose one person who be the you know, the the the

exemplar of struggle for racial justice under law. that person would be thurgood marshall. and this case would be probably the most important of the cases that that that he helped bequeath to us. so thank you i want to thank the sponsors too. it's been it's such an honor to be here and and get to talk about this in front of my twin sons forced them to listen to me. oh yeah like why did do that embarrass them. right. they're both it advanced us history and doing well so that that the story i want to you with it's it's it's kind painful. i've clerked for marshall's last active year on the court.

we had a case that year involving the city of oklahoma's school district, a case called dowel or oklahoma city versus dowel. and i think it's okay for me to say i supported him of all the clerks supported him in this case. but i got to see him is we didn't know then that this was his last active year on the court first week brennan retired at first my first week on the job of my last week on the job justice marshall retired but i watch him struggle to convince his colleague not to send, you know send the message that it was time to stop desegregating schools dowel was trying to get out from under a desegregate an order they had waited 18 years to to enforce brown and had had

a integrated schools for very brief period and was wanted it to be declared unitary and get out from under it and in chambers was very upset. he practiced with us the things he say in conference and he wasn't. he was partially his his colleagues adored him. they really mean one of his best friends on the court was, antonin scalia. scalia would come and talk to him, you know, but they waited until he died. i mean case they kind of just hinted at what would be necessary to stop desegregation laws. they waited. he died. but the nineties in a series of cases that culminate in missouri versus jenkins basically. the court said to the extent that school segregation patterns just reflect segregated

neighborhoods, that's the district school district's fault. and so we will no longer force them to have integration pants to overcome residential segregation. and that's the main reason we have rapidly resegregated and justice marshall was devastated. but the day after the opinion came down, he came back in the office. his jolly self, you know, and. his attitude was, you know, each generation has to just pick up the fight. so you young people in the room, you got to pick up the fight. and i said, i'm. sure sure. i enjoyed that. he took.

good evening. my name is chris nordyke and i had the distinct honors tonight of serving the richard nixon foundation's vice president of external and of introducing special guest speaker. but before i do that, i want to note that just over one month ago on 13th, we had the pleasure of hosting george w bush here at the library at a special dinner in to honor all who serve and to officially open our new special exhibit portraits of courage. a commander in chief's tribute to america's warriors growing out of president bush's, personal commitment and the ong