A Timeline and Primer on Desegregation
Recapping events from 1865 to present that affect K-12, higher education
Note: The following timeline was constructed from information by Learning for Justice, the National Archives, and the Library of Congress
1865 to 1947: Reconstruction and Jim Crow
1865: The Civil War ends; the 13th Amendment is enacted to abolish slavery.
1868: The Fourteenth Amendment is ratified, guaranteeing "equal protection under the law"; citizenship is extended to African Americans.
1875: Congress passes the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which bans racial discrimination in public accommodations.
1883: The Supreme Court strikes down the Civil Rights Act of 1875 finding that discrimination by individuals or private businesses is constitutional.
1890: Louisiana passes the first Jim Crow law requiring separate accommodations for whites and blacks.
1896: In Plessy v. Ferguson, the U.S. Supreme Court embraces “separate but equal” policy, offering legal protection for school segregation. The ruling, which is built on notions of white supremacy and black inferiority, provides legal justification for Jim Crow laws in southern states.
1927: In Gong Lum v. Rice, the Supreme Court ruled a Chinese student can be defined as non-white for segregation purposes.
1939: Thurgood Marshall is named special counsel for the NAACP, succeeding his mentor, Charles Hamilton Houston. Marshall would eventually be lead counsel in the Brown v. Board case.
1940: Almost one-third of all Americans express support for integrated schools. In Southern states, however, integration has the support of 2 percent of the populace.
1947: In Westminster School District v. Mendez, a federal appeals court strikes down segregated schools for Mexican Americans.
1948-1955: Lawsuits, Brown, and Brown II
1948: The NAACP board of directors formally endorses Thurgood Marshall's legal strategy, opting for an all-out attack on segregation instead of pushing for the equalization of school facilities.
1949: Marshall and NAACP officials meet with residents in Clarendon County, S.C., and agree to launch a test case against segregation if at least 20 plaintiffs can be found. In November, the first of the five cases — Briggs v. Elliott — that led to Brown v. Board of Education is filed.
1951: Briggs v. Elliott goes to trial, with Marshall and the NAACP presenting evidence from sociologist Kenneth Clark’s controversial “doll study” that showed how segregation harmed black school children. The U.S. District Court denied the desegregation request and ordered the equalization of black schools, but Judge J. Waties Waring dissented, providing the plaintiffs with a 28-page blueprint for much of the arguments in Brown v. Board.
1952: The Supreme Court consolidates the five desegregation cases under the name Brown v. Board of Education. Marshall, who later becomes the first African-American Supreme Court justice, is the lead counsel for the plaintiffs.
1953: Earl Warren is appointed Chief Justice and the Supreme Court hears the second round of arguments in Brown.
1954: With its unanimous decision Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court bans segregation, declaring separate schools “inherently unequal” and pushing the nation into decades-long debates over integration and education equity.
1955: In Brown II, the high court calls for school desegregation “with all deliberate speed.”
1956-1971: Battles over Integration
1956: The governor of Tennessee calls out the National Guard after white protestors seek to block desegregation of a high school in Clinton.
1957: The 101st Airborne Division and National Guard are called to Little Rock, Ark., to provide protection for nine black students integrating Central High School. Meanwhile, in Virginia, the legislature calls for "massive resistance" to school desegregation and pledges to close schools under desegregation orders.
1959: In Prince Edward County, Va., officials close their public schools rather than integrate them. White students attend private academies; black students do not head back to class until 1963 when the Ford Foundation funds private black schools. The Supreme Court orders the county to desegregate and reopen its schools the following year.
1962: A federal appeals court orders the University of Mississippi to admit James Meredith, an African-American student. Meredith is greeted on his first day of school by a mob of more than 2,000 whites who are rioting.
1963: With a majority (62%) of Americans — including 73% of Northerners and 31% of Southerners — saying they believe blacks and whites should attend the same schools, two African-American students, Vivian Malone and James A. Hood, successfully register at the University of Alabama. This is despite George Wallace's "stand in the schoolhouse door" that resulted in President Kennedy federalizing the Alabama National Guard.
1964: Title IV of the Civil Rights Act authorizes the federal government to file school desegregation lawsuits.
1968: With Green v. School Board of New Kent County, the U.S. Supreme Court orders segregated schools to be dismantled “root and branch.” Five factors — facilities, staff, faculty, extracurricular activities, and transportation — are to be used to gauge a district’s compliance with the Brown mandate.
1969: The Supreme Court declares the "all deliberate speed" standard is no longer constitutionally permissible, ordering the immediate desegregation of Mississippi’s schools.
1971: In Swann v. Charlotte- Mecklenburg, the Supreme Court approves strategies — including busing across traditional neighborhood boundaries and magnet programs — to promote integrated schools.
1972 to 1988: A Mixed Bag
1972: Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 is passed, prohibiting sex discrimination in any educational program that receives federal financial assistance
1973: Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act is passed, prohibiting schools from discriminating against students with mental or physical impairments. This would lead to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) that is still in place today.
Also in 1973, the Supreme Court states cannot provide textbooks to racially segregated private schools to avoid integration mandates. In another lawsuit, Keyes v. Denver School District No. 1, the court distinguishes between state-mandated segregation (de jure) and segregation that is the result of private choices (de facto). The latter, the court rules, is not unconstitutional.
In a third decision, the Supreme Court rules in San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez that education is not a "fundamental right" and that the U.S. Constitution does not require equal education expenditures within a state.
1974: In Milliken v. Bradley, a case from Detroit, Mich., the high court rejects metropolitan-wide desegregation plans. Meanwhile, in a separate lawuit based in San Francisco, the court rules that schools must provide instruction to students with limited English proficiency.
1976: During protests against Boston school desegregation, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photo of a flag-wielding protestor highlights the divisions over school desegregation.
1988: Integration peaks in K-12 schools, with almost 45 percent of blacks attending majority-white schools. This number would start to slide throughout the 1990s and beyond.
1991 to Present: Sliding Back
1991: In Board of Education of Oklahoma City v. Dowell, the Supreme Court approves new rules that allow districts to free themselves from court desegregation orders. Oklahoma City is released from a court order, abandons its desegregation efforts, and returns to neighborhood schools.
1992: In Freeman v. Pitts, the high court rules school districts can fulfill their obligations in an incremental fashion
2001: In Charlotte, N.C., white sue to end the desegregation plan in the city-county school district. A federal judge bars the use of race in future student assignments.
2002: A report from the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University concludes that America's schools are resegregating. The following year, another study by the Civil Rights Project finds schools were more segregated in 2000 than when busing for desegregation began in 1970.
2003: In Grutter v. Bollinger, the Supreme Court rules that student body diversity is a national priority that justifies the consideration of race in university admissions. However, in Justice Sandra Day O’Conner’s majority opinion, she wrote: “We expect that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today.”
2007: In Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District, the Supreme Court finds voluntary school integration plans unconstitutional. This leads to an escalation in resegregation of K-12 schools.
2014: In Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, the Supreme Court upholds a Michigan constitutional amendment that bans the use of racial preferences in college admissions. This raises new legal obstacles that could limit school diversity policies.
2016: In a 4-3 decision, the court rules against Abigail Fisher, a white woman who claimed she was denied admission to the University of Texas at Austin based on her race. The ruling determined universities can use race as a factor in admissions.
June 2022: Schools are even more segregated, with more than one-third of the nation’s students attending a school that is predominantly same race/ethnicity, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. Fewer than one-third of white students attend a high-poverty school, compared to more than seven in 10 black students, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court is expected to dismantle the decades-long practice of affirmative action in a pair of cases brought by conservative activist Edward Blum’s Students for Fair Admissions group. The lawsuits were filed against Harvard and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for allegedly discriminating against Asian applicants.