Supreme Court and African Americans Flashcards
What was the 1873 Slaughterhouse decision?
BAD. Said that the 14th amendment didn’t protect Civil Right that a person derived from state citizenship. Said that state rights were more important than federal rights.
When did the SC declare the 1875 CR act unconstitutional?
1883
What was the 1876 US vs Reece decision?
BAD. States can use voting qualifications.
Plessy vs Ferguson 1896
BAD. Separate but equal.
1898 Mississippi vs Williams
BAD. Exclusion of black people from the voting register may have been the effect but was not the intention.
1915 Guinn vs USA
GOOD. Declared ‘grandfather clauses’ unconstitutional.
1923 Moore vs Dempsey
GOOD. Ruled that mobs dominated trials and deprived them of due process guaranteed by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Court refused to uphold the death sentence of 12 blacks. Increased unacceptability of lynching.
1933 Trudeau vs Barnes
BAD. The state had to exhaust the case before it can get to the federal Supreme Court. It blocked blacks from going straight to SC and slows NAACP.
1938 Gaines vs Canada
GOOD/BAD. Ruled that separate but equal had to actually be equal. However, it didn’t challenge Plessy v Ferguson which ensured continued segregation.
1944 Smith vs Allright
Exclusion of blacks from primaries was unconstitutional - number of black voters increased as a result.
1954 Brown vs Board of Education Topeka Kansas.
Segregation education is unconstitutional.
1955 Brown 2
Desegregation of education had to happen with all due deliberate speed.
1956 Browder v Gayle
Ruled that segregated buses are illegal following the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
1969 Alexander vs Holmes County Board of Education
Ordered immediate desegregation of schools in the south.
1971 Swann vs Charlotte-Mecklenburg board of Education.
Ruled in favour of desegregating education and said bussing was a good way to do it.
1971 Grigg vs Duke Power Company
GOOD. Supported affirmative action.
1974 Milliken v Bradley
BAD. Only allowed bussing if it was because of deliberate segregation. It stopped court order bussing to promote desegregation.
1976 Washington vs Davis
BAD. Said that a law could only be interpreted as racist if it has racist intent, not racist outcomes.
1976 Hills vs Gautreaux
GOOD. Said that racially discriminatory public housing was unconstitutional and violated the 1964 CR act, remedial action was needed to alleviate the effects of this practice and not only in the city borders.
1978 Regents of University of California vs Bakke.
BAD. A white student denied a place at University of California due to unfair discrimination because he was white and not black. Courts found that racist quotas were unconstitutional.
1984 Grove City vs Bell
BAD. Ruled that organisations that were receiving federal funding only had to comply with the areas of civil rights legislation in which they were receiving funding for.
1992 United States vs Fordice
GOOD. 8 public universities in Mississippi had not sufficiently integrated and they must take affirmative action to change this.
