May 18, 1896

Plessy v. Ferguson

The Supreme Court upholds Louisiana railway segregation in Plessy v. Ferguson

The Louisiana statute exempted nurses attending children of the other race — an exception Harlan used to expose its social hierarchy.

18 May 1896, seven votes to one

The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the Louisiana Supreme Court's judgment against Homer Plessy on 18 May 1896, upholding the Separate Car Act as applied to intrastate railway travel. Eight justices participated; David Brewer did not.

Justice Henry Billings Brown's majority opinion held that state-required racial separation did not necessarily imply legal inferiority and violated neither the Thirteenth nor the Fourteenth Amendment.

Reasonableness measured by custom

The majority treated the railway rule as a reasonable exercise of state police power, judging reasonableness by established usages, customs and traditions and by public comfort, peace and good order. It did not investigate whether the actual accommodations were equal in practice.

Justice John Marshall Harlan dissented alone, arguing that the Constitution was color-blind and warning that the ruling would prove as pernicious as Dred Scott.

Back to a Louisiana courtroom

Neither the phrase nor the practice originated here: Louisiana's statute used the “equal but separate” wording, and earlier cases had already sustained some intrastate railway segregation. The holding concerned that Louisiana statute, not every separate facility everywhere.

Plessy had not yet been finally convicted when the Supreme Court ruled, because the constitutional challenge had interrupted his prosecution. The judgment affirmed the lower court “with costs,” letting Judge John Howard Ferguson resume the case; Plessy later pleaded guilty and paid the statutory fine.

Sources

Researched 23 Aug 2026 5 sources 2 audit passes

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