NAACP Legal Strategy

Charles Hamilton
Houston
 Creator of strategy
1st Strategy
 Show
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that there is no equality
Begin in Graduate Schools
Why?
• Inequality is most apparent (there are FEW black
graduate schools)
• Least threatening to the population as a whole
Thurgood Marshall

Howard University
Law School
 Trained by Charles
Houston
 Desire to apply the
tenets of the
Constitituion to all
citizens.
 1st Black Supreme
Court Justice.
Murray v. Maryland School of Law
(1936)
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Murray denied admission
to U of Md. Law
Houston and Marshall
argue that there are no
black law schools in the
state
To compensate, Md.
offers scholarship to an
out of state law school
Lower court orders Md.
Law to allow Murray inupheld after Md. appeals.
Gaines v. Missouri (1938)
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Lloyd Gaines seeking
admission to the all white
law school at U of Mo.
Univ. offers to build
school on campus of allblack Lincoln U. (no
funds, no plans, Univ.
would pay tuition to out of
state law school if he
didn’t want to wait.)

Supreme Court Rules for
Gaines
 States had an obligation
to provide an equal
education. Could not
send black students out
of state, could not ask
black students to wait
while black schools built.
 Only applies to law
schools
Sweatt v. Painter (1946) (U. of
Texas Law)
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Herman Sweatt tried to register
for Law School at U. of Texas
offered three basement rooms
downtown, off campus, taught
by part-time faculty
2000 white students from the
University rallied in support
of Sweatt
Lower court rules against
Sweatt
Appeal process goes all the
way to Supreme Court
McLaurin v. Oklahoma St. Board of
Regents (1949)
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Marshall said that eight
people had applied to a
doctoral program in
education, they chose,
McClaurin a 68 year old
black professor-why?
Forced to sit at roped off
desk with sign saying
“reserved for colored”
Made to eat at separate
table in café, restricted
table in library
Supreme Court Ruling on
Sweatt and McLaurin (1950)

Similar arguments, Court hears both
together
 Amicus curiae=(Friend of the court “brief”)
filed in favor of Universities by southern
states, amicus curiae filed in favor of
plaintiffs by justice department
 (President Truman shifts US Gov’t policy
on southern segregation)
 Supreme Ct. says equality must be genuine
(only applied to grad schools, doesn’t
overturn Plessy)
NAACP’s New Two Part Strategy
 First:
Separate but Equal is
Unconstitutional
 Second: Even if Separate but Equal is
Constitutional, schools could never be
truly equal-the consequences of
segregation (intellectual, economic,
social/psychological) made equality
impossible
Bolling v. Sharpe (1950)

Gardner Bishop, Black barber with 14 yr. old
daughter, Judine
 Group of parents in Washington, D.C. launched
a strike keeping kids home from Browne Jr.
High.
 Built to accommodate 800 students, it was filled
with 1800, students had to attend in two shifts.
 Nearby white school had hundreds of empty
seats.
Briggs v. S.C. Clarendon County
(1952)
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1st time attacking segregation in elementary
schools
3 times as many blacks as whites
White students received more than 60% of
educational funding
Per capita spending for white students was
$179/yr and for black students $43/yr
New kind of evidence-Kenneth Clark’s Dolls
Test-Black Girl Preferred White Doll
• (See Video) –What KEY Important point is made
from this Psych research?
Davis v. County Schools of Prince
Edward County Md.(1951)
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Moton High School held twice as many students as it
was designed for, no cafeteria, no gym
County’s only concession to complaints was to erect tarpaper and wooden shacks for overflow of students
Highest paid teacher at Moton earned less than lowest
paid white teacher in the county
Barbara Rose Johns, a Moton High School JUNIOR
plotted a rebellion
Phone principal, forge signature about assembly,
convince teachers to leave, plan a strike
Principal urged them not to strike but didn’t order them
back to class
Students decided to strike, on 3rd day, NAACP is there
and takes the case.
Brown v. Board of Education of
Topeka, Ks.(1954)
7
yr old Linda Brown had to cross railroad
tracks in a switching yard and wait for a
rickety bus to take her to a black school on
the other side of town.
 A white school was much closer to her
home.