Disney in the Classroom
The Ernest Green Story

Ernest Green’s story actually starts with a man named Homer Plessy. In 1896 Plessy decided to challenge "Jim Crow". (A system of Southern laws that required the separation of blacks from whites.) While traveling to New Orleans, Plessy (who was only one eighth black and so appeared to be white) bought a ticket for a "whites only" railroad car. He took his seat without incident and then informed the conductor of his racial background. The conductor ordered Plessy to move to the "colored" railroad car. When Plessy refused to do so he was arrested. Plessy sued the railroad company claiming that by requiring the separate seating of blacks and whites (especially since the railroad cars for blacks were inferior to those for whites) the company was violating his right "to equal protection of the laws". The first time the case was heard (by a Judge Ferguson) the railroad company won. Plessy then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court also sided with the railroad company and thus gave legal basis to the concept that separate facilities for blacks and whites were legal if they were "equal". The Court’s "separate but equal" ruling established a system of segregation that lasted almost seventy years.

This decision was the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on Brown v. The Board of Education. In this case NAACP lawyers presented the argument that the creation of separate schools for black students guaranteed that black students would receive an education that was inherently unequal. The NAACP's argument was supported by overwhelming physical and psychological evidence. However, most experts did not expect the Court to rule for the NAACP because of the social upheaval such a decision would produce. Yet, perhaps to everyone's involved surprise the Court did unanimously decide for the NAACP’s argument.  The Justices then ordered that every southern public school system be "integrated with all deliberate speed".