plessy vs. ferguson
This was a petition filed in the supreme court of Louisiana in 1896, by Homer Plessy, the plaintiff. He filed this petition against the Honorable John H. Ferguson, judge of The petitioner was a citizen of the United States and a descent meaning he had both white and African American ethnic backgrounds. Keep in mind that at this time Blacks were not considered equal to whites. Mr. Plessy to be exact was seven-eights Caucasian and one-eighth African American blood. The amount of African American in his blood was hardly discernable to say the least. He therefore felt he was entitled to every recognition, rights, privileges, and immunities secured to the citizens of the United States of the of the white race by its constitution and laws, that on June 7, 1892, he engaged and paid for a first class passage on the East Louisiana Railway. The trip from New Orleans to Covington, in the same state, and thereupon entered a passenger train, and took possession of a vacant seat in a coach where passengers of the white race were accommodated, that such railroad company was incorporated by the laws of Louisiana as a common carrier. It was not
A statue which implies merely a legal distinction between the white and colored races, a distinction which is founded in the color of the two races, and which must always exist so long as white men are distinguished from the other race by color has no tendency to destroy the legal equality of the two races, or re-establish a state of involuntary servitude. No Person or person shall be permitted to occupy seats in coach, other that the ones assigned to them on account of the race they belong to. Indeed we do not understand that the plaintiff strenuously relies upon the thirteenth amendment. Upon the issuing of such demurrer, overruled the plea of the court be enjoined by a writ of prohibition from further proceeding in such case, the court will proceed to fine and sentence the petitioner to imprisonment and thus deprive him of his constitutionality of the act under which he was being persecuted. It also gave the civil rights movement a pretty good kick-start. Plessy's argument was that the Louisiana Act did not apply to him being more of white descent. Plessy was then brought before the recorder of the city for preliminary examination, and committed for trial to the criminal district court for the parish of Orleans, where information was filed him in the matter set forth, for a violation of Louisiana act. I feel that this is one of the most influential cases to ever reach the Supreme Court. In New Orleans there held to answer a charge made by such officer the effect that he was guilty of having criminally violating an act of the general assembly of the state, approved on July 10,1890, in such case made and provided. Without crucial decisions such as these, I do not feel that our country would be where it is today. The main point of Plessy's argument was based on the fact of it being unconstitutional of the act of general assembly. The constitutionality of this act conflict both with the thirteenth amendment of the fourteenth amendment, which prohibits certain restrictive legislation on the part of the state. In response, the district attorney on behalf of the state of Louisiana filled a demurrer.
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