Plessy v. Ferguson
United States Supreme Court
163 U.S. 537 (1896)
Louisiana's 1890 law required separate railway cars for white and Black passengers; Plessy, who was seven-eighths white and one-eighth Black but classified as Black under state law, deliberately sat in a car reserved for white passengers, refused the conductor's order to move, and was forcibly removed and imprisoned. A Louisiana trial judge, Ferguson, upheld the state's authority to regulate railways operating within its borders in this manner, and the Louisiana Supreme Court affirmed; the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari.
Whether a state may enact a law providing for separate railway cars for white and Black passengers without violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.