The NAACP's Legal Strategy Against Segregated Education, 1925-1950

By Mark Tushnet and Mark V. Tushnet

Book Overview

The NAACP's fight against segregated education -- the first public interest litigation campaign -- culminated in the 1954 Brown decision. While touching on the general social, political, and economic climate in which the NAACP acted, Mark V. Tushnet emphasizes the internal workings of the organization as revealed in its own documents. He argues that the dedication and the political and legal skills of staff members such as Walter White, Charles Hamilton Houston, and Thurgood Marshall were responsible for the ultimate success of public interest law. This edition contains a new epilogue by the author that addresses general questions of litigation strategy, the persistent question of whether the Brown decision mattered, and the legacy of Brown through the Burger and Rehnquist courts.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0807855952
• ISBN13: 9780807855959
• Release Date: February 2005
• Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
• Length: 244 Pages
• Weight: 0.86 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.2" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Thorough-good

Probably the most important US Supreme Court decision of the 20th Century was the 1954 case of Brown v. Board of Education, which famously overturned the "separate but equal" doctrine and declared segregation in public education to violate the Equal Protection Clause (of the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment). Important as Brown itself was, however, in truth the Brown decision represented the culmination of a remarkable litigation campaign waged over decades by Thurgood Marshall, Charles Hamilton Houston, and the NAACP Legal Defense & Education Fund. Professor Tushnet's classic study of this campaign collects and imparts a detailed history of this campaign in the years leading up to, and eventually bringing about, Brown. As much as Tushnet carefully examines the key problems Jim Crow legal doctrine posed for the lawyers, it is Tushnet's exploration into how the NAACP overcame the difficult organizational, financial, political, and human resources challenges of the endeavor that makes this truly the story of a great campaign, one chock full of timeless lessons for social justice lawyers and activists of every stripe.