EOTO #3

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 Supreme Court Paving the Way

A large factor in the Brown v. Board of Education court decision was the path paved by three prior major court rulings. The first being Mendez v. Westminster. This case in particular was not a ruling by the Supreme Court as it was kept within the California federal courts by the school board officials. However, this 1947 court case (just under 8 years prior to Brown v. Board) decided that forcing students with Mexican ancestry into separate remedial schools was unconstitutional, mainly based upon the limitations from not being able to learn English while surrounded by it.

Three years later, two anti-segregation Supreme Court cases were both successful on the same day. Sweatt v. Painter of 1950 was one of these two cases in which it was decided that a black man named Herman Sweatt had the right to attend the University of Texas Law School, as opposed to their law school created "equally" for people of color. The separate law school was determined to be of far less quality in comparison, making it not truly align with the separate but equal guideline used in society. It was on these grounds that Sweatt, along with the NAACP, was able to come out of the case with a winning decision.

                    

On the same day in 1950, McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents occurred. This Supreme Court case decided that a public institution of higher education could not discriminate based upon race. This directly impacted the entirety of the academic field for people of color, essentially ending segregation within college or graduate level education. Most importantly, such a decision worked in unison with the other two court cases to create a massive stepping stone for the road to success in Brown v. Board of Education. 

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