Forty-six years ago, yesterday, nine people finally recognized that separate cannot possibly mean equal. Linda Brown, from Topeka, was tired of riding the bus every day for five miles when there was a school -- a white school, a supposedly "equal," but actually better, school-- just four blocks from her house. Thirteen families, in fact, were tired of situations like that, and, with the support of the NAACP, filed a class action suit against the Board of Education.
The Supreme Court's unanimous decision to reverse the 1896 ruling that essentially promoted segregation was necessary and also risky. When a governing body recognizes the need for change before its citizens do, the potential for backlash is dangerous. The chilling words of George Wallace, nine years later, as he proclaimed in his inaugural address, "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever," were, sadly, not merely his own opinion. They echoed a widely-held sentiment that integration was weakening the country. Nine years later and still, segregation seemed like the answer to people. Forty-six years later, and I am willing to guarantee that there are people who still believe that segregation, and the denial of equal rights, is not without its merits.
I wonder about those nine justices and what they must have been thinking when they handed down their decision. I used to imagine the Supreme Court as this somewhat omniscient body of people who pass arbitrary decisions without really thinking about how they may affect the country. But I now think that maybe those nine justices were scared, scared because before they were justices, they were citizens of this country, and had a very good idea about the country's racial climate.
It would be very easy to criticize those justices; we could say that they merely handed down a decree and walked away. But what would criticism accomplish? The Supreme Court sent us some important messages that day. They sent a message to the 13 families and said to them that by putting themselves on the line for the sake of something truly important to them, the Court acknowledged the need for change. They sent a message to this country and said that it didn't matter how many people believed in something, if what they believed in was wrong.
I ask myself, sometimes, what business a white girl from Long Island has listening to those messages. The truth is I don't have much first-hand experience with racial discrimination. But I do know that when I hear the phrase, "separate but equal," it makes me cringe. And when I think about how far we've come from that, I realize we have made progress but still have a lot farther to come. The notion that separation and equality do not go hand and hand extends to much more than just a school system, and that is exactly what business I have with those messages. We owe it to those 13 families and nine justices to make sure that we do not rest upon the status quo.