Justice
#AirBnBWhileBlack and the Legacy of Brown vs. Board
The current ruffle over AirBnB shows civil rights laws and court victories haven’t fully flushed Jim Crow blood from America’s veins.
This week marks the 120th and 62nd anniversaries of the landmark Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board U.S. Supreme Court decisions, respectively.
Plessy legalized the racial “separate but equal” policy on May 18, 1896. Brown reversed that decision on May 17, 1954, finding that anything separate is inherently unequal, especially given America’s unique history of racial discrimination. What the U.S. learned about itself in those six decades between those two rulings was supposed to guide policymaking in the post-Brown era. The full accommodation and integration of African Americans into all institutions and living venues of U.S. society is Brown’s ultimate goal.