On this Day May 17th 1954

On This Day: May 17
This is the 137th day of the year.

Fact of the Day: Brown v Board of Education
In May 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that segregation of public schools "solely on the basis of race" denied "equal educational opportunity" even if "physical facilities and other 'tangible' factors may have been equal." The case, Brown v. Board of Education, was argued by Thurgood Marshall, then director of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, who went on to become the first black appointed to the Supreme Court. Marshall presented evidence showing that separating black and white students discriminated against blacks, placing them at a severe disadvantage. He argued that segregated schools were not and could never be equal. Such schools, he said, violated the equal protection guarantee of the 14th Amendment.