Dean's World

As Arnold Harris so profoundly observed: "One man or woman with courage is a majority."

“But in view of the constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law. The humblest is the peer of the most powerful. The law regards man as man, and takes no account of his surroundings or of his color when his civil rights as guaranteed by the supreme law of the land are involved.”
-Justice John Marshall Harlan, dissent, Plessy vs. Ferguson (1896)

I'm going to have to say that I wish Justice Harlan's straightforward Constitutionalist argument had been the basis for Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education (1954) instead of the sociological nonsense of Gunnar Myrdal. It was that last element which, along with the disastrous Engle vs. Vitale (1962) (banning prayer in public schools), began to bring the Supreme Court into disrepute among conservatives. Tragic.

But, despite all that, Homer Plessy and Rosa Parks did win. Segregation is abolished. Free at last.

As Arnold Harris so profoundly observed: "One man or woman with courage is a majority."