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With the 1896 Plessy v. Feguson Supreme Court decision, ________ became a legally sanctioned part of the American way of life?

User NikiC
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Final answer:

The 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson Supreme Court ruling established "separate but equal" as a legal doctrine, institutionalizing de jure segregation, which persisted until it was overturned in 1954 by Brown v. Board of Education.

Step-by-step explanation:

With the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson Supreme Court decision, "separate but equal" became a legally sanctioned part of the American way of life. This landmark decision arose from a Louisiana law that prohibited black and white people from sitting together on trains, which was challenged by Homer Plessy, a light-skinned African American. The Supreme Court ruled in a 7-1 decision that segregation did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause as long as the segregated facilities for both races were equal.

This principle of de jure segregation was cemented by the Supreme Court and led to widespread institutionalized racial discrimination. The unequal treatment and inferior facilities provided for African Americans under the guise of "separate but equal" persisted until the ruling was overturned by Brown v. Board of Education in 1954.

User Vlad Nikiforov
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