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To: Publius Valerius
Everyone knowns that Brown was wrong and feels guilty about it

I don't know who this "everyone" is that you're referring to, but the vast majority of Americans have no idea that it was wrongly decided. They've all been told from grade school on that it was a triumph of the Constitution against a corrupt system that managed to resist its dictates for so long.

In fact, not only do they not know that it was wrongly decided, they don't even really know what it decided. Contrary to widespeard popular belief, it did not overturn Plessy vs Ferguson. Instead, it went through contortions to try to uphold that earlier precedent while insisting that it didn't apply to the field of public education. The upshot was that the court decided, probably for the first time ever, that a law or policy can be unconstitutional because of the way it makes those affected by it "feel". That's a horrible precedent to set.

If "everyone" was aware of these things, then it's highly likely that not "everyone" would consider it a good thing.

146 posted on 08/26/2005 7:11:57 AM PDT by inquest (FTAA delenda est)
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To: inquest
By everyone, I mean everyone with any legal knowledge at all. Obviously, in order for someone to know that a case was wrongly decided, they would have to know the law.

If "everyone" was aware of these things, then it's highly likely that not "everyone" would consider it a good thing.

As I said, just run a search on Brown on Lexis or Westlaw and you'll find about 10,000 law review articles defending Brown. As I mentioned in my post above, begin with Bickel's 1955 Harvard Law Review article. Bickel was a clerk for Frankfurter on the 1954 Court that decided Brown and whose task was to compile the legislative history of the 14th Amendment.

147 posted on 08/26/2005 8:51:28 AM PDT by Publius Valerius
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