Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr. authors the majority opinion in Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, establishing First Amendment protection for commercial speech by striking down state restrictions on prescription drug price advertising. This landmark decision creates …
Lewis F. Powell Jr.William BrennanWarren BurgerByron WhiteThurgood Marshall+1 morecommercial-speechfirst-amendmentcorporate-rightsjudicial-captureconstitutional-expansion
On February 6, 1956, the University of Alabama expelled Autherine Lucy, its first Black student, after a three-day white supremacist riot made her presence on campus untenable. University officials blamed Lucy for the violence and used her NAACP-supported lawsuit challenging her suspension as …
On May 31, 1955, one year after declaring school segregation unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court issued Brown II, its implementation ruling. Rather than setting firm deadlines or providing specific remedies, the Court ordered desegregation proceed “with all …
Earl WarrenU.S. Supreme CourtNAACP Legal Defense FundThurgood MarshallSouthern state governmentscivil-rightssegregationjudicialdemocratic-erosionmassive-resistance
On May 17, 1954, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. The Court declared that racial segregation in public schools violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, …
On July 17, 1944, two transport ships loading ammunition at Port Chicago Naval Magazine in California explode, killing 320 men instantly, including 202 African American enlisted men who comprised the entire loading workforce. Three weeks later, 258 surviving Black sailors refuse to return to loading …
U.S. NavyThurgood MarshallNAACPPort Chicago 50Eleanor Rooseveltracial-discriminationmilitary-justicecivil-rightslabor-exploitationinstitutional-racism
The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in Smith v. Allwright that Texas’s white primary system violated the Fifteenth Amendment, striking down one of the South’s most effective tools for excluding Black voters from meaningful political participation. The decision, argued by Thurgood Marshall for …
Supreme CourtStanley ReedThurgood MarshallNAACP Legal Defense FundLonnie Smith+1 morevoting-rightssupreme-courtwhite-primarycivil-rightsnaacp+1 more