Thursday, February 25, 2016

Strum on Mendez v. Westminster

We’ve already noticed Philippa Strum’s book on Mendez v. Westminster.  Now comes her posting of an article on the case, “We Always Tell Our Children They are Americans": Mendez v. Westminster and the Beginning of the End of School Segregation, which originally appeared in the Journal of Supreme Court History (2014): 307-28.  She writes, “Mendez v. Westminster, decided in 1946, was the first case in which a federal court declared "separate but equal" to be unequal. Although the NAACP was not involved at the trial level, the brief it submitted on appeal became its practice brief for Brown v. Board of Education. The case led to integration of Mexican-American children in schools throughout California and the southwest.”