November 19, 2025 • 20 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, in 1896, the United States Supreme Court delivered one of the most damaging rulings in its history when it upheld segregation in Plessy v. Ferguson. The decision cemented the idea of separate but equal and gave legal cover to the rise of Jim Crow laws across the country.
More than a century later, Homer Plessy’s descendant, Keith Plessy, reflects on what that ruling cost generations of Americans. He also shares how the descendants of Plessy and Judge Ferguson have come together to confront the legacy of a landmark Supreme Court case that shaped civil rights for decades.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
This is our American stories, and we love to tell
stories about our nation's history. And there's always All of
our stories about history are brought to us by the
great folks at Hillsdale College, where you can go to
learn all the things that matter in life, all the
things that are beautiful in life. And if you can't
get to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come to you if their
free and terrific online courses, go to Hillsdale dot edu.
(00:36):
And as you know, we like to bring you events
that shaped our country, and some for the better and
some for the worst. And through it all there have
been people fighting, fighting for the promises made in our constitution.
Sometimes the battles we fought have been lost. Today Robbie
brings us the story of the Plus ev. Ferguson case
(00:56):
and a Supreme Court decision that solidified segregation.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
For over fifty years.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
It's told by a descendant of Homer Plessy himself, Keith Plessy.
Here's the story.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Separate but equal. It's a phrase that haunted African Americans
for years. The right to separate individuals, restaurants, businesses, train cars,
buses based on the color of one's skin. Separate but
equal was not a policy left over from the Civil War.
There wasn't until more than thirty years after the Civil
War that segregation became the law of the land, but
(01:35):
not all states fell in at the same time. In
New Orleans, Louisiana, there was a man named Homer Plessy
who would, with the help of the country, fight for
the equality that black citizens had tasted for a brief moment.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
My name is Keith Plessy.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
I am a four generation descendant of Homer Plessy, plaintiff
in the Plessy Versus Ferguson case of eighteen ninety six.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Alma Plessi was.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
Born in eighteen sixty three March seventeenth, the same year
that Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. He grew up
in a turbulent time. Civil War was when he was
an infant. Post Civil War was his younger life where
(02:24):
he experienced reconstruction in Louisiana. Being protected by the Union soldiers,
they were able to attend the same schools as white citizens.
There were three additions to the US Constitution Amendments, the thirteenth,
(02:47):
the fourteenth, and the fifteenth Amendments. Those amendments came during
reconstruction thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, Fourteenth Amendment equal protection the laws,
and the.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Fifteenth Amendment was the right to vote. So those three.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
Things occurred during Reconstruction, and Homoplasy was.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
A young man experiencing those changes.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
So it was developing him to not only enjoy the
freedoms that came through Reconstruction, but to defend those rights
when they were being taken away. And during his childhood
many protesters and activists of his time set the pace
(03:35):
for him.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
When he became a young.
Speaker 4 (03:37):
Man, Homo Plus's father died at a young age, and
Homoplus he was about six years old when his father
passed away. His mother remarried into a family called the
Due Parts. Victor Dupart was part of the Unification movement,
(03:58):
and Victor Dupart's father and life law was part.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Of the Unification movement.
Speaker 4 (04:03):
That movement combined white and black workers who protested for
equal paid and they got it during Reconstruction. However, when
Homer pless He became a young man, those rights were
slowly deteriorating, and Homer Plessey attended these meetings with his stepfather,
(04:24):
Victor Dupart, and he was familiar with the Citizens Committee,
but he was not a member of the Citizens Committee.
That was a group of eighteen lawyers, businessmen, prominent citizens,
mixed race organization. There was some white citizens, some African
(04:47):
American citizens long in the battle for freedom. I think
their history goes back abolition long before the Civil War
American Revolution. Were also participated in the Battle of New Orleans.
That Citizens Committee had a deep background in fighting for freedom.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
A lot of those uh.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
F ancestors of the Citizens Committee who fought in the
plus if Ferguson case at the turn of the century
were very much involved in the development of America. Homoplacy
himself had a relative that was decorated in the American Revolution.
(05:29):
His great grandfather was a gentleman by the name of
Matthew de Vaux. Matthew de Vaut was decorated four times
in battle in the American Revolution, which not being recognized
as the American Revolution because Louisiana was still the Louisiana
Territory during the UH American Revolution. So his history goes
(05:49):
back the The right to fight for his freedom was
born with the country, and it it was in his
dna to battle for his rights. When eighteen ninety rolled
around and Louisiana decided to jump into this segregation chain
(06:11):
of laws that were spreading across the South. Florida had
adopted its segregation laws on trains. Alabama was before Louisiana,
and when Louisiana adopted its separate car law was eighteen
ninety and by eighteen ninety one a challenge was being
(06:31):
presented to them to change that law by the Citizens Committee.
Speaker 5 (06:36):
Here in New Orleans, the Withdraw Car Act or Separate
Car Act was a law passed in Louisiana that required
railroad companies to provide equal but separate.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
Train car accommodations for blacks and whites. But Homer's case
was not the first to challenge separate car law. Another
man who was white, passing Daniel Day dune More, did
it first class car traveling from New Orleans to Montgomery, Alabama.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
When Homer Plassey was selected the state law was being challenged.
The interstate law allowed trains outside the state of Louisiana,
so it didn't apply separate call or didn't apply to
those trains, but the trains to travel within the state
of Louisiana, the ones who were restricted by race in
each car. Well, if you look at the Louisiana law
(07:36):
as it was written. You had a first class car
that was designated for white citizens and a second class
car that was designated for anyone of color. In the
system of the East Louisiana Railroad. They would have preferred
to sell all first class tickets as opposed to a
(07:57):
separate car that had to be set up, save, for instance,
the white car was not full. One black citizen comes
up to ride the train. You have to prepare another
car for this guy, and you have a schedule to
meet when your train is taken off, it's going from
one area to another. The delay that process by changing
(08:17):
the car, having to add a car to the train
took off a lot of time from the schedule, which
resulted in poor service.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
So you know, those.
Speaker 4 (08:29):
Who wanted to exercise segregation on those trains had to
suffer being late for their appointments.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
So it didn't make sense.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
And you're listening to Keith Plussy and what a story
this is, and anyone who's ever read the case, and
you can actually just type in plus E. V. Ferguson
and read the opinion, because it's astonishing. And when we
come back, we're going to continue with Keith Plussy's voice
and again a direct relative, a descendant of Homer Plusy,
(09:04):
and my goodness, it's a name you've heard, but it's
real life person. And that's why we love telling you
these stories. These were real life people and without them
doing what they did, things wouldn't have changed. And it
took a lot of courage to do what he did.
When we come back, more of the story of plus
E v. Ferguson as told by Keith Plussy here on
(09:25):
our American stories, and we're back with our American stories
and the story of the US Supreme Court case, probably
the most infamous, the eighteen ninety six Plus ev. Ferguson case.
(09:50):
When we last left off, Homer Plusy was working with
an organization to actually get caught so they could start
the legal battle that would land them at the Supreme Court.
When one looked at Plusy, they couldn't tell if he
was white or black. And this is part of how
they hoped to challenge the separation of individuals into white
cars in black cars. Here's Homer's descendant again, Keith Plessy,
(10:12):
continuing with this story.
Speaker 4 (10:17):
Now, that law also created another problem, which was how
do you tell that a person's black or a person's white.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
In New Orleans, you had so many.
Speaker 4 (10:28):
Citizens who appeared to be white, but they were actually black,
and it was hard for the conductors to determine.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
The race of someone.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
Until today, it's still a problem because you know, I
have a personal take on that, which I say that
one of the most ridiculous rules that were developed back
then was called the one drop rule, that if you
had one drop of African blood in your line, your
geniality line, that you were considered black. And in Homo
(11:00):
Plessy's case, one of the most ridiculous things that they
were saying was that he was one eighth black because
of his great grandmother, Agnes, who was a slave, so
he was considered an octor room. You know, I mean,
that's kind of ridiculous to try to have a meter
(11:21):
to measure someone's race. You know, it just it went
into so many ridiculous that, you know, rather than being
recognized as a human being as a person, you had
to talk about somebody's color the skin, and you.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
Know, just didn't make any sense to me.
Speaker 4 (11:44):
The Citizens Committee had already cut a deal with the
East Louisiana Railroad to work on this plan to change
the law. So when Homo Plessy approached that train station,
he was already expected to arrive. He purchased his ticket
without conflict. He entered the train the train call which
(12:07):
was designated for whites only, and he sat down well.
The conductor and the arresting officer were also hired by
the Citizens Committee and the East Louisiana Railroad to arrest
Homer plessing take him off that train so that they
can challenge the law. He was bailed out because the
bail was set so he could be released.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
The initial criminal case was overseen by Judge John Howard Ferguson,
and he ruled that Louisiana was able to regulate their
interest state travel in whatever manner they deemed fit. After
the verdict was passed, the Citizens Committee stepped in and
appealed the case up to the state Supreme Court.
Speaker 4 (12:48):
That result of the case was appealed to the US
Supreme Court and it was challenged in the US Supreme
Court by Homer Plessing the Citizens Committee, and that's when
it became Plessy versus Ferguson, and it became a national case.
What the Citizens Committee did to raise money to represent
(13:10):
Homer Plessing. I think the phrase, if I can get
it correct, was the liberality of the rich and the
might of the poor combined. So you had a list
around the United States of people who sent a dollar,
who sent ten dollars, some people sent fifty cents, but
(13:30):
everybody combined created the fund to represent Homer Plessy in
the US Supreme Court, and it was a national representation.
It was fought for about four years. However, it was unsuccessful.
As history would write it. The decision was separate but
(13:51):
equal became in the law of land. But in that instance,
a new era of civil rights pioneers were developing around
the scene of that case, a fight that continued to
actually change the law. After a separate but equal was
(14:12):
adopted as the law of land, many other areas that
were not segregated became segregated. So it brought about a
backward step to America that I think it was a
crippling situation, probably one of the worst, if not the
worst decisions at a point in American history where we
(14:32):
could have actually turned the tables on the inequalities that
the country was producing at the same time with this
narrative of.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Equal justice for all, it was.
Speaker 4 (14:48):
Not being practiced at that time, and it was given teeth.
Jim Crow gave segregation teeth to bite into American society
in every facet possible. I mean, you had drinking fountains, parks.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Didn't allow you to come into certain areas.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
Even when I was a kid, there was a park
that exercised weekends for white kids and black kids had
to squeeze in a little time in the park during
the week after school and the weekends where everybody was
out of school, we couldn't go in that park. I
(15:32):
was born in nineteen fifty seven, so that's a long
time after eighteen ninety six, and you know, it was
still affecting my life as a kid growing up in
New Orleans. Eventually, Brown Versus Board of Education changed Homer
(15:54):
Plusy's case. The Plusy decision changed the landscape of civil
rights law at that point, but transportation still was not
changed until maybe the sixties, when you had the Civil
Rights Act signed. There were still buses being attacked, so
the transportation issue was not solved.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
There was education in Brown v. Boarden.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
I remember, as a child in elementary school being told
that I was related to Homer Plessic.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
One of my teachers who I can remember, Miss Waters.
Speaker 4 (16:33):
She brought the phone book into the room and while
we were talking about Plessy Versus Ferguson, she looked at
my name, stood me up in front of the class
and told the kids, Keith's last name is spelled just
like Homer Plessics.
Speaker 3 (16:51):
But it wasn't until much later that Keith realized how
closely related he was to Homer.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
Nineteen ninety six when I met author Keith Weldon Medley,
and this gentleman was doing research on Homer Plessy.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
He had done.
Speaker 4 (17:07):
Extensive research and his book was being developed was called
Us Freeman Plessy Versus Ferguson to Fight Against Segregation, and
his book entailed the genealogy of Homer Plessy's family, and
that's when I really found out my connection to Homer Plessy,
(17:29):
to my great grandfather.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
And also at the.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Same time he was doing research on Judge John Howard Ferguson.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
And not long after, Phoebe Ferguson, Judge Ferguson's great great granddaughter,
and Keith Plessi, whose great grandfather was Homer Plus's cousin,
would meet.
Speaker 4 (17:48):
He invited us to his book signing, which we had
never seen or known of each other before then, and
at his book signing we met for the first time.
And when I first met Missus Ferguson, she shook her
hand and she began to apologize for slavery, segregation, and
(18:09):
anything that ever went wrong during racial relations. And I
kind of interrupted her and said, hey, it's not our fault.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Those things happen. We can do something different.
Speaker 4 (18:20):
It's no longer pleasing versus Ferguson. It's Plessy and Ferguson.
So we became friends at that instant, and we've been
friends ever since. And it took us from two thousand
and four to two thousand and nine when we actually
developed the foundation. We signed our letters of incorporation at
(18:46):
a restaurant called Cafe and reconciled when we signed our
papers there. We didn't realize that on July ninth we
were signing those papers the fourteenth Amendment. It was adopted
to the US Constitution on July to ninth, eighteen sixty eight.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
And great job is always to Robbie and the Plussy
and Ferguson Foundation is doing a lot to educate folks. Together.
Heath Plussy and Phoebe Ferguson are spreading their message that
their mutual history can be a tool to create unity
and understanding. I wanted to read you the lone dissenting opinion.
Everyone knows that the statute in question had its origin
(19:28):
in the purpose not so much to exclude white people
from railroad cars occupied by blacks, but as to exclude
colored people from coaches occupied by or assigned to white people.
Our Constitution is colorblind and neither knows nor tolerates classes
among citizens in respective civil rights. All citizens are equal
before the law.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
The humblest is the.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
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. And that is
Harlan dissenting and PLUSY v. Ferguson in eighteen ninety six
plus E v. Ferguson is told by Keith Plussy. The
story here on our American Stories
This is our American stories, and we love to tell
stories about our nation's history. And there's always All of
our stories about history are brought to us by the
great folks at Hillsdale College, where you can go to
learn all the things that matter in life, all the
things that are beautiful in life. And if you can't
get to Hillsdale, Hillsdale will come to you if their
free and terrific online courses, go to Hillsdale dot edu.
(00:36):
And as you know, we like to bring you events
that shaped our country, and some for the better and
some for the worst. And through it all there have
been people fighting, fighting for the promises made in our constitution.
Sometimes the battles we fought have been lost. Today Robbie
brings us the story of the Plus ev. Ferguson case
(00:56):
and a Supreme Court decision that solidified segregation.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
For over fifty years.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
It's told by a descendant of Homer Plessy himself, Keith Plessy.
Here's the story.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Separate but equal. It's a phrase that haunted African Americans
for years. The right to separate individuals, restaurants, businesses, train cars,
buses based on the color of one's skin. Separate but
equal was not a policy left over from the Civil War.
There wasn't until more than thirty years after the Civil
War that segregation became the law of the land, but
(01:35):
not all states fell in at the same time. In
New Orleans, Louisiana, there was a man named Homer Plessy
who would, with the help of the country, fight for
the equality that black citizens had tasted for a brief moment.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
My name is Keith Plessy.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
I am a four generation descendant of Homer Plessy, plaintiff
in the Plessy Versus Ferguson case of eighteen ninety six.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Alma Plessi was.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
Born in eighteen sixty three March seventeenth, the same year
that Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. He grew up
in a turbulent time. Civil War was when he was
an infant. Post Civil War was his younger life where
(02:24):
he experienced reconstruction in Louisiana. Being protected by the Union soldiers,
they were able to attend the same schools as white citizens.
There were three additions to the US Constitution Amendments, the thirteenth,
(02:47):
the fourteenth, and the fifteenth Amendments. Those amendments came during
reconstruction thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery, Fourteenth Amendment equal protection the laws,
and the.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Fifteenth Amendment was the right to vote. So those three.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
Things occurred during Reconstruction, and Homoplasy was.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
A young man experiencing those changes.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
So it was developing him to not only enjoy the
freedoms that came through Reconstruction, but to defend those rights
when they were being taken away. And during his childhood
many protesters and activists of his time set the pace
(03:35):
for him.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
When he became a young.
Speaker 4 (03:37):
Man, Homo Plus's father died at a young age, and
Homoplus he was about six years old when his father
passed away. His mother remarried into a family called the
Due Parts. Victor Dupart was part of the Unification movement,
(03:58):
and Victor Dupart's father and life law was part.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Of the Unification movement.
Speaker 4 (04:03):
That movement combined white and black workers who protested for
equal paid and they got it during Reconstruction. However, when
Homer pless He became a young man, those rights were
slowly deteriorating, and Homer Plessey attended these meetings with his stepfather,
(04:24):
Victor Dupart, and he was familiar with the Citizens Committee,
but he was not a member of the Citizens Committee.
That was a group of eighteen lawyers, businessmen, prominent citizens,
mixed race organization. There was some white citizens, some African
(04:47):
American citizens long in the battle for freedom. I think
their history goes back abolition long before the Civil War
American Revolution. Were also participated in the Battle of New Orleans.
That Citizens Committee had a deep background in fighting for freedom.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
A lot of those uh.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
F ancestors of the Citizens Committee who fought in the
plus if Ferguson case at the turn of the century
were very much involved in the development of America. Homoplacy
himself had a relative that was decorated in the American Revolution.
(05:29):
His great grandfather was a gentleman by the name of
Matthew de Vaux. Matthew de Vaut was decorated four times
in battle in the American Revolution, which not being recognized
as the American Revolution because Louisiana was still the Louisiana
Territory during the UH American Revolution. So his history goes
(05:49):
back the The right to fight for his freedom was
born with the country, and it it was in his
dna to battle for his rights. When eighteen ninety rolled
around and Louisiana decided to jump into this segregation chain
(06:11):
of laws that were spreading across the South. Florida had
adopted its segregation laws on trains. Alabama was before Louisiana,
and when Louisiana adopted its separate car law was eighteen
ninety and by eighteen ninety one a challenge was being
(06:31):
presented to them to change that law by the Citizens Committee.
Speaker 5 (06:36):
Here in New Orleans, the Withdraw Car Act or Separate
Car Act was a law passed in Louisiana that required
railroad companies to provide equal but separate.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
Train car accommodations for blacks and whites. But Homer's case
was not the first to challenge separate car law. Another
man who was white, passing Daniel Day dune More, did
it first class car traveling from New Orleans to Montgomery, Alabama.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
When Homer Plassey was selected the state law was being challenged.
The interstate law allowed trains outside the state of Louisiana,
so it didn't apply separate call or didn't apply to
those trains, but the trains to travel within the state
of Louisiana, the ones who were restricted by race in
each car. Well, if you look at the Louisiana law
(07:36):
as it was written. You had a first class car
that was designated for white citizens and a second class
car that was designated for anyone of color. In the
system of the East Louisiana Railroad. They would have preferred
to sell all first class tickets as opposed to a
(07:57):
separate car that had to be set up, save, for instance,
the white car was not full. One black citizen comes
up to ride the train. You have to prepare another
car for this guy, and you have a schedule to
meet when your train is taken off, it's going from
one area to another. The delay that process by changing
(08:17):
the car, having to add a car to the train
took off a lot of time from the schedule, which
resulted in poor service.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
So you know, those.
Speaker 4 (08:29):
Who wanted to exercise segregation on those trains had to
suffer being late for their appointments.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
So it didn't make sense.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
And you're listening to Keith Plussy and what a story
this is, and anyone who's ever read the case, and
you can actually just type in plus E. V. Ferguson
and read the opinion, because it's astonishing. And when we
come back, we're going to continue with Keith Plussy's voice
and again a direct relative, a descendant of Homer Plusy,
(09:04):
and my goodness, it's a name you've heard, but it's
real life person. And that's why we love telling you
these stories. These were real life people and without them
doing what they did, things wouldn't have changed. And it
took a lot of courage to do what he did.
When we come back, more of the story of plus
E v. Ferguson as told by Keith Plussy here on
(09:25):
our American stories, and we're back with our American stories
and the story of the US Supreme Court case, probably
the most infamous, the eighteen ninety six Plus ev. Ferguson case.
(09:50):
When we last left off, Homer Plusy was working with
an organization to actually get caught so they could start
the legal battle that would land them at the Supreme Court.
When one looked at Plusy, they couldn't tell if he
was white or black. And this is part of how
they hoped to challenge the separation of individuals into white
cars in black cars. Here's Homer's descendant again, Keith Plessy,
(10:12):
continuing with this story.
Speaker 4 (10:17):
Now, that law also created another problem, which was how
do you tell that a person's black or a person's white.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
In New Orleans, you had so many.
Speaker 4 (10:28):
Citizens who appeared to be white, but they were actually black,
and it was hard for the conductors to determine.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
The race of someone.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
Until today, it's still a problem because you know, I
have a personal take on that, which I say that
one of the most ridiculous rules that were developed back
then was called the one drop rule, that if you
had one drop of African blood in your line, your
geniality line, that you were considered black. And in Homo
(11:00):
Plessy's case, one of the most ridiculous things that they
were saying was that he was one eighth black because
of his great grandmother, Agnes, who was a slave, so
he was considered an octor room. You know, I mean,
that's kind of ridiculous to try to have a meter
(11:21):
to measure someone's race. You know, it just it went
into so many ridiculous that, you know, rather than being
recognized as a human being as a person, you had
to talk about somebody's color the skin, and you.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
Know, just didn't make any sense to me.
Speaker 4 (11:44):
The Citizens Committee had already cut a deal with the
East Louisiana Railroad to work on this plan to change
the law. So when Homo Plessy approached that train station,
he was already expected to arrive. He purchased his ticket
without conflict. He entered the train the train call which
(12:07):
was designated for whites only, and he sat down well.
The conductor and the arresting officer were also hired by
the Citizens Committee and the East Louisiana Railroad to arrest
Homer plessing take him off that train so that they
can challenge the law. He was bailed out because the
bail was set so he could be released.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
The initial criminal case was overseen by Judge John Howard Ferguson,
and he ruled that Louisiana was able to regulate their
interest state travel in whatever manner they deemed fit. After
the verdict was passed, the Citizens Committee stepped in and
appealed the case up to the state Supreme Court.
Speaker 4 (12:48):
That result of the case was appealed to the US
Supreme Court and it was challenged in the US Supreme
Court by Homer Plessing the Citizens Committee, and that's when
it became Plessy versus Ferguson, and it became a national case.
What the Citizens Committee did to raise money to represent
(13:10):
Homer Plessing. I think the phrase, if I can get
it correct, was the liberality of the rich and the
might of the poor combined. So you had a list
around the United States of people who sent a dollar,
who sent ten dollars, some people sent fifty cents, but
(13:30):
everybody combined created the fund to represent Homer Plessy in
the US Supreme Court, and it was a national representation.
It was fought for about four years. However, it was unsuccessful.
As history would write it. The decision was separate but
(13:51):
equal became in the law of land. But in that instance,
a new era of civil rights pioneers were developing around
the scene of that case, a fight that continued to
actually change the law. After a separate but equal was
(14:12):
adopted as the law of land, many other areas that
were not segregated became segregated. So it brought about a
backward step to America that I think it was a
crippling situation, probably one of the worst, if not the
worst decisions at a point in American history where we
(14:32):
could have actually turned the tables on the inequalities that
the country was producing at the same time with this
narrative of.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Equal justice for all, it was.
Speaker 4 (14:48):
Not being practiced at that time, and it was given teeth.
Jim Crow gave segregation teeth to bite into American society
in every facet possible. I mean, you had drinking fountains, parks.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Didn't allow you to come into certain areas.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
Even when I was a kid, there was a park
that exercised weekends for white kids and black kids had
to squeeze in a little time in the park during
the week after school and the weekends where everybody was
out of school, we couldn't go in that park. I
(15:32):
was born in nineteen fifty seven, so that's a long
time after eighteen ninety six, and you know, it was
still affecting my life as a kid growing up in
New Orleans. Eventually, Brown Versus Board of Education changed Homer
(15:54):
Plusy's case. The Plusy decision changed the landscape of civil
rights law at that point, but transportation still was not
changed until maybe the sixties, when you had the Civil
Rights Act signed. There were still buses being attacked, so
the transportation issue was not solved.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
There was education in Brown v. Boarden.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
I remember, as a child in elementary school being told
that I was related to Homer Plessic.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
One of my teachers who I can remember, Miss Waters.
Speaker 4 (16:33):
She brought the phone book into the room and while
we were talking about Plessy Versus Ferguson, she looked at
my name, stood me up in front of the class
and told the kids, Keith's last name is spelled just
like Homer Plessics.
Speaker 3 (16:51):
But it wasn't until much later that Keith realized how
closely related he was to Homer.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
Nineteen ninety six when I met author Keith Weldon Medley,
and this gentleman was doing research on Homer Plessy.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
He had done.
Speaker 4 (17:07):
Extensive research and his book was being developed was called
Us Freeman Plessy Versus Ferguson to Fight Against Segregation, and
his book entailed the genealogy of Homer Plessy's family, and
that's when I really found out my connection to Homer Plessy,
(17:29):
to my great grandfather.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
And also at the.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Same time he was doing research on Judge John Howard Ferguson.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
And not long after, Phoebe Ferguson, Judge Ferguson's great great granddaughter,
and Keith Plessi, whose great grandfather was Homer Plus's cousin,
would meet.
Speaker 4 (17:48):
He invited us to his book signing, which we had
never seen or known of each other before then, and
at his book signing we met for the first time.
And when I first met Missus Ferguson, she shook her
hand and she began to apologize for slavery, segregation, and
(18:09):
anything that ever went wrong during racial relations. And I
kind of interrupted her and said, hey, it's not our fault.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Those things happen. We can do something different.
Speaker 4 (18:20):
It's no longer pleasing versus Ferguson. It's Plessy and Ferguson.
So we became friends at that instant, and we've been
friends ever since. And it took us from two thousand
and four to two thousand and nine when we actually
developed the foundation. We signed our letters of incorporation at
(18:46):
a restaurant called Cafe and reconciled when we signed our
papers there. We didn't realize that on July ninth we
were signing those papers the fourteenth Amendment. It was adopted
to the US Constitution on July to ninth, eighteen sixty eight.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
And great job is always to Robbie and the Plussy
and Ferguson Foundation is doing a lot to educate folks. Together.
Heath Plussy and Phoebe Ferguson are spreading their message that
their mutual history can be a tool to create unity
and understanding. I wanted to read you the lone dissenting opinion.
Everyone knows that the statute in question had its origin
(19:28):
in the purpose not so much to exclude white people
from railroad cars occupied by blacks, but as to exclude
colored people from coaches occupied by or assigned to white people.
Our Constitution is colorblind and neither knows nor tolerates classes
among citizens in respective civil rights. All citizens are equal
before the law.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
The humblest is the.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
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. And that is
Harlan dissenting and PLUSY v. Ferguson in eighteen ninety six
plus E v. Ferguson is told by Keith Plussy. The
story here on our American Stories
Host
Lee Habeeb
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