Separate but Unequal

Almost 75 years ago one of the most famous civil rights cases was marked a turning point in history as it overturned the long standing case of Plessy vs. Ferguson. In 1896, Plessy vs. Ferguson established the "Separate but Equal" which would be used for the next 55 years as an excuse to discriminate and separate races from each other. In the case of Brown vs. Board of Education, which overturned the "Separate but Equal" term proved that the standing of society was in fact separate but unequal. Although no expected an over night change, progression towards integration was expected, yet there was rallies against it. Over the course of the next 68 years, there is still a present struggle of integration of schools. However there is a strong difference between the integration struggles that exist today and the past. Although there is no separate bathrooms, water fountains or restaurants, our history of segregation effects the young children of today.
During the integration process, real estate agents used the form of Blockbusting to change the demographics of a neighborhood. White people would be convinced to sell their homes for extremely cheap, and people of color would more or likely buy them because of how cheap they are. Since these houses were sold for so cheap, the property declined in value. This decline in value started a trickle down effect of the development of a lower class town. Minorities were soon trapped in these houses because they could not sell their houses for high enough to be able to move out of the neighborhood due to redlining. Soon neighborhoods were segregated, not by choice, but through the decision of real estate companies and the people existing in the neighborhoods. As soon as a neighborhood became slightly segregated, white families often moved.

Now 75 years later, neighborhoods all around the nation are segregated because over time minorities remained in the same communities. As I look through the students in my classroom and the entire school, I realize that all of them are minorities in a lower class part of the city. Although our country may say we integrated, yet, we are segregated by the trickle down effect.