The NAACP's Legal Strategy against Segregated Education, 1925-1950

By Mark V. Tushnet

With a new epilogue by the author

264 pp., 6 x 9

  • Paperback ISBN: 978-0-8078-5595-9
    Published: February 2005
  • E-book PDF ISBN: 979-8-8908-8012-3
    Published: January 2012
  • E-book EPUB ISBN: 978-0-8078-8295-5
    Published: January 2012

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The NAACP's fight against segregated education--the first public interest litigation campaign--culminated in the 1954 Brown decision. While touching on the general social, political, and economic climate in which the NAACP acted, Mark V. Tushnet emphasizes the internal workings of the organization as revealed in its own documents. He argues that the dedication and the political and legal skills of staff members such as Walter White, Charles Hamilton Houston, and Thurgood Marshall were responsible for the ultimate success of public interest law. This edition contains a new epilogue by the author that addresses general questions of litigation strategy, the persistent question of whether the Brown decision mattered, and the legacy of Brown through the Burger and Rehnquist courts.

About the Author

Mark V. Tushnet, professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center, is author, coauthor, or editor of twenty books, including a two-volume history of Thurgood Marshall's years on the Supreme Court.
For more information about Mark V. Tushnet, visit the Author Page.

Reviews

"Skillfully cutting through the maze of legal technicalities and jargon to make clear the strategy of the NAACP, [Tushnet] has presented an extraordinary case study."--Journal of American History

"A brilliantly told narrative of how the NAACP developed a legal strategy for attacking segregation. It also raises the deepest question about under what circumstances law can be used by the weak to reform the structure of power."--Morton J. Horwitz, Harvard Law School