Plessy 1 Plessy v. Ferguson and Miranda v. Arizona Name Class Date Professor Plessy v. Ferguson and Miranda v. Arizona Two landmark rulings made by the Supreme Court involve the cases of Plessy v. Ferguson and Miranda v. Arizona. In both rulings the impact to society was great with one resulting in the segregation of African American citizen for the next fifty years while the other affected the way law enforcement officers’ question and interrogate criminal offenders. While both of these cases occurred in two different centuries the ruling of the court had a direct impact on functions in American society and the rights of the individual citizen. In Plessy the rights of the African American where limited but in the case of Miranda individual rights were broadened. Plessy vs. Ferguson In the case of Plessy v. Ferguson the case began when an African American male who was half white and appeared white went against a Louisiana law that requires separate accommodations for separate races. Homer Plessy was a member of a group in New Orleans known as the Citizens Committee that fought for the equal right of the African American citizen. The Citizens Committee decided to test a Louisiana Law known as the 1890 Louisiana Separate Car Act. When Homer Plessy entered the train and took accommodations in the white section of the railcars he was detained by a police officer and held in a separate car until he was arrested upon exiting the train. Plessy was charged with breaching Louisiana Law and was jailed and fined. On appeal the Louisiana Appeals Court ruled declared forced segregation in railroad cars traveling between states to be unconstitutional (Wolf, 2011). The case was then appealed to the Louisiana Supreme Court that upheld the ruling of the district court and found the state had a right to establish laws that provide separate but equal accommodations. The case was then appealed for the last time when it went in front of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the state and the laws concerning the segregation of the White and African American citizen was not addressed for over sixty years when the Supreme Courts ruling was reversed in the case of Brown vs. Board of Education. When the Plessy case was brought in front of the Supreme Court by the defendant and the members of the Citizens Committee the claim was the defendant was denied his Fourteenth and Thirteenth Amendment rights. Plessy claimed that the 1890 Louisiana Separate Car Act violated his Thirteenth Amendment right against involuntary servitude. In other Plessy was claiming that by being forced into separate accommodations he was being placed in involuntary servitude. The court ruled that the Thirteenth Amendment did not apply to segregation so the defendants Thirteenth Amendment right could not have been violated. Under the Fourteenth Amendment the defendant, Plessy, claimed he was denied the right to equal protection.