June 1950

In Sweatt v. Painter (1950), the Supreme Court unanimously rules that the University of Texas must admit Heman Marion Sweatt to its law school. Texas had hastily created a separate Black law school rather than integrate. The Court finds the separate school unequal not just in physical facilities but in reputation, faculty, alumni, and community connections — beginning the argument about intangible inequalities that culminates in Brown v. Board. Sweatt's case is argued by Thurgood Marshall.

In McLaurin v. Oklahoma (1950), decided the same day as Sweatt, the Supreme Court rules that George McLaurin, admitted to the University of Oklahoma doctoral program but forced to sit in a separate anteroom, use a designated library desk, and eat at different hours, cannot be treated differently from white students. The case invalidates formal 'admitted but segregated' arrangements and further undermines the 'separate but equal' doctrine before Brown.

Andy Wright, the last imprisoned Scottsboro defendant, is released on parole on June 9, 1950, nineteen years after being falsely accused of rape in 1931. Most of the nine defendants had been imprisoned for years despite recantation by one accuser, proof of innocence, and international advocacy. The case documents how the Southern legal system could imprison Black men for decades on false charges. Clarence Norris, the only one sentenced to death who survived, is pardoned by Alabama Governor George Wallace in 1976.