The challenge of desegregating schools was brought upon in 1954 by five separate court cases, ultimately joined together and called Brown v. The Board of Education. Though each case was different, they all revolved around the main argument that segregation itself violated the "equal protection under the laws" guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment, and had detrimental psychological effects on Negroes. Segregation was almost always initiated by whites, and initiated on the basis that blacks were inferior and undesirable. A sense of inferi ....