"Roberts vs,City of Boston"(December 4,1849)

The case of Roberts v.The City of Boston began,on this day.This lawsuit


This lawsuit was on behalf of an African American five-who was barred from school.


The suit was heard by the Massachuetts Supreme Court and was a prerequisite legal ruling the civil rights cases of the NAACP's assault on America's segregated educational system.The judge presiding was Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw.In 1848,five-year-old Sarah Richards was barred from the local primary school because she was African-American;her daddy Benjamin sued the city.The lawsuit was part of an organized effort by the African-American community to end racially segregated schools.A city ordinance passed in 1845 said any child "ulawfully excluded from public schools" could recover damages (which meant they could sue the city).Little Sarah had been forced to walk past five other schools to reach the "colored" schools in Smith Court.Now all Sarah's lawyers had to do was prove that she had been barred those schools unlawfully! Benjamin Roberts violated no law when he took his daughter to be enrolled.


School authorities argued that special provisions had been made for "colored"students.Since Boston maintained racially segregated schools,that Sarah passed five white schools on her way to the African American schools,the school board contended,was no consequence.Benjamin retained the attorney,abolitionist and later United States Senator Charles Sumner.Charles worked with Robert Morris,a young African-American abolitionist and activist lawyer from Boston.This formidable legal team broke new ground in their argument before the court.Invoking "the great principal"embodiied in the Constitution of Massachusetts,they asserted that all persons,regardless of race,color,stand as equals before the law.


In April 1850,the Supreme Judicial Court issued its ruling in Roberts v.Boston.Chief Justice Shaw,unmoved by impassioned oratory about freedom and equality,decided the case on narrow legal groups,ruling in favor of the right of the school committee to set education policy as it saw fit.Justice Shaw could find no constitutional reason for abolishing African Americans schools.Boston's school would remain segregated.