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Why did Justice John Marshall Harlan believe segregation imposed a badge of servitude on African Americans?

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Plessy v. Ferguson judgment — Plessy v. Ferguson *Plessy* v. *Ferguson* judgment, issued by the U.S. Supreme Court on May 18, 1896, advancing the controversial “separate but equal” doctrine for assessing the constitutionality of racial segregation laws.

In his dissenting opinion for Plessy v. Ferguson, Justice John Marshall Harlan argued that the Separate Car Act imposed a badge of servitude on African Americans because the law was universally understood to presuppose their inferiority.1

Harlan maintained that the true purpose of the statute was not to provide equal accommodations, but to compel African Americans to remain separate from white passengers, thereby interfering with their personal liberty and freedom of movement based solely on race. By enforcing this separation, the law relegated African American citizens to a permanent condition of legal inferiority, which Harlan believed violated the Thirteenth Amendment prohibition against slavery and involuntary servitude.12

Harlan famously declared that the U.S. Constitution is "color-blind" and does not tolerate classes among citizens, asserting that all individuals are equal before the law regardless of their race.12