Robert J. Cottrol

This book does not begin with the famous Brown decision of 1954, but it begins pre-Civil War, pre-Progressive Era, pre-Civil Rights. In fact, the Brown decision doesn’t come up until half of the book is already complete. The preceding chapters sort of build you up, sets up a framework of laws and culture that help properly understand how very important the Brown decision was. You go from the 14th Amendment to Plessy and then all the way to Brown with a whole lot of stuff happening in between. With almost 100 years of dynamic racial history leading up to Brown, the book properly gives credit to how groundbreaking Brown truly was and how it is, as as result, changed the way America is today.… (mer)