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Removing a Badge of Slavery: The Record of Brown v. Board of Education, edited by Mark Whitman. Princeton, NJ & New York: Markus Wiener, 1993. 357 pp. $49.95, cloth.
With this year marking the 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, Removing a Badge of Slavery is appropriate reading for persons interested in the history of this momentous event. Although this book is directed at a general audience, even those readers who are already familiar with the events surrounding the Brown decision will find it informative.
A significant portion of this work is dedicated to presenting edited texts of many of the most important documents associated with Brown, including excerpts from court opinions, trial transcripts, litigants' briefs, legislative and administrative documents, and scholarly research. As Whitman notes in his introductory remarks: "I have tried...to let the record of Brown speak for itself in this book to the greatest degree possible" (p. vii). While perhaps the most intriguing portions of the book are the documents associated with Brown, readers will find the sections written by Whitman interesting, enlightening, and reflective of a thorough understanding of the issues involved in this monumental case. Many readers will no doubt differ with Whitman regarding his choices in editing cases and other documents; others may wish that he had included more of the original texts. Nonetheless, he has accomplished a more than satisfactory job of reducing an immense amount of relevant material down to a single volume and many will appreciate his concise editing.
After an informative introductory section, part one focuses on the forebears of Brown. It begins with the record of the 1849 case of Roberts v. City of Boston, in which Massachusetts Supreme Court Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw articulated the rule of separate but equal and "was the first...