Which Supreme Court case established the 'separate but equal' doctrine?

• A. Plessy v. Ferguson
• B. Brown v. Board of Education
• C. Dred Scott v. Sandford
• D. Marbury v. Madison

Answer: (A)

The main concept being tested is where the "separate but equal" idea came from in U.S. law. The correct answer is a late 19th-century Supreme Court decision that upheld racial segregation by allowing separate facilities for black and white Americans as long as they were equal in quality. This ruling gave legal cover to Jim Crow laws and the system of state-imposed racial segregation across the South for many decades. The other cases don’t establish this doctrine: one case addressed whether enslaved people could be citizens and property rights under the Constitution, another created the principle of judicial review, and a later case (Brown v. Board of Education) actually rejected the idea that separate facilities could be equal.