ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the fundamental conflict between the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the racial caste system enforced by state segregation laws. It argues that the Equal Protection Clause should reinforce the privileges or immunities clause as a bar to state grants of monopoly power to private persons and firms. Since the Equal Protection Clause was adopted primarily to protect the legal rights of former slaves, the foremost group of cases under the clause have concerned racial segregation. The doctrine of Homer A. Plessy confirmed the constitutionality of a caste society. The economic theory of racial discrimination postulates that there exists a dominating ethnic group in a society and that many of the members of that group have a taste not to associate with members of the other ethnic groups. In theory, the Equal Protection Clause as applied to markets should reinforce the national commerce power in protecting and maintaining a nationwide free economy.
