ABSTRACT
Freedom in the post-Civil War South was quite fragile, and higher education did not insulate one from sociopolitical hegemony. e Reconstruction Era, while aording greater social, economic, and political freedoms, was also quite violent. Even the famed Wizard of Tuskegee and White House Advisor, Booker T. Washington, could not escape White supremacist violence and was attacked while visiting a friend at home in New York (The Crisis, 1911; Harlan, 1983). is chapter begins with a discussion of the legal status of Blacks aer the Civil War, highlighting the Supreme Court precedent of Plessy v. Ferguson and the implications for state-sanctioned racial segregation. is ruling not only impacted Blacks but Native, Asian, and Latino/a Americans as equal citizenship privileges at the time varied by state law. While not directly referenced in the Court’s opinion, the social scientic theory of that day, eugenics, and contemporary outgrowths bolstered biodeterminism, the idea of race as destiny. e combination of legal precedent and pseudoscientic theory together reinforced that racial castes are more complex than Black and White, and justify racial segregation in higher education. e discussion then turns towards the Progressive Era and the quest to dismantle separate but equal. It is a quest centered in the eld of higher education, a battle both in the courts and in the halls of academe.
