On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court launched the modern quest for racial equality in America when it struck down public school segregation in Brown v. Board of Education. That quest has developed slowly into a controversy about the meaning of civil rights and the idea of equality-a controversy that contin- ues to inject itself into our politics today.
After the Civil War, black leaders and civil-rights advocates generally believed that the law should make no distinctions on the basis of race....