Customer Reviews

Simple Justice: The History of Brown v. Board of Education and Black America's Struggle for Equality

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This is the most thorough book you will read on Brown v. Board of Education. Kluger makes an attentive reader of his work a modest authority on the subject. You had better be very interested in the topic, however, as he leaves no stone unturned. Kluger writes not as a lawyer or historian but as a journalist who is witness to the multitude of events which he depicts.

Besides the numerous civil rights leaders and soldiers the reader encounters, the author provides an intimate account of Supreme Court justices and the process of decision-making. This proves to be the most compelling aspect of the book.

It's required reading for every social revolutionary.

A quarter of a century after it was first published, "Simple Justice" still has the power to move, enrage and touch the hearts of anyone who believes that justice ultimately prevails.

It should be required reading in any college U.S. history course because it shines an intense spotlight on the complex development of legal issues and thinking that produced the end of segregation in the United States.

I do not exaggerate when I say I believe that this is the best history book I've ever read. Further, it's wise to read it now, because an awful lot of the people instrumental in the ultimate decision, Brown vs. the Board of Education, are dying out. The late Thurgood Marshall is a great example of a lost legal talent and courageous leader who did the right thing by all Americans by winning this case. Read this book now, if only so you'll recognize the heroes in their obituaries.

What Richard Kluger has done in this account is spell out the development first of segregation, telling us just who and how the dreaded Jim Crow laws came about-including segregation laws in the North-and then walk us through how, piece by piece, legal decisions were strung together to put an end to legal segregation.

I grew up in the 1960s and 1970s and, if I thought about it at all, had the idea that the Brown decision had more or less come out of nowhere. Eventually, I began to catch on, and then I read this book. If you are similar-minded, this book will set you straight and point you to the many unsung heroes who have made us a fairer country, in line with the ideals that helped found this country. If you're a parent looking for good role models, forget sports and entertainment. Look to this book for examples of people who literally risked everything, and often paid dearly, to do the right thing. They didn't shrink from the challenge; they stepped forward, many many times. That so many others did not only reminds us of how fearful we are to force change or risk our own well being to tackle injustice. I wish I could rate it higher.

There are some books that every American needs to read in order to be a responsible citizen; this is one of those books. (The only other that comes to mind right now is "The Federalist Papers.")

"Simple Justice" is really two books in one: the first deals with the horrific institution of slavery in the United States and the post-Civil War oppression of blacks in the form of Jim Crow laws; the second deals with the strategy that desegregationists (principally the NAACP) used to dismantle the formal apartheid of the South.

Evaluated solely on its subject matter, this book would merit the requirement of being read. The story of how Thurgood Marshall (then a top NAACP attorney, later U.S. Solicitor General, then U.S. Supreme Court Justice) chipped away at the "separate but equal" doctrine in small steps gives the reader an appreciation of how entrenched institutional racism was as recently as the mid-20th Century. In addition, the reader will gain an understanding of how what is arguably the most important decision of the Supreme Court of the 1900s came about.

But there's another reason to read "Simple Justice." Richard Kluger is an amazingly gifted writer (for proof, try reading the first chapter of "Ashes to Ashes," his monumental work on the tobacco industry; even if you don't smoke, his description of smoking in the first chapter will have you feeling the smoke go down your throat), and his powerful prose makes you feel the pain that his characters endured as a result of slavery and Jim Crow laws.

By no means is this is a "fun" book to read; indeed, parts of it are incredibly unpleasant to read and will make you ashamed to be an American (unless, of course, you're John Rocker). But it's precisely because Kluger is able to evoke such shame that makes this book so important.

I am taking the time to write a review of this book simply because I consider it the best non-fiction book I have ever read. (And no, I am not a friend or relative of the author.)

The topic is an important topic, but that is not what made this book special for me. What made it special is the narrative style employed by Kluger that makes this book read like a novel. It engaged me and pulled me through to see how the story turned out. (Not the Court Case, I knew that result; but what I didn't know was how the case impacted each of the individual actors. It was a life changing event for all of them and Kluger explores this in detail.)

Since its publication, my little law firm has given a copy of this book to each of my law-student research clerks upon graduation. If they do follow in my footsteps and champion civil rights causes, it is indispensible survival equipment. If it has the same effect on them it did on me when I kept my nightly appointments with it in 1980, it will orient them within the history in which they will play a part, show them how hard work and careful planning can let them face powerful opponents cheerfully, and inspire them to believe that, yes, they can make a difference.

Better than any biography on any of the characters involved in the many cases leading up to the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Dramatically will increase your understanding of civil rights history. The best legal analysis and historical depiction of the Brown decision. A compelling read.

This book should have gotten a Pulitzer but did not. It is not easy reading by any means, but it is deeply significant to any student of law, sociology, history, or education. As an attorney myself, I marvelled at the depth of research he did, but as a reader I also enjoyed the very readable style of language used. It is very long, very detailed, and at times, very strident. I have recommended it often, and cited it in my own work in education law. I consider it a standard work all serious scholars and educated readers should own. $20.00 makes it a steal considering how good it really is!

Richard Kluger's Simple Justice was not only one of the most detailed, but also most interesting books I have read on history/political science. Although I feel that I'm more aware than the average white American in regard to the current economic and ethnic social disparities in the US, and also thought I was reasonably knowledgeable in regard to the civil rights struggle in the US, this book taught me a great deal.

I found part I of Kulger's book "Under the Color of Law" very interesting. One of the things of interest to me was how people during that time, both black and white, thought about the issues. I don't mean the hardcore abolitionists, or `civil rights-soldiers' so much as the common white and black man, and also those political leaders, including the more powerful ones like President Lincoln who were somewhat more indirectly involved in the changes that eventually started to take place.

Tom Anderson
Anderson Analytics, LLC

The 1954 Supreme Court Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education decision was, according to Richard Kluger in Simple Justice, one of the high court's single most important rulings. This decision invalidated the ruling in the 1896 Plessy vs. Ferguson case that held that segregated facilities were acceptable as long they were "separate but equal." The court also overruled a lower court ruling that the Topeka schools were substantially equal and hence constitutional.

In reaching its decision the court found that it was inconclusive if the original framers of the 14th Amendment intended to outlaw segregation in educational facilities. Actually, it is clear from the historical record that the authors of the 14th Amendment did not intend banning such segregation. The court also took the attitude that social circumstances had changed regarding the role of public education since 1896 so much that the court simply could not be held by the Plessy ruling any more. The court also took the position that segregation was inherently harmful to minority groups.

Another related case to Brown was the Bolling case regarding school segregation in the District of Columbia. In this case, the court held that the 5th Amendment applied to racial segregation. In the Brown and Bolling decisions, the court held that referees should be appointed by the lower courts to supervise the end of segregation.

The court decisions in the Brown and Bolling cases were written in very brief texts. They failed to convincingly explain to a skeptical public just why it was that segregation was unconstitutional. They also did not quote the lone dissenter in the Plessy decision, John Marshall Harlan, on just why segregation was inherently unconstitutional.

The content of the actual court rulings reveal that the justices failed to properly understand the evility of segregation. This showed a basic ignorance of the justices of the effects of racism upon minorities. The record also shows that Chief Justice Earl Warren prized public relations over doing his duty. Additionally, in an effort for an unanimous decision, the actual ruling in Brown was severely watered down. By doing so, the court inadvertently signaled the segregationists that it really was not serious about enforcing equality in the land. The end result was that a decade later, there was little real progress made towards racial integration in the Deep South.

As the above shows, Kluger's volume about Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education contains plenty of sharp opinions about the Brown case and its true role in the history of American race relations.
Kluger's book is also an invaluable source of information about the folks who actually filed the historic lawsuits in the first place.

Kluger's book also contains masterful character sketches of the leading figures behind the historic Supreme Court decisions. One of these heroes was the flawed Earl Warren who had earlier supported the mass detainment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

The principal hero in Kluger's mind, is Thurgood Marshall. Marshall was a tireless crusader for civil rights. Marshall had been the head of the NAACP's legal division since 1938. Initially, Marshall refrained from contronting the Plessy decision head on because he realized that doing so would be counter productive. That being the case, Marshall endeavored to win victories for minorities within the separate but equal guidelines. This strategy resulted in a string of victories that encouraged Marshall to challenge the Plessy ruling.

Unlike most other authors of books about the history of civil rights, Kluger does not laud Marshall for being a latter day saint. Kluger's portrait of Marshall is both fair and balanced and takes note of Marshall's flaws.

Simple Justice is a classic work about civil rights history and as such should be required reading in American History classes.

This book is eloquently written and covers a great deal of history in a very gripping report. Kluger has researched a great deal of information and presents an interesting argument. I'd also suggest Orfield's Dismantling Desegregation and Perry's Young, Gifted, and Black.

One forewarning about Kluger's book is that the binding is terrible. I read this book as a part of a class, and everyone had chunks of pages falling out of the book. You will want to keep this gem of a book as together as possible!