Roberts v. City of Boston - Abiel Smith School
The Abiel Smith School represents the pivotal point in legally mandated school segregation when the Massachusetts Supreme Court established the separate but equal principle in Roberts v. City of Boston (1849). This principle directly influenced the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) that allowed separate but equal under the Constitution. Located in a pre-civil war free black community, and part of the Boston African American National Historic Site, Smith School was the all-black school associated with this first legal challenge to school segregation. Boston African American - Abiel Smith School: www.nps.gov
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