Timeline: Landmark Desegregation Cases

Legal rulings breaking down the walls of segregation have reshaped the makeup of America's public schools in ways that continue to change and resonate throughout the nation's school districts.

Federal courts continue to grapple with issues of school segregation in a legal arc that extends back decades. The U.S. Supreme Court, in particular, has issued a chain of high-impact, often controversial rulings from 1954’s Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka forward, and has seen its jurisprudence on the issue evolve over time in ways that still roil the legal landscape. Explore these historic cases in more detail in this interactive timeline.

A version of this article appeared in the May 14, 2014 edition of Education Week