The Briggs v. Elliott case of 1951 was a landmark legal battle in the fight against racial segregation in American schools. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of African-American parents and their children residing in Clarendon County, South Carolina who were dissatisfied with the inferior conditions of segregated black schools compared to white ones. They sought an end to segregation, arguing that it violated the "equal protection clause" of the Fourteenth Amendment. However, instead of ending segregation outright, District Court Judge J Waties Waring ruled for "separate but equal" facilities which led to improvements in black school buildings and buses without desegregating them. This decision did not satisfy those seeking full equality and they appealed to higher courts leading eventually to Brown v Board Education where racial segregation was declared unconstitutional.

The Briggs v. Elliott case did not have a dissenting opinion as it was decided by the U.S District Court for the Eastern District of South Carolina, which ruled in favor of segregation. The court held that so long as facilities were equal, racial segregation was constitutional under the "separate but equal" doctrine established by Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). However, this decision was later appealed to and overturned by the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), where it unanimously declared that separate educational facilities are inherently unequal and thus violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.