In the 1928 case of Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railway v. White, Administrator et al., the U.S Supreme Court was tasked with determining whether a state law that required railroads to provide separate but equal accommodations for black and white passengers violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The railway company argued that it did because it imposed an undue burden on interstate commerce by requiring them to rearrange their cars based on racial segregation laws in different states. However, after consideration, the court ruled against this argument stating that such requirements were within a state's police power and did not violate any constitutional rights or interfere unduly with interstate commerce as long as they were applied equally without discrimination between races.

In the dissenting opinion for Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railway v. White, it was argued that the Tennessee statute in question did not violate due process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment as majority opined. The dissenters believed that states have a right to regulate businesses within their borders and protect their citizens from harm or unfair practices by corporations operating therein. They contended that this law merely required railroads to provide equal facilities for both black and white passengers - an obligation already imposed on them by federal laws against racial discrimination in public accommodations. Thus, they saw no constitutional infringement here but rather a legitimate exercise of state power aimed at ensuring social justice and equality among its residents regardless of race or color.