In the case of School District of Omaha et al. v. United States et al., 1976, the U.S Supreme Court ruled on a dispute involving desegregation in public schools. The Omaha school district had been ordered by a lower court to implement measures for racial integration, including busing students across district lines and redrawing attendance zones. However, the school district appealed this decision arguing that it was not responsible for segregation because it did not create or maintain racially discriminatory policies. The Supreme Court upheld the lower court's ruling stating that even if a school board did not intentionally segregate its schools, it still has an affirmative duty to eliminate segregation "root and branch". This means taking active steps towards integration rather than simply refraining from discriminatory practices. This landmark decision reinforced previous rulings such as Brown v Board of Education which declared segregated schooling unconstitutional and clarified that all districts have an obligation to actively pursue desegregation regardless of their historical involvement in creating or maintaining segregated systems.

In the dissenting opinion for School District of Omaha et al. v. United States et al., Justice William J. Brennan Jr., joined by Justices Thurgood Marshall and Byron White, argued that the majority's decision to uphold Nebraska's law mandating busing limits was a departure from established precedent regarding school desegregation cases. They contended that this ruling allowed states to maintain racially segregated schools under the guise of neighborhood schooling and undermined federal efforts to enforce equal educational opportunities for all students regardless of race or ethnicity. The dissenters believed that such state laws were unconstitutional as they perpetuated racial discrimination in public education, contrary to Brown v Board of Education which declared segregation inherently unequal and thus unlawful under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.