In Plessy v. Ferguson, (1896), the Supreme Court of the United States ruled against Homer Adolph Plessy's claim of his right to travel in the first-class railroad car from New Orleans to Covington, Louisiana. Plessy, was a French-speaking Creole (Haitian refugees who ran away from the Toussaint L'Ouverture revolution), and shoemaker from New Orleans. The Supreme Court ratified the constitutionality of the Separate Car Act, enacted in Louisiana in 1890, which required railway companies to assign black and white travelers "equal but separate" wagons.
