Washington University Journal of Law & Policy Volume 46 Emerging Ideas in Law 2015 The Far-Reaching Shadow Cast By Ferguson Kimberly J. Norwood Washington University School of Law Follow this and additional works at: https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/law_journal_law_policy Part of the Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons, Law and Race Commons, and the Law and Society Commons Recommended Citation Kimberly J. Norwood, The Far-Reaching Shadow Cast By Ferguson, 46 WASH. U. J. L. & POL’Y 001 (2015), https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/law_journal_law_policy/vol46/iss1/7 This Essay is brought to you for free and open access by the Law School at Washington University Open Scholarship. It has been accepted for inclusion in Washington University Journal of Law & Policy by an authorized administrator of Washington University Open Scholarship. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Washington University Journal of Law & Policy The Far-Reaching Shadow Cast By Ferguson Kimberly Jade Norwood In the opinion of the court, the legislation and histories of the times, and the language used in the Declaration of Independence, show, that neither the class of persons who had been imported as slaves, nor their descendants, whether they had become free or not, were then acknowledged as a part of the people, nor intended to be included in the general words used in [the Constitution of the United States]. They had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect .