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Syracuse University SURFACE Writing Program – Dissertations College of Arts and Sciences 5-2013 (re)Constructing a Landmark: A Rhetorical Analysis of Brown v Board of Education at Fifty Christine A. Geyet Syracuse University Follow this and additional works at: https://surface.syr.edu/wp_etd Part of the Rhetoric Commons Recommended Citation Geyet, Christine A., "(re)Constructing a Landmark: A Rhetorical Analysis of Brown v Board of Education at Fifty" (2013). Writing Program – Dissertations. 35. https://surface.syr.edu/wp_etd/35 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Arts and Sciences at SURFACE. It has been accepted for inclusion in Writing Program – Dissertations by an authorized administrator of SURFACE. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ABSTRACT This dissertation examines the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case on the occasion of its fiftieth anniversary with emphasis on its civic and social rhetorical functions. The analysis focuses on the two week period leading up to the fiftieth anniversary and the dedication of the Brown v Board of Education National Historic Site in Topeka. Data was gathered from various web sites related to the National Historic Site and the events in Topeka on the weekend it was dedicated, and from database records of national and international news sources. These materials were analyzed in three categories beginning with the Site itself and moving outward from Topeka to the national media response. The author argues that Brown functions in two ways that rival its function as law: first, as a tool of statecraft, a symbolic representation of America’s highest ideals around which community is built through epideictic performances; and second as a dialectic, a proposition around which there continues to be an asynchronous conversation on how to achieve, or continue to move toward, the promise of Brown. Understanding the reconstruction of Brown at its fiftieth anniversary and the continued need for rhetorical efforts to bring about its promises underscores the value of studying Judicial rhetoric from a rhetorical perspective, both to understand its civic and social function and to recognize the limits of law to achieve social change. (re)Constructing a Landmark: A Rhetorical Analysis of Brown v. Board of Education At Fifty A Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy in Composition and Cultural Rhetoric Christine A. Geyer May 2013 Copyright © Christine A. Geyer 2013 All Rights Reserved Table of Contents 1. “For the Better and Forever”: Brown Turns 50 1 2. A Landmark for the Landmark Case: The Brown v Board of 31 Education National Historic Site 3. Praising Athenians in Topeka 64 4. Of Folkways and Stateways: Brown as Dialectic 100 5. The Available Means: Brown as Agency 138 6. Works Cited 168 iv 1 Chapter One: “For the Better and Forever”: Brown Turns 50 On Monday, May 17, 2004, President George W. Bush traveled to Topeka, Kansas, the first time a sitting president had visited the city in a decade. Although it was an election year, Bush was not making a campaign stop. He was there to speak at the opening and dedication of the Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site, an event that drew many national leaders as well as thousands of visitors. Earlier in the day, Kansas governor Kathleen Sebilius held a proclamation ceremony on the steps of the Kansas Statehouse, with Senator John Kerry, then the presumptive Democratic candidate for president, speaking after her. This marked the first time presidential candidates from both maJor political parties had ever visited Topeka during an election year, let alone on the same day. Many other national political and civil rights leaders were present, along with thousands of visitors and resident spectators, for a day of commemorative ceremonies all focused on the landmark decision known as Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. The dedication of the Brown v Board of Education National Historic Site was timed to coincide nearly to the minute with the fiftieth anniversary of the decision’s announcement in the Supreme Court in 1954. It constituted the high point of a year-long series of events commemorating the original decision and sparking a widespread conversation about the decision, its legacy, and its meaning for the future in both academic and public forums. One such event took place at Syracuse University in April, Just a month before the dedication weekend in Topeka. Throughout the daylong conference, panels and discussion groups focused on the historical events leading up to the original decision, the role of the attorneys and social scientists in the case, the progress made toward equality in 2 education and racial Justice at all levels of American society, and individual experiences in the post-Brown society. The keynote address featured Linda Brown and Cheryl Brown Henderson, daughters of Oliver L. Brown, who became the lead and named plaintiff in the Brown case. The Brown sisters visited many events that year, both to discuss the impact of the decision on their family and to further the mission of The Brown Foundation for Educational Equity, Excellence and Research, which they helped establish as a “living tribute” to the plaintiffs and attorneys in the Brown decision (About). The conference events at Syracuse read as a microcosm of the hundreds of newspaper articles, historical displays, re-enactments and other events that took place that spring. Earlier in the year, Bush had declared the theme of National Law Day for 2004 to be “To Win Equality by Law: Brown v. Board of Education at 50,” and bar association luncheons across the country featured a range of speakers from members of the original legal team to contemporary Judges to the Brown sisters discussing the history and impact of the Brown decision. The Library of Congress opened a special six-month long commemorative exhibition called “With An Even Hand: Brown v. Board at 50.” The opening included a series of lectures, concerts and films focused not just on the Brown decision, but also on the civil rights movement as a whole. The AARP, one of the sponsors of the exhibit, marked the year with its “Voices of the Civil Rights ProJect,” an oral history proJect that would become a permanent part of the Library of Congress collection on its completion. NPR radio host Tavis Smiley broadcast his show live from the Turpin Lamb Theater at Morgan State University in Maryland, interviewing members of the original legal team, contemporary legal scholars and other civil rights activists. Law schools held conferences to assess the progress made toward equality in education and racial Justice at all levels of 3 American society. Surviving members of the original legal team published memoirs, while contemporary legal scholars convened to re-write the Opinion to what they thought it should have said. In the composition and rhetoric field, Catherine Prendergast won a national book award for her analysis of Brown and its role in literacy achievement, while another group of rhetoric scholars led by Clarke Rountree published a collection of essays discussing the role rhetoric played in Brown, from its roots in the nineteenth century decision in Plessy v. Ferguson through the 1957 decision in Cooper v. Aaron. In the week before the anniversary date, major newspapers across the country carried special sections detailing the history of the case and offering contemporary opinions on the state of education and racial equality. Not all of the publicity was positive. A New Yorker article asked “Did Brown Matter?” (Sunsten). A series of books published that year carried titles expressing disappointment with the outcome of Brown, using phrases like “unfinished agenda” (Anderson and Byrne), “unfinished legacy” (Rhode and Ogletree), “troubled legacy” (Patterson) and “unfulfilled hope” (Bell). Many writers decried the degree of segregation that existed, although not by force of law, in schools all through the country. Some newspapers ran extensive feature stories describing the challenges and inequalities still existing long after Brown was decided. Others took the occasion to remark on social and economic inequality in America, and many walked the fine line between recognition for the great promises of Brown and the lack of achievement toward those goals. Even in the speeches in Topeka, these phrases are often repeated as the speakers differentiated between the achievement the decision represents and the actualization of that achievement. 4 This project took shape in response to the disparity in these responses to Brown’s fiftieth anniversary. It began late in 2002, when the College of Law at Syracuse University invited Bell to give a lecture based on his forthcoming book. In his lecture that day, titled “The Mesmerizing Effects of Racial Landmark Cases,” Bell explained why he had come to believe that Brown v. Board of Education had been wrongly decided, how his thinking had changed from his early career as a civil rights lawyer. He said the problem with decisions such as Brown was they mesmerized people into believing that because the Supreme Court had ruled, the problem was solved; an assessment that Brown’s first fifty years clearly showed, by his reckoning, to be incorrect. By the spring of 2004, Bell’s disappointment was being echoed in several places, including remarks made during Syracuse University’s commemorative day, when Professors Linda Carty and Paula Johnson offered their reflections on the decision and its history, concluding that they were “less inclined to celebrate this 50th anniversary of the decision, than to commemorate the significance of what it could still mean for this society.” Initially, I wanted to understand this disappointment, to see why so many believed Brown had fallen short. Eventually, this led to the larger question of why anyone expected Brown, or any other Supreme Court decision, to accomplish so much in the realm of social change.

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