THE DOCTRINE OF «SEPARATED BUT EQUAL» OPPORTUNITIES IN DECISIONS                                  OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE USA ON ARGUMENTS ABOUT HIGHER EDUCATION 

Nikolaev Boris Viktorovich, Candidate of historical sciences, associate professor, sub-department of legal disciplines, Penza State University (40 Krasnaya street, Penza, Russia), nikolboris@yandex.ru
Emelin Mikhail Yur'evich, Postgraduate student, Penza State University (40 Krasnaya street, Penza, Russia), mikhemelin@yandex.ru 

340.143 (73) 

Background. Changes in the system of higher education, the need to ensure equal rights to higher education without discrimination necessitate the study of international experience to ensure equality in the system of higher education. One of the traditional and at the same time, actual problems in the U.S. higher education system is the problem of racial and national equality and the overcoming of discriminatory theory and practice, in particular the doctrine of the «separated but equal». The goal of the study is to analyze the genesis of this doctrine in practice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Materials and methods. Implementation of the research objectives was achieved on the basis of the analysis of the main decisions of the Supreme Court of the USA, in which there is substantiation, development, and then the denial of the doctrine of the «separated but equal». A special place in the framework of this study is taken by the case Plessy vs. Ferguson, Sipuel vs. Board of Regents, McLaurin vs. Board of Regents of the State of Oklahoma, Sweet vs. Paintner, Brown vs. Board of Education. Methodology includes the methods of comparative and historical legal analysis, which allows to compare the contents and implications for the development of the theory and practice of legal regulation of landmark decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court based on the specific historical circumstances of their adoption.
Results. The formation and development of the doctrine of «separated but equal» in the decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court has been investigated; the basis of the revealed discriminatory nature of this theory and practice has been analyzed; the causes and conditions of its termination in the U.S. Supreme Court decisions has been considered.
Conclusions. Examination of the decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court allows to realize the reasons, the grounds and contents of the doctrine of the «separated but equal», and reveal its discriminatory essence, to determine that education has become one of the most important fields of application of this doctrine, and then its abolition, to take into account the foreign experience in the provision of national and racial equality in order to ensure genuine equality in the sphere of higher education in our country. 

the U.S. Supreme Court, racial discrimination, higher education in the USA, judicial doctrine. 

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