Segregation in America legally began to end with the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, which declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional. This ruling overturned the "separate but equal" doctrine established by Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, which had upheld segregation. However, full legal dismantling of segregation came with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlawed segregation in public places and employment. The enforcement of this law took several years with many court cases. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 further helped to dismantle segregation by protecting voting rights for African Americans. Thus, while segregation began its legal end in 1954, it was effectively ended through persistent civil rights legislation and enforcement by the mid-1960s.
The Jim Crow laws, which mandated segregation in the South from the late 19th century, were systematically overturned starting with the Brown decision and ultimately abolished through civil rights activism and federal legislation in the 1960s. Despite this, social and de facto segregation persisted in some areas for years afterward, but legally mandated segregation ended with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
In summary, segregation ended in legal terms primarily between 1954 and 1965, with the Brown v. Board ruling and the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts marking critical legal milestones in ending segregation in America.
