The Containment: Detroit, the Supreme Court, and the Battle for Racial Justice in the North

In 1954, the Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling in the case of Brown v. Board of Education, which ruled segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. The integration of schools in the South would proceed in a laborious process, as Jim Crow still maintained a stranglehold. However, a series of cases would develop in the 1960s and 1970s in the North, which illustrated that segregation existed above the Mason-Dixon Line. In the case of Bradley v Milliken (1970), the segregation of Detroit schools would be challenged, particularly concerning how discriminatory housing policies enabled inequality in education. However, the verdict would be appealed to the Supreme Court, where a more conservative and constructionist court overruled the initial ruling. In the decades since, the impact of Brown has been watered down with subsequent judicial challenges (Parents Involved v Seattle, 2006).

The Containment is an overarching and provocative study of how equality in education continues to be fought for in the United States through the courts, legislatures, and the media. Author Michelle Adams has written a riveting work that is both scholarly and yet also impassioned. This book is an important historical work.