Steve Luxenberg is the author of "Separate: The Story of Plessy v. Ferguson, and America's Journey from Slavery to Segregation" and the critically acclaimed "Annie’s Ghosts: A Journey into a Family Secret." During his thirty years as a Washington Post senior editor, he has overseen reporting that has earned numerous national honors, including two Pulitzer Prizes.
Plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court case synonymous with “separate but equal,” created remarkably little stir when the justices announced their near-unanimous decision on May 18, 1896. Yet it is one of the most compelling and dramatic stories of the nineteenth century, whose outcome embraced and protected segregation, and whose reverberations are still felt into the twenty-first. "Separate" spans a striking range of characters and landscapes, bound together by the defining issue of their time and ours: race and equality.
