Certainly, there was great tension in the ranks when racial integration became the order of the day, especially at bases in the still legally segregated South.

The majority decision in the case of Plessy v. Ferguson established a new judicial idea in America - the concept of "separate but equal," meaning states could legally segregate races in public accommodations, such as railroad cars and public schools.

A result of newly promised settlement talks is likely to influence similar cases that the Justice Department is overseeing in Alabama, Tennessee and Louisiana, which, like Mississippi, legally segregated higher educational institutions into the 1960's.

From the 1870s to the end of the 19th century, southern states reinforced a system of white supremacy by legally segregating blacks from whites using legislation.

These states changed markedly from the 1890s through the 1950s, as two waves of the Great Migration led more than 6.5 million blacks to abandon the economically depressed, legally segregated Deep South in search of better job opportunities and living conditions, first in Northern and Midwestern industrial cities, and later west to California.

Unlike the southern states, Utahns had never legally segregated their schools, colleges, or universities.