Today, Tom's guest is Steve Luxenberg, a longtime associate editor at The Washington Post. His latest book, Separate: The Story of Plessy v. Ferguson, and America’s Journey from Slavery to Segregation, chronicles the events that led up to the landmark 1896 Supreme Court ruling.In 1892, Homer Plessy, a young black musician who often passed for white, boarded a train in New Orleans, and was arrested when he sat in the whites-only railway car. His arrest formed the basis of a Supreme Court challenge to the Louisiana Separate Car Act, a state law that segregated black and white people while riding the train. The Court’s decision, four years later, enshrined in American law the ----separate but equal---- doctrine. It wasn’t until 60 years later, in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education case, that the doctrine of “separate but equal” was repudiated by the Court. Tonight at 7 p.m. Steve will be discussing his book with Judge Robert M. Bell, the former chief judge of the Maryland Court of Appeals. The event is part of the Open Society Institute's ----Talking About Race---- series and will be held at the Church of the Redeemer in Baltimore. For more details about tonight's event, click here.We live-streamed this conversation on WYPR's Facebook page. Watch the video here.

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