Parents Involved and the Struggle for Historical Memory­

In his Jerome Hall Lecture, Professor Tushnet addresses the legacy of Brown v. Board of Education in the more recent case of Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School Dist. No. 1 (PICS), which struck down the voluntary school integration programs used in Seattle and Louisville. As Chief Justice Roberts wrote, an important “debate” in the PICS case was over “which side is more faithful to the heritage” of Brown v. Board of Education. That debate is part of what historians have called the struggle for historical memory.

The politics of memory in PICS is not simply a struggle over what Brown “really meant,” it is also a struggle over the merits of contending positions in today’s constitutional law.