On March 12, 1956, the majority of Southern senators and congressmen joined forces in Washington, D.C., to publicize the “Declaration of Constitutional Principles.” Now known by its more evocative label, the “Southern Manifesto,” this statement denounced the Supreme Court's unanimous decision in Brown vs. Board of Education, which two years earlier had invalidated racial segregation in public schools.

The nation will not celebrate Saturday's 60th anniversary of the Southern Manifesto as it does civil rights victories — and for good reason. But we should not permit this crucial date to pass unacknowledged, because doing so invites the comforting delusion that the mind-set supporting the manifesto has been banished from polite society. Although the Southern Manifesto may seem utterly disconnected from current racial realities, arguments marshaled by its drafters presaged recent developments in the Supreme Court's constitutional doctrine.

To the extent that the manifesto is considered at all today, it is viewed as a furious tirade that peddled the crudest sort of racism in an effort to galvanize segregationist sentiment among white Southerners. The reality of the manifesto, however, complicates this disfiguringly broad portrayal, revealing that the South's congressional delegation was capable of advancing subtle, carefully calibrated legal arguments that were designed to rally national support to its cause.

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