and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, Segregation in higher education, in law schools and graduate programs respectively, violates the Equal Protection Clause. Laid the groundwork for the desegregation of all schools in Brown v. Board of Education, four years later. Decided June 5, 1950 (argued April 4, 1950). Opinion of the Court: Fred M. Vinson → go there Topic: Discrimination based on race and ethnicity. Sweatt v. Painter, 339 U.S. 629 (1950), was a United States Supreme Court case that successfully challenged the "separate but equal" doctrine of racial segregation established by the 1896 case Plessy v. Ferguson. The case was influential in the landmark case of Brown v. Board of Education four years later. Wiki link