Ferguson, as well as the majority of The Supreme Court, argued that the Separate Car Act was not violating Mr. Plessy's !3th or 14th Amendment rights. They both said that Louisiana could make it's own rules concerning Railroads as long as they ran within state boarders. They also said that the 14th Amendment only applied to the actions of the government and not to the actions of individual states.

Homer Plessy argued that The Separate Car act violated his 13th and 14th amendment Rights. He said that his 13th amendment rights were violated because he was being forced into involuntary servitude by being forced to sit in a train car that he didn't wish to. HE said that his 14th Amendment rights were denied because the laws separating blacks and whites in public facilities like those of the Louisiana Railroad, made blacks inferior to whites because the quality of the black facilities was of much poorer quality than those of the whites.

Although Mr. Plessy lost his Supreme Court case in 1896 and the seven Justices through away his argument, he was spreading is ideas of true equality and his name was known nationwide for standing up for true equality and against the injustices of segregation.

On the morning of Tuesday, June 7, 1892 a man named Homer Plessy bought a first class ticket to Covington and boarded the all white passenger car on the East Lousiana railroad. While the train was departing, Mr. Plessy was approached by a white railroad officail and was demanded to move from the white passenger car to the black passenger car.

Mr. Plessy was asked to move to the black passenger car because he was one eighth African American. Later, in years to come he became the face of the movement to abolish segregation laws. He took his argument to the supreme court in 1896, just four years after his arrest that sparked the start of a nationwide recognition of the inequality in the separate but equal doctrine.