14th Amendment adopted

On this day in US history, after three-quarters of US states ratified the bill, the 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the US, was passed on July 28, 1868. This bill also included formerly enslaved people, reaffirming the privileges and rights of all citizens. But decades after its adoption, the outcome of the landmark case, Plessy v. Ferguson, allowed the legal segregation of public facilities. This then eventually opened the door to more widespread segregation, to which African Americans suffered decades of debilitating discrimination in the country.