The Navy has ordered a significant number of new Arleigh Burke-class Destroyers for its fleet, which will be delivered in the next 10 to 15 years. The aim of this petition is simply to name one of these new ships after US Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan of Kentucky.
Justice Harlan is significant for being the only one opposing the institution of racial segregation in in the 1896 court case Plessy v. Ferguson. In his dissenting opinion, he wrote:
"...in view of the constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law."