Despite the best intentions of the drafters of the 14th Amendment, for many years after its ratification in 1868, the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted the amendment so narrowly as to render it almost toothless. One justice who disagreed with this interpretation was Justice John Marshall Harlan. Harlan was the lone dissenter in the Civil Rights Cases of 1883 and Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896. He stated: “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 colorblind and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law.”