Republican legislator Henry Demas from St John the Baptist Parish challenged the bill as coming from the "ranks of Democratic Senators who pandered to the needs of the lower classes".
An editorial in The Daily Picayune of New Orleans spoke of "almost unanimous demand on the party of White people of the State for the enactment of the law" which would "increase the comfort for the traveling public".
On February 24, Desdunes bought a first-class ticket and boarded a designated White car on the Louisiana and Nashville Railroad from New Orleans to Montgomery, Alabama.
Desdune's case never went to trial because the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled on May 25 in the unrelated Abbott v. Hicks that the Separate Car Act did not apply to interstate passengers,[2] rendering the test moot.
[10] On June 7, 1892 Plessy purchased a first-class ticket to take him from New Orleans to Covington on the East Louisiana Railroad, this time both destinations being within the state.
Finally, the case ended in the Supreme Court of the United States in Plessy v. Ferguson with the judgment being upheld, leading to the judicial sanction of "separate but equal".