A note about examining behavior of the southern courts during the civil rights movement...
It's important to remember that back then, the district courts answered directly to the Supreme Court. As a result, there was no "buffer" between the district courts and the Supreme Court.
Today, the appellate courts act as a buffer between the district courts and the Supreme Court. District courts answer to the
appellate courts' jurisprudence, not that of the Supreme Court. Supreme Court jurisprudence is supposed to become that of the appellate courts, but history shows that to be laughably optimistic (see, e.g.,
Silveira v Lockyer and the
the en banc denial for it, and pay attention especially to the 9th Circuit's definition of "militia" and how it conflicts with the Supreme Court's definition in
Miller).
The very existence of the appellate courts makes possible widespread defiance of the Supreme Court, precisely
because it is appellate court jurisprudence, and not Supreme Court jurisprudence, that district courts are beholden to.