Civil Rights and Public Policy
Chapter 6
Introduction

Civil Rights
– Definition: Policies designed to protect people
against arbitrary or discriminatory treatment by
government officials or individuals.

Racial Discrimination
 Gender Discrimination
 Discrimination based on age, disability,
sexual orientation and other factors
Two Centuries of Struggle

Conceptions of Equality
– Equal opportunity
– Equal results

Early American Views of
Equality
 The Constitution and
Inequality
– 14th Amendment: “…equal
protection of the laws.”
– Strict scrutiny- must be
compelling purpose for the
discrimination to be
constitutional
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy

The Era of Slavery
– Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857)
– The Civil War
– The Thirteenth Amendment

The Era of Reconstruction
and Resegregation
– Jim Crow laws
– Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy

The Era of Civil Rights
– Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
– Court ordered integration and busing of
students
– Civil Rights Act of 1964



Made racial discrimination illegal in many areas
Created EEOC
Strengthened voting right legislation
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy

Percentage of Black Students Attending School With Whites in
Southern States (Figure 5.1)
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy

Getting and Using the Right
To Vote
– Suffrage: The legal right to
vote.
– Fifteenth Amendment:
Extended suffrage to African
Americans
– Poll Taxes: Small taxes levied
on the right to vote.
– White Primary: Only whites
were allowed to vote in the
party primaries.
Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy

Getting and Using the Right To Vote
– Smith v. Allwright (1944): ended white
primaries.
– Twenty-fourth Amendment: Eliminated poll
taxes for federal elections.
– Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections
(1966): no poll taxes at all.
– Voting Rights Act of 1965: Helped end formal
and informal barriers to voting.

Race, the Constitution, and
Public Policy
Other Minority Groups
– Native Americans
 Santa Clara Pueblo v. Martinez (1978)
 Applied Bill of Rights to tribes
– Hispanic Americans
 Mexican American Legal Defense and Education
Fund
 Texas v. Hernandez (1954)-Mexican Americans
were a "special class" entitled to equal protection
under the Fourteenth Amendment.
– Asian Americans
 Korematsu v. United States (1944)
 Finding Executive Order 9066- to be constitutional
Stop lecture
Women, the
Constitution, and
Public Policy

The Battle for the Vote
– Nineteenth Amendment: Extended suffrage to women
in 1920.

The “Doldrums”: 1920-1960
– Laws were designed to protect women, and protect men
from competition with women.

The Second Feminist Wave
– Reed v. Reed (1971)
– Supreme Court ruled that the administrators of estates
cannot be named in a way that discriminates between
sexes.
– Title IX Act of 1972- prohibits gender discrimination
in federally subsidized education programs, including
athletics
Women, the Constitution,
and Public Policy

The Second Feminist Wave, continued
– Craig v. Boren (1976)
– Draft is not discriminatory

Women in the Workplace Wage Discrimination and Comparable
Worth-Adkins v. Children’s Hospital (1923): In this case, the Supreme Court
held that a federal law establishing a minimum wage for women was
unconstitutional.

Women in the Military


United States v. Virginia (1996): The Supreme Court ruled 7-1 against the Virginia
Military Institute’s male-only admissions policy.
Executive order to look into allowing women to fight (2012)

Sexual Harassment-
Newly Active Groups Under the
Civil Rights Umbrella

Civil Rights and the Graying of America
 Civil Rights and People With Disabilities
– Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990

Gay and Lesbian Rights
– Bowers v. Hardwick (1986) Georgia sodomy law
criminalizing oral and anal sex in private between
consenting adults when applied to homosexuals upheld in court
– Lawrence v. Texas (2003)
– Texas law was unconstitutional-right to privacy due
process clause-overturned Bowers v. Hardwick
Newly Active Groups Under the
Civil Rights Umbrella
Affirmative Action

Definition:
– A policy designed to give special
attention to or compensatory treatment of
members of some previously
disadvantaged group.


A move towards equal results?
Regents of the University of
California v. Bakke (1978)
 It bars quota systems in college
admissions but affirms the
constitutionality of affirmative action
programs giving equal access to
minorities.
 Adarand Constructors v. Pena (1995)
 Can companies be given preferential
treatment if fall under racial or gender
equality?
Understanding Civil Rights
and Public Policy

Civil Rights and Democracy
– Equality favors majority rule.
– Suffrage gave many groups political
power.

Civil Rights and the Scope of
Government
– Civil rights laws increase the size of
government.
– Civil rights protect individuals.
California Issues with Civil
rights

Mendez v. Westminster (1947)- schools
cannot segregate students based on
racial/national origins (brown vs. board of
education)
 Perez v. Sharp (1948)- their should be no
state law that bars people of different
national/racial origins from marriage (loving
v. Virginia
Current issues up for debate

Due process of law
 Gender discrimination
 Sexual orientation
 Disabilities
 Right to privacy-due process