CHAPTER 16
Two concepts of Equality
a. equality of opportunity: everyone should have the
same CHANCE to succeed
b. equality of outcome: Everyone should succeed and the
government should re-distribute the
wealth (requires more gov’t involvement)
Invidious discrimination:- HARMFUL
Civil Rights: powers and privileges GUARANTEED to the individual
Civil War Amendments: 13, 14, and 15
1866 laws were made in response to the “black codes”
Some forms of this act are still in effect today
1. All Americans can make and enforce contracts
2. All Americans can sue others in court
3. All Americans have the right to inherit, purchase, sell and
hold or convey property
Although congress enacted these laws, the SC weakened some of those
rights
A. 1883 the court struck down the Civil Rights Act of 1875 that
dealt with:
The National Government could prohibit only national government action
that discriminated against blacks, private acts of discrimination or acts of
omission by a STATE were beyond the reach of the national government.
= States could do whatever they wanted when it came to discrimination
Racism: Belief of inherent differences among races and one race is
superior to another
Poll Tax: A tax imposed on a voter
Racial Segregation: segregation of blacks and whites
Plessy v. Ferguson:
a. separate but equal
NAACP: tries to dismantle school segregation
Few SC decisions gave hope to the end of racial segregation but the case
below was an exception:
1935 Lloyd Gaines applied to the all white University of
Missouri Law School
1938 the SC ruled he must be admitted
Heman Sweat from TX took his case to the SC, because the
state only offered him two rooms in a building with
two black lawyers as his teachers. He refused.
George McLaurin: University of Oklahoma admits him on a
segregated basis
In 1950 the SC ruled on Sweat and McLaurin and found:
Both schools must give them full student status and
Segregated facilities are NOT OK
1948 President Truman’s executive order: DESEGREGATE the Military
1951 Brown v. the Board of Education reaches the SC and is rendered a
verdict in 1954. The verdict:
UNANIMOUSLY---- SEPARATE IS NOT EQUAL
“implementation was not forced until 1955” “with all deliberate speed”
What case did this come from? _______Brown v. BOE II___
many southern states refused or moved at a snail’s pace
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg County Schools affirmed:
The right of lower courts to order the busing of children to
ensure school desegregation.
De jure segregation: imposed LAW – Plessy v. Ferguson
De facto segregation: Segregation is a natural FACT-- happens naturally
Bussing produced: “White flight”
1974 SC ruling meant an end to large scale school desegregation in
metropolitan areas
CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT:
pg. 521
Civil disobedience= the willful but non-violent breech of
unjust laws
A. boycott-- refusing to buy products
B. sit in – A form of civil disobedience--Greensboro, NC
1962 What happened to James Meredith?
JFK provided federal troops to protect his right to attend the
University of Mississippi
1963 Kennedy asks Congress for legislation to outlaw segregation
in public accommodations.
CIVIL RIGHTS ACT of 1964
*Full & Equal enjoyment of goods/services in places of
PUBLIC ACCOMODATIONS
* Created the EEOC- Equal Employment Opportunities Commission
* Established the right to equality in Employment Opportunities
* Strengthened Voting Rights legislation
* Provided that funds could be withheld from federally assisted
programs administered in a discriminatory manner
Congress enacted the Elementary and Secondary Education Act 1965
What were the ramifications of the Act?
$$$ was withheld from schools if they did not desegregate
Ollie McClung:
White owner of small restaurant refused to serve blacks
The SC vindicated the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by reason of the
congressional power to regulate interstate commerce rather
than the 14th amendment
24th Amendment: abolished poll taxes
Economic Opportunity Act of 1964: provided education and training to
combat poverty
Voting Rights Act of 1965: empowered the Attorney General to send
Voter Registration Supervisors to areas
with fewer that ½ of the minority
eligible voters had not been registered
Fair Housing Act of 1968: banned discrimination in the rental and
sale of most housing
What led to violence in Northern cities in 1964 & 1968?
Unemployment- poverty-segregation-assassinations
Grove City College v. Bell- 1984
Part A:
The college can receive federal $ to give to students if the college
doesn’t discriminate
However….
Only the specific department was barred from discrimination
President Reagan’s view on civil rights: Not a supporter of Civil Rights
Against Quotas
Supreme Court views on civil rights 1980’s-1990’s:
Narrowed the scope of national civil rights
More concerned with freedom than equality protections
President Bush’s views on civil rights:
At 1st against quotas, but then changes his mind and signs the
New Civil Rights Act 1991
EXTRA/OLD Material
List -Native Americans Policy and major events over the twentieth
century
Hispanic Americans Policies and Major events
1990 Americans with Disabilities Act:
A deceptively simple question exists:
List Homosexual American Policies and events:
Protectionism:
19th Amendment
sexism:
STEREOTYPES UNDER SCRUTINY:
1976 the SC finally developed a workable standard for reviewing
such
laws: gender based distinctions are justifiable only if they
serve
some important government purpose!
1996 US v. Virginia:
Ruth Bader Ginsburg applied her “skeptical scrutiny” test
She stated, “Parties who seek to defend gender based
government action must demonstrate an
exceedingly persuasive justification for
that
action”
ex-women on the front lines of
battles
ERA:
AFFIRMATIVE ACTION: EQUAL OPPORTUNITY OR EQUAL
OUTCOME
a. establishing numerical goals= most aggressive form of AA
President Johnson’s reasoning for this:
b. employers engage in race conscious preferential treatment to
avoid litigation
c. Reverse Discrimination
1. Regents of the University of California v. Bakke:
2. Johnson v. Transportation Agency, Santa Clara County
1995 the SC created its most crippling jolt to some forms of AA
3. 1995 Adarand Constructors v. Pena
A. JUSTICE O”CONNOR- “Strict Scrutiny”
Quotas are now under serious threat from the above
case
POLITICS OF AFFIRMATIVE ACTION:
*Views of AA by blacks and whites?
*Views of AA by men and women
*AA encourages unprotected groups to strive for inclusion
In 1999 what did Saenz v. Roe state?
Question:
Does a state statute, authorizing states receiving Temporary Assistance to Needy Families to pay the
benefit amount of another State's TANF to its first year residents, violate the Fourteenth Amendment's
right-to-travel protections?
Decision: 7 votes for Roe, 2 vote(s) against