AP Government: Ch. 9 - Civil Rights

Civil Rights

protections for individuals from discrimination based on race, national origin, religion, sex, and other characteristics, ensuring equal treatment under the law

Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975

guaranteed children the right to free public education, regardless of their disability

Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990

-signed into law in 1990 by George H. W. Bush

-guarantees that people with disabilities are not discriminated against in employment, in buying goods and services, and in participating in government programs

-protects those with a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one more more major life activities

-improved access to public transportation, public services, and other areas of public and commercial life

-requires states to modify public buildings so disabled citizens an access them

-example of an unfunded mandate (Congress didn't fund)

Dred Scott v Sandford

-the Supreme Court ruled that Scott, former slaves, and the descendants of slaves were not citizens of the US, even if they were residents of free states or territories

-according to Justice Roger Taney, the natural rights proclaimed in the Constitution did not extend to African Americans, who at the time of the nation's founding, had been "subjugated by the dominant race" and therefore did not deserve any rights

-the decision further polarized public opinion on the question of slavery and galvanized both pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces in the US

Post-War South

-after the Civil War, southern states began to pass laws to preserve the status quo between whites and African Americans

-passed "black codes": pieces of legislation that attempted to restrict the economic and political rights of African Americans

13th Amendment

-passed in 1865 after the Civil War

-prohibited slavery in the US

14th Amendment

-passed in 1868 after the Civil War

-granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the US

-placed restrictions on state laws that sought to abridge the privileges and immunities of citizens in the US

-overturned the 3/5ths Compromise in the original Constitution

-has the Equal Protection Clause

Equal Protection Clause

-clause of the 14th Amendment

-has been used to protect the civil rights of Americans from discrimination based on race, national origin, religion, gender, and other characteristics

15th Amendment

-passed in 1870 after the Civil War

-granted voting rights to African American men

Jim Crow Laws

-southern states' efforts to ignore the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments

-enforced segregation across all aspects of life, including transportation, entertainment, business, and education

-example of de jure segregation

Other Racism

-poll taxes and literacy tests determined whether African Americans were "qualified" to vote

-violence and persistent threat of violence

-KKK terrorized and murdered African American politicians and civic leaders

Plessy v Ferguson**

-the Court upheld the constitutionality of legalized racial segregation with "separate but equal"

-test case organized by the African American community in New Orleans to challenge Louisiana's Jim Crow laws

-ruled that Louisiana's law did not violate the 14th Amendment

-declared that "separate but equal" facilities did not violate the Constitution (though the facilities were NEVER equal)

Separate But Equal

the doctrine that racial segregation was constitutional so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal (they never were)

NAACP

-National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

-created a legal defense fund to hire Thurgood Marshall to challenge legal segregation

Legal Segregation

-the separation by law of individuals based on their race

-challenged in a series of cases by Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP

Brown v Board of Education**

-Oliver Brown tried to enroll one of his three daughters in an all-white elementary school that was closer their house than the all-black school and that did not require her to walk through busy and dangerous railroad yards

-Court overturned Plessy v Ferguson

-"separate but equal" has no place in public education, being inherently unequal

-segregation = violation denial of the equal protection of the laws

Brown vs Board of Education II**

-the Court encouraged compliance with Brown I "with all deliberate speed" = contradictory word choice that was intentionally vague

-placed federal district court judges in charge of desegregation efforts

-some southern district court judges were not sympathetic to the Court's ruling and tried to slow down compliance

-result: in 1964 (10 years after Brown I), 98% of African American children in the South still attended completely segregated schools

De Jure Segregation

-the separation of individuals based on their characteristics, such as race, intentionally and by law

-type of segregation that Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP challenged

-largely eliminated by the end of the 1960s

De Facto Segregation

-a separation of individuals based on characteristics that arises not by law but because of other factors, such as residential housing patterns

-based not on law, but on private choices or the lingering social consequences of legal segregation

-harder to eliminate than de jure segregation

Swann v Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education

the Court ruled that busing was constitutionally permissible

Busing

-the use of transportation to desegregate public schools

-often unpopular with parents

-busing efforts stirred up considerable political oppression in both the North and South

-those in favor: argued that busing was necessary given the depth of the roots of segregation

-those opposed: argued that the role of government in securing equal protection was only to strike down unjust laws, not to implement plans to produce racially integrated schools

Milliken v Bradley

-the Court considered a case of educational segregation that had been caused not by law but by residential housing patterns in and around Detroit

-"white flight" led to white suburban schools and black urban schools

-Court ruled that the schools would not be ordered to desegregate because the district boundaries had not been drawn for the purpose of segregating students

Affirmative Action

-a policy designed to address the consequences of previous discrimination by providing special consideration to individuals based upon their characteristics, such as race or gender

-benefits individuals who are members of groups that faced discrimination i the past or are underrepresented

-opponents argue that it constitutes "reverse discrimination"

Regents of the University of California v Bakke

-concerned the use of quotas, or the setting aside of a number of places at a school, contracts with the government, or job opportunities for groups who have suffered past discrimination

-Allan Bakke (white) sued the regents of the University of California at Davis after he was denied admission to its medial school; argued that his academic record was superior to the group of 16 minority applicants for whom seats had been set aside

-brought his suit under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment

-Court agreed that the quota system violated Bakke's rights and those of other white applicants and made the school admit him

-Court also affirmed the worthiness of the goal of increasing minority student enrollment

Gratz vs Bollinger

-Court tried to clarify its position on affirmative action

-considered the use of a points system in undergraduate admissions decisions

-Jennifer Gratz had been denied admission to the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor

-the university used a points system; some points were awarded for membership in a traditionally underrepresented racial or ethnic group

-the Court ruled that the points system was unconstitutional, but it did not strike down the use of race or ethnicity as factors in admissions decisions

Grutter vs Bollinger

-the Court affirmed the possibility of using race and ethnicity in admissions decisions

-Barbara Grutter sued the University of Michigan's law school for using race as a factor of admission

-the Court ruled that the university could use race as a factor as long as it could show that it had a "compelling interest" to do so; the Court determined that ensuring a diverse student body demonstrates such an interest

Fisher v University of Texas at Austin

the Court upheld the consideration of race in college admissions

Student for Fair Admissions Inc. v President and Fellows of Harvard College**

ultimately ruled that affirmative action programs violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment

Social Movement

large groups of citizens organizing for political change

Civil Disobedience

the intentional refusal to obey a law to call attention to its injustice

Montgomery Bus Boycott

-in 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat and was arrested

-Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was selected to lead the boycott

-after lasting for more than a year, the boycott ended with the Supreme Court's 1956 decision in the case of Colvin and three others that declared the bus law unconstitutional

MLK's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail"

-begins by offering his reply as a sincere response to the white clergymen's concerns

-defends his presence in Birmingham professionally, as leader of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference

-defends his movement's tactics on the basis of natural rights, drawing a distinction between just and unjust laws: whether or not it matches with God's natural law

-racial oppression is unjust

-lists the grievances and injustices that led to his actions

-says that the greatest threat to black freedom in America is not the KKK, but white moderates who prefer peace over liberty

Civil Rights Act of 1964

-legislation outlawing racial segregation in schools and public places

-authorized the attorney general to sue/withhold grants individual school districts that failed to desegregate

-outlawed employment discrimination based on race or ethnicity, religion, national origin, or gender

-part of President Kennedy's civil rights efforts before his assassination in 1963

Voting Rights Act of 1965

-legislation outlawing literacy tests, which had been preventing African Americans from voting

-authorized the Justice Department to send federal officers to register voters in uncooperative cities, counties, and states

Guinn v US**

declared the grandfather clause (can't vote unless your grandfather could) unconstitutional

Smith v Allwright**

outlawed white primaries held by the Democratic Party, which were in violation of the 15th Amendment

24th Amendment

abolished poll taxes

19th Amendment

-granted women the right to vote

-ratified in 1920

-part of the first wave of the women's rights movement

Second Wave of the Women's Rights Movement

-addressed inequalities at work and in the home, as well as protection from violence and sexual harassment

-began in the 1960s

"The Feminine Mystique"

-book by Betty Friedan

-highlighted the ways in which American society assumed that women were best suited for roles as wives and mothers

-challenged these assumptions and wanted dramatic changes

Title IX

-contained in a set of amendments to the Higher Education Act of 1972

-prohibited sex discrimination in schools receiving federal aid

-applied equally to curriculum, health care, and residential life

-had the impact of increasing female participation in sports programs

Equal Rights Amendment (ERA)

-"Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex"

-failed to be secured by the women's rights movement during the ratification process

Standard of Strict Scrutiny

-used for cases involving race discrimination

-a government has to show a "compelling interest" to justify unequal treatment

-difficult to meet

Rational-Basis Standard

-differential treatment must be shown to be reasonable and not arbitrary

-a lower legal bar to meet

-Ex: under this standard, air traffic controllers must retire at age 56

Intermediate Scrutiny Standard

-in between the standard of strict scrutiny and rational-basis

-used for cases involving gender discrimination

-while the Court doesn't place gender on the same level as race, it reviews claims of gender discrimination using a higher standard than, for example, age or disability

-in general, the Court has found most forms of differential treatment for men and women to be unconstitutional, except when such treatment can be justified as serving important governmental objectives (ex: the draft)

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

does not specifically mention sexual harassment, but the Court has ruled ruled in several recent cases that sexual or gender-based harassment violates the act's antidiscrimination provisions

Quid Pro Quo Harassment

-first kind of sexual harassment

-occurs when employers request or demand sexual favors in return for advancement or employment

-in these cases, employers can be found liable for the behavior of their offending employees, even if the employer did not know about the behavior at the time it occurred

Hostile Working Environment

-second kind of sexual harassment

-involves actions, statements, or conditions that unreasonably interfere with the ability of employees to do their jobs

-in these cases, employers are generally held liable only if they knew about the offending behavior but did nothing to stop it

Bowers v Hardwick**

Court ruled that laws making sodomy illegal are legal based on founders' intent

Lawrence v Texas**

6-3 decision that reversed Bowers

Obergefell v Hodges**

-state is required to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples

-state is required to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states