AP Gov Chapter 5 Vocab

Civil Rights

Policies designed to protect people against arbitrary or discriminatory treatment by government officials or individuals.

Fourteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment adopted after the Civil War that states, "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." It is the first and only part of the Constitution to invoke the idea of equality.

Equal Protection of the Laws

Part of the Fourteenth Amendment emphasizing that the laws must provide equivalent "protection" to all people.

Thirteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment ratified after the Civil War that forbade slavery and involuntary servitude.

Civil Rights Act of 1964

The law making racial discrimination in public accommodations illegal. It forbade many forms of job discrimination. It also strengthened voting rights.

Suffrage

The legal right to vote, extended to African Americans by the Fifteenth Amendment, to women by the Nineteenth Amend-ment, and to 18-to 20-year-olds by the Twenty-sixth Amendment.

Fifteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment adopted in 1870 to extend suffrage to African Americans.

Poll Taxes

Small taxes levied on the right to vote. Were used by most Southern states to exclude African Americans from voting.

White Primary

Primary elections from which African Americans were excluded, an exclusion that, in the heavily Democratic South, deprived African Americans of a voice in the real contests. The Supreme Court declared white primaries unconstitutional in 1944.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

A law designed to help end formal and informal barriers to African American suffrage. Under the law, hundreds of thousands of African Americans registered to vote, and the number of African American elected officials increased dramatically.

Nineteenth Amendment

The constitutional amendment adopted in 1920 that guarantees women the right to vote.

Equal Rights Amendment

A constitutional amendment originally introduced in Congress in 1923 and passed by Congress in 1972, stating that "equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex." Despite public sup-port, the amendment fell short of the three-fourths of state legislatures required for passage.

Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990

A law passed in 1990 that requires employers and public facilities to make "reasonable accommodations" for people with disabilities and prohibits discrimination against these individuals in employment.

Affirmative Action

A policy designed to give special attention to or compensatory treatment for members of some previously disadvantaged group.