AP Gov // Chapter 9: Civil Rights

What’s the difference between Civil Liberties and Civil Rights?

Civil Liberties are the fundamental rights that are protected from government infringement.

Civil rights are the protections of the people ensuring everyone is treated equally.

What was the act that was passed in 1990 that provided protections for disabled Americans in employment and government programs?

American Disabilities Act (1990) also known as the ADA.

What sparked the “504 sit-ins” in the San Francisco Federal building?

Heumann organized protests after witnessing the government attempting to stall the enforcement of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act which prohibited discrimination against disabled Americans.

What happened in Dred Scott v Sanford?

The Supreme Court ruled that slaves and descendants of slaves were not considered citizens in America.

What did the 13th Amendment do?

Freed all slaves.

What did the 14th Amendment do?

• Affirmed citizenship for anyone born in the United States

• Allowed Selective Incorporation of Amendments into States

• Equal Protection Clause

What did the 15th Amendment do?

Granted voting rights to black men.

What happened in Plessy v Ferguson?

Context: a caucasian man was arrested and fined for sitting in white carriages in a train, raising the question whether or not such segregated facilities violated the Constitution

Precedent: doctrine of “separate but equal” was created, meaning as long as the service provided was equal, it can still be separated by race.

Which case overturned Plessy v Ferguson?

Brown v Board of Education

What happened in Brown v Board of Education?

Supreme Court unanimously overturned Plessy v Ferguson, stating that education is outside the morales of the doctrine of separate but equal and acknowledged that the doctrine was flawed.

De Jure Segregation

Word “jure” means law as such this word refers to the segregation written into law

De Facto Segregation

Segregation based on personal and private believes and could have resulted from the lingering discrimination and segregation from being written into laws.

What happened in Swann v Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education?

In this case, the Supreme Court sought an answer to whether or not the courts could provide remedies for segregated schools–in this case with bussing– in which the courts argued it was permissible to use bussing to desegregate schools.

What happened in Milliken v Bradley?

The question the court answered in this case was who would be responsible for desegregating schools that were segregated due to residential patterns. In this case, the Court ruled that since these districts weren’t created with the purpose of segregating students, they wouldn’t be ordered to desegregate.

What is affirmative action?

Policies designed to address consequences of previous discrimination, aimed to provide special accommodations for those affected by these issues.

What happened in the case of Reagent of University of California v Bakke?

The court ruled that the “quota” system utilized by the university to provide an advantage to special underrepresented minorities an opportunity to enter the University was actually unconstitutional. However, the Courts acknowledged the benevolence of providing affirmative action and supported it’s use outside of quotas.

What were the 2 other cases involved with affirmative action in universities in 2003?

Gratz v Bollinger: The use of a points system that provides ethnic minorities bonus points was found unconstitutional, however the Courts never ruled against using ethnicity as a factor for admission.

Grutter v Bollinger: Affirmed the use of affirmative action in university admissions as long as the university has a “compelling reason”

Which case in 2016 upheld affirmative action?

Fisher v University of Texas at Austin