Civil Rights Act of 1964
Ananya Rajesh, Luke Conlon, Channing Fang, Coleman Wylie
What are the Major Provisions?
- Made racial discrimination illegal in places of public accomodation
- Forbade discrimination in employment on basis of race, color, religion, and gender
- Created the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)
- Created provisions for withholding federal funds for state and local governments and other institutions that practiced racial discrimination
- Strengthened voting rights legislation
- Authorized the US Justice Department to initiate lawsuits to desegregate
What are the Major Objectives?
- To desegregate places of public accomodation
- To eliminate discrimination in the work place and in public forums
- Specifically prohibit discrimination in education, voting, and public places
- To provide resources to African Americans and other groups, such as women
Was the Civil Rights Act initially successful?
- While still in Congress, opponents of the Act proposed over 500 amendments and held a filibuster in the Senate.
- After the Act was passed, Southern congressmen did not resist the new law.
- However, many angry whites broke out in riots and beat African Americans in opposition to the passage of the Act.
- There were numerous holdouts to the Act, and over the ten years following the Act, the Justice Department broughts suits against over 500 school districts and 400 restaurants , taverns, gas stations, and hotels.
- The voting rights provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 were not successfully and necessitated the creation of the Voting Rights of 1965, a year later.
What are the Impacts and Lasting Consequences of the Civil Rights Act of 1964?
- The immediate impacts of the Act were riots in the South following the passage of the Act.
- The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission continues to operate to this day.
- In Mississsippi, voter registration of the eligible Black population went from under 7% in 1965 to more than 70% in 1976.
- The Act legally forbade racial discrimination in public places and in places of employment and set a legal basis for racial equality.
- Three years later, in 1968, the Supreme Courtcase Jones v. Mayer Co. held that federal law bars all racial discrimination (private or public), in sale or rental of property. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was indubitably a step towards changing legal environment that was more favorable to equality.
From today's perspective, to what degree did the law achieve its objectives?
- Overt racial discrimination is not legally permissable in public places.
- It still took the Civil Rights movement to achieve further legal standards of equality, such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
- Although racial discrimination in schools is not permissable, inner city schools (which typically have a greater proportion of minority students) usually have less funding and fewer opportunities available to students.
- In terms of employment, the EEOC set a standard that has continued to guarantee a legal basis for equal opportunity in employment.
- In 2008, the United States elected Barack Obama, the first African American president. This reality would have been unthinkable int he 1960s.