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Dred Scott vs Stanford
Dred Scott v. Sanford was a decade-long fight for freedom by a black slave named Dred Scott. The case went through several courts and ultimately reached the U.S. Supreme Court, whose decision angered abolitionists and gave momentum to the anti-slavery movement. Dred Scott was born into slavery around 1799. After Peter Blow (his owner) died in 1832, surgeon Dr. John Emerson purchased Scott and eventually took him to Illinois, a free state. Dred thought he should be free, however he lost the case. -
13th Amendment
The 13th Amendment was ratified in 1865 after the Civil War and it abolished slavery in the United States. The 13th Amendment states: “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” The amendment was the first explicit mention of the institution of slavery in the U.S. Constitution. -
14th Amendment
The Fourteenth Amendment addresses many aspects of citizenship and the rights of citizens. The most commonly used phrase in the amendment is "equal protection of the laws", which figures prominently in a wide variety of landmark cases, including Brown v. Board of Education (racial discrimination), Roe v. Wade (reproductive rights), Bush v. Gore (election recounts), Reed v. Reed (gender discrimination), and University of California v. Bakke (racial quotas in education) -
15th Amendment
The 15th Amendment granted African-American men the right to vote and was adopted into the U.S. Constitution in 1870. Despite the amendment, by the late 1870s discriminatory practices still were implemented to prevent blacks from exercising their right to vote, especially in the South. It wasn’t until the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that the government interfered at the state and local levels if they denied African-Americans their right to vote under the 15th Amendment. -
Plessy vs Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson was a decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that upheld racial segregation laws for public facilities as long as the segregated facilities were equal in quality. The decision kept the many state laws promoting racial segregation that had been passed in the South. The case originated when Homer Plessy, a person of one-eighth black ancestry deliberately violated Louisiana's Separate Car Act of 1890, which required "equal, but separate" train car accommodations. -
White Primaries
White primaries were elections held in the southern states where only white voters were permitted to participate. Statewide white primaries were established by the State Democratic Party units or by state legislatures.White Primaries were a method used by white Democrats to disenfranchise black and other minority voters. They also passed laws and constitutions with methods to raise barriers to vote. -
19th Amendment
The 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote which ended almost a century of protest. In 1848, the movement for women’s rights launched on a national level with the Seneca Falls Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott. Following the convention, the demand for the right to vote became a focus in the women’s rights movement. Stanton and Mott, along with Susan B. Anthony and other activists, raised public awareness to grant voting rights to women. -
Poll Taxes
Poll taxes begun in the 1890s as a way to keep African Americans from voting in southern states. Poll taxes were a voting fee to discourage African-Americans. Most African-Americans were poor ans didn't have the money to spend for these poll taxes. Voters were required to pay their poll tax before they could cast a ballot. A “grandfather clause” excused some poor whites from payment if they had an ancestor who voted before the Civil War, but there were no exemptions for African Americans. -
Brown vs Board of Education
Brown v. Board of Education was a landmark Supreme Court case in which the justices ruled that racial segregation of children in public schools was unconstitutional. Brown v. Board of Education helped establish that “separate-but-equal” education and other services were not equal at all.This overturned Plessy v. Ferguson, which said that racially segregated public facilities were legal, so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal. -
Affirmative Action
Affirmative action describes policies that support members of a disadvantaged group that has previously suffered discrimination (and may continue to) in such areas as education, employment, or housing. Support for affirmative action has sought to achieve goals such as lower inequalities in employment and pay, increasing access to education, promoting diversity, and addressing past wrongs, harms, or hindrances. -
24th Amendment
The 24th Amendment prohibits both Congress and the states from limiting the right to vote in federal elections on payment of a poll tax or other types of tax. The amendment was proposed by Congress to the states on August 27, 1962, and was ratified by the states on January 23, 1964. Southern states of the former Confederate States of America adopted poll taxes in laws of the late 19th century, as a measure to prevent African Americans from voting. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex or national origin. It is considered one of the most important legislative achievements of the civil rights movement. First proposed by President John F. Kennedy, it survived strong opposition from southern states and was then signed into law by Lyndon B. Johnson. Congress expanded the act and later passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 enforced the 15th 95 years after the amendment was ratified. In those years, African Americans in the South faced obstacles to voting. This included poll taxes, literacy tests, and other restrictions to deny them the right to vote. They risked harassment, intimidation, and physical violence when they tried to register or vote. As a result, very few African Americans were registered voters, and they had very little political power locally or nationally. -
Reed v Reed
Reed v. Reed was an Supreme Court equal protection case. Sally and Cecil Reed, a married couple who had separated, were in conflict over which of them to designate as administrator of the estate of their dead son. Idaho Code specified that "males must be preferred to females" in appointing administrators of estates and the court appointed Cecil as administrator of the estate. Sally Reed went to the Supreme Court who argued that the Fourteenth Amendment forbids discrimination based on gender. -
Equal Rights Amendment
The Equal Rights Amendment was proposed to the Constitution and explicitly states: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex”. It was designed to stop many state and federal laws that discriminate against women. It was then submitted to the state legislatures for ratification but, it was not ratified. It would have been the 27th Amendment to the Constitution. -
Regents of the University of California v Bakke
Regents of the University of California v. Bakke was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States. It upheld affirmative action, allowing race to be one of several factors in college admission policy. However, the court ruled that specific racial quotas, like the 16 out of 100 seats set aside for minority students by the University of California, Davis School of Medicine, were not allowed. -
Bowers v Hardwick
Bowers v. Hardwick is a United States Supreme Court decision that upheld, in a 5–4 ruling, the constitutionality of a Georgia law criminalizing sodomy in private between consenting adults, in this case with respect to homosexuals though the law did not differentiate between homosexual sodomy and heterosexual sodomy. This case was overturned in 2003 in Lawrence v. Texas, though the Georgia law had already been struck down in 1998. -
Americans with Disabilities Act
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) became law in 1990. The ADA is a civil rights law that prohibits discrimination against individuals with disabilities in all areas of public life, including jobs, schools, transportation, and all public and private places that are open to the general public. The purpose is to make sure that people with disabilities have the same rights and opportunities as everyone else. -
Lawrence v Texas
In 1998, John Geddes Lawrence Jr. was arrested along with an acquaintance at his apartment in Texas, when sheriff's deputies found them engaging in sexual intercourse. Lawrence v. Texas was a Supreme Court decision in which the Court ruled that American laws prohibiting private homosexual activity between consenting adults are unconstitutional. The Court reaffirmed the concept of a "right to privacy" in the U.S. Constitution in Roe v Wade, even though it is not explicitly stated. -
Obergefell v Hodges
Obergefell v. Hodges is a landmark civil rights case in which the Supreme Court ruled that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The 5–4 ruling requires all fifty states to perform and recognize the marriages of same-sex couples on the same terms and conditions as the marriages of opposite-sex couples.
