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13th Amendment
Ratified by the states on Dec 6 of 1865. the purpose was to eradicate slavery throughout the United States under the administration of Abraham Lincoln. -
14th Amendment
Ratified July 28th of 1868. The 14th Amendment guaranteed citizenship of anyone born in the United States. States are not allowed to enforce laws going against the rights or privileges of a citizen. People may not be denied life, liberty, or property without due process of law. Everyone is equally protected. -
15th Amendment
Ratified on March 30th in 1870, the 15th amendment grants the right of every united states citizen to vote despite race, color, or previous condition of servitude. -
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Jim Crow
This acted as a means for local governments to halt progress between blacks and whites. Segregation and obscure voting laws hindered reconstruction in the south. Grandfather clauses protected white poor people from the literacy tests that blacks faced as a prerequisite for voting. -
Poll Taxes
Poll Taxes occurred under the Jim Crow Laws and kept African Americans from voting because they had to pay a large tax in order to vote. Because most African Americans during reconstruction were poor sharer croppers, it kept a large amount from voting. -
Literacy Tests
Literacy Tests were also in motion under the Jim Crow Laws. They prevented African Americans from voting because most were illiterate and poor. Poor white Americans were still allowed to vote under the Grandfather Clauses. These stated that if their grandfather voted before the civil war, then they had that right as well -
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson was a landmark supreme court case that continues segregation nationally. It declared that separate can be equal and as long as facilities offered to blacks were equal to the ones offered to whites it was equal. The case decision was eventually overturned in Brown v. Board of Education. -
19th Amendment
This amendment allows women to finally be able to vote. Under the constitution, the government is not allowed to discriminate based on sex. The right to vote is known as woman suffrage. -
Equal Rights Amendment
The Equal Rights Amendment is a proposed amendment to the constitution. It was only ratified by 35 states while the required amount is 38 and has been brought to congress multiple times since then. The purpose of the amendment is to guarantee rights and end discrimination based on sex. -
Korematsu v. United States
When it comes to a suspicious indiviual's rights versus the safety of the country, the individual is less important. The court stated that in a time of emergency it is more important to protect everyone from spies and countries at war with us than to protect one person's rights. -
Sweatt v. Painter
This court case was a unanimous decision to allow Sweatt to be admitted into a University that denied him because of his race. They found that the Black law school was grossly unequal to the one Sweatt had been denied admission and based on Plessy v Ferguson, separate is okay but only when it's equal. -
Brown v. Board of Education
Brown v. Board of Education is another landmark supreme court case that overturned the previous decision that separate was equal in Plessy v. Ferguson. The supreme court decided that in nearly all cases separate was not equal therefore segregation was unconstitutional. This is the case that ended segregation legally and nationally though it was difficult to put into full affect. -
Montgomery Bus Boycott
Montgomery Bus Boycott was a protest for civil rights among African Americans who refused to ride the Montgomery Alabama public buses. They were against segregated seating. This could be seen as the beginning of Martin Luther King Jr.'s large impact on the civil rights movement. It went on for 15 days. -
JFK Address to the Nation on Civil Rights
John F Kennedy gave a speech to the nation standing up for civil rights. He addressed African American rights and turned them from a legal issue to a moral one. Economic, educational, and moral dimensions of racial discrimination were discussed. -
24th Amendment
Ratified on January 23rd in 1964. this amendment prohibits congress and the states from conditioning the rights to vote in federal elections on payment of a poll tax. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
Ended segregation in public places and stopped employers from discriminating on the bases of race, color, religion, sex, or nation origin. it was signed into law by Lyndon B Johnson. -
DeJure/ DeFacto Segregation
DeJure Segregation is defined as segregation that occurred by law while DeFacto segregation occurred based on the concentration of races in certain areas. This made it difficult to desegregate. -
Voting Right Act of 1965
Under Lydon B Johnson, the voting rights act was put in place to overcome barriers a the state and local level from from keeping African Americans from voting -
Robert Kennedy Speech in Indianapolis
Upon arriving to Indianapolis, Robert Kennedy was informed that MLK had just been assassinated. He gave a speech on the tragedy consoling the citizens. -
Reed v. Reed
This court case was a unanimous decision that the unequal treatment of men and women is unconstitutional. It was said that choosing a member of one sex over the other to eliminate hearings or merits just based on sex is unconstitutional. -
Title IX
This title is a portion of the United States Education Amendments of 1972. Thus title protects people from discrimination based on their gender. People cannot be excluded from participating, receiving benefits, or discriminated against in any education program or when receiving financial aid. -
Affirmative Action
Affirmative action policies are ones where the organization actively puts forth effort to improve opportunities for groups that have a history of being discriminated against and opportunistically limited. The focus with this is often education and employment. -
Regents of University of California v. Bakke
This was a supreme court decision that Universities' use of racial quotas in admissions processes are not constitutional, but a college can use affirmative action to accept more minority applicants is constitutional in certain situations. The quotas violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964. -
Bowers v. Hardwick
Micheal Hardwick was seen having homosexual intercourse in his home in Georgia. After a 5-4 court decision, the court decided that it is unconstitutional to complete acts of sodomy and the constitution does not protect it. The court feared it would be a product of "judge-made constitutional law" and would send them down the road of illegitimacy for ruling that it was constitutional. -
Americans with DIsabilities Act
The Americans with Disabilities Act was put in place to prevent discrimination upon citizens with disabilities and make more facilities available to them. Innovations were made to include areas that are friendly to Americans with disabilities so that they have equal access to the same things every other citizen has. The public has to accommodate to the needs of disabled citizens in public facilities, and they are granted equal employment opportunity. -
Lawrence v. Texas
This court case overturned the decisions of Bowers v. Hawkins stating that as free adults same sex couples are free to engage in their conduct privately. The government does not have the right to intrude on the personal and private life of an individual. -
Fisher v. Texas
This was a supreme court case that ruled that any University's admission policy must be tailored to serve governmental interest and if the policy did not then race cannot be considered when deciding if a student cant be admitted to the University. -
Obergefell v. Hodges
Obergefell v. Hodges is a landmark supreme court decision that says marriage is a protected right under the constitution and therefore it is a right that is guaranteed to same sex couples as well as heterosexual couples. Because of this court case same sex marriage must be nationally recognized as a legal union.
