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13th Amendmend
The 13th amendment abolished slavery in the United States and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. -
14th Amendment
The 14th amendment defines national citizenship and forbids states to restrict the basic rights of citizens or other persons. It states that no state shall make or enforce any law which shall reduce 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. -
15th Amendment
The Fifteenth Amendment prohibits the federal and state governments from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of servitude." -
Plessy vs Ferguson
The Plessy decision was a Supreme Court case that, by a 7-1 ruling upheld the rights of states to pass laws allowing or even requiring racial segregation in public and private institutions such as schools, public transportation, restrooms, and restaurants. -
19th Amendment
The Nineteenth Amendment prohibits any United States citizen from being denied the right to vote on the basis of sex. -
Korematsu v. United States
The Korematsu decision was significant because it ruled that the United States government had the right to exclude and forcibly move people from designated areas based on their race. The decision was 6-3 that the need to protect the United States from espionage and other wartime acts was more important than Korematsu's individual rights. Even though Korematsu's conviction was eventually overturned in 1983, the Korematsu ruling concerning the creation of exclusion orders has never been overturned -
Sweatt v. Painter
The Supreme Court case Sweatt v. Painter was a landmark civil rights case that successfully challenged the “separate but equal” doctrine of racial segregation that was established by Plessy v. Ferguson. This case was important because the justices came to the decision that “separate but equal” was an oxymoron and did not provide true equality. -
Jim Crow
The Jim Crow laws were racial segregation state and local laws put in place after the Reconstruction period in Southern United States that continued until 1965 mandating racial segregation in all public facilities in Southern U.S. states. -
Brown v. Board of Education
Brown vs. Board of Education was an important case because it overruled segregation in schools, declaring that it was "inherently unequal" to maintain separate institutions. The previous logic to segregation was that the institutions were "separate but equal." As a result, black and white children were allowed to attend the same schools, though the decision took a very long time to implement and often wasn't implemented until well into the 1960s. -
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Montgomery Bus Boycott
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Montgomery Bus Boycott
The Montgomery Bus Boycott, in which African Americans refused to ride city buses in Montgomery, Alabama, to protest segregated seating, took place from December 5, 1955, to December 20, 1956, and is regarded as the first large-scale demonstration against segregation in the U.S.The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately ordered Montgomery to integrate its bus system. -
Poll Taxes
A poll tax is a tax that each adult has to pay in order to vote in an election. The laws ran from 1880- 1964. -
24th Amendment
Before this amendment, citizens in some states had to pay a fee to vote in a national election. This fee was called a poll tax. On January 23, 1964, the United States ratified the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, prohibiting any poll tax in elections for federal officials. -
Literacy Tests
A literacy test, used from 1880-1965, refers to a state government practice of administering tests to prospective voters. These exams determine whether a person meets the literacy requirements for voting, serving in the armed forces, etc which test one’s ability to read and write. -
Civil Rights of Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a federal law that authorized federal action against segregation in public accommodations, public facilities, and employment. The law was passed during a period of great strength for the civil rights movement, and President Lyndon Johnson had to persuade many reluctant members of Congress to support the law. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 eliminates voting qualifications or prerequisites to voting, or standards, practices, or procedures that deny or curtail the right of a U.S. citizen to vote because of race, color, or membership in a language minority group. -
Robert Kennedy Speech in Indianapolis upon death of MLK
Robert F. Kennedy broke the news of Martin Luther King's death to a large gathering of African Americans that evening in Indianapolis, Indiana. The gathering was actually a planned campaign rally for Robert Kennedy in his bid to get the 1968 Democratic nomination for president. He was the first to break the news of King’s death to the public. -
Reed v. Reed
Reed v. Reed was an Equal Protection case in which the Supreme Court ruled that the administrators of estates cannot be named in a way that discriminates between the sexes. The Court held that an Idaho law's unequal treatment of men and women based on sex was a violation of the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause. Reed v. Reed became the basis of many more decisions that protected men and women from gender discrimination. -
Equal Rights Amendment
The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was a proposed amendment to the US Constitution that would guarantee equality under the law regardless of sex. The Era was introduced in 1923, passed by Congress in the 1970s but fell 3 states short to be added to the Constitution. The significance of this amendment is that it guarantees equal rights regardless of what gender you are because the Constitution only explicitly talks about males. -
Affirmative Action
Affirmative action is one of the most effective tools for redressing the injustices caused by our nation's historic discrimination against people of color and women, and for leveling what has long been an uneven playing field.
This action or policy favors those who tend to suffer from discrimination, especially in relation to employment or education. Affirmative action basically guarantees equal rights for all people regardless of race or gender. -
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 quotas, such as the 16 out of 100 seats set aside for minority students by the University of California, Davis School of Medicine, were impermissible. -
Bowers v. Hardwick
In Bowers v. Hardwick, the Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution does not protect the right of gay adults to engage in private, consensual sodomy. This 5-4 ruling was overturned in 2003. -
Americans with Disabilities Act
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is the nation's first comprehensive civil rights law addressing the needs of people with disabilities, prohibiting discrimination in employment, public services, public accommodations, and telecommunications. The importance of the ADA is readily apparent: by specifically prohibiting discrimination and mandating equal opportunity and access for both employment and public services, the ADA has empowered individuals with disabilities and enabled them to take a -
Lawrence v. Texas
The Lawrence v. Texas was significant because, by a 6-3 ruling, it found the “Homosexual Conduct” law unconstitutional and established, for the first time, that lesbians and gay men share the same fundamental liberty right to private sexual intimacy with another adult that heterosexuals have. This was huge because gay couples could no longer be punished for having sexual relations with each other. -
Fisher v. Texas
The Fisher decision is a significant shift in the way courts in Texas previously viewed the use of race in university admissions. Fisher v. University of Texas concerned the affirmative action admissions policy of the University of Texas at Austin. The Supreme Court ruled that The University of Texas at Austin can continue using affirmative action in its admission policies. -
Indiana Gay rights court battle
Same-sex couples hoping to get married in Indiana will have to wait until the U.S. Supreme Court addresses the question of whether gay marriage bans are constitutional. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago on Monday approved a stay sought by Indiana’s attorney general of the appeals court’s Sept. 4 ruling that found Indiana and Wisconsin’s gay marriage bans to be unconstitutional.
