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Congress passes the 1st Civil Rights Act
In 1964, Congress passed Public Law 88-352 (78 Stat. 241). The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. Provisions of this civil rights act forbade discrimination on the basis of sex, as well as race in hiring, promoting, and firing. -
15th Amendment
Passed by Congress February 26, 1869, and ratified February 3, 1870, the 15th amendment granted African American men the right to vote. -
14th Amendment
All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge 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. -
The 1st Women’s Suffrage Amendment was introduced in Congress, but was defeated
January 25, 1887: The first vote on woman suffrage is taken in the Senate, where it is defeated 34 to 16, with 25 members absent. 1887: Kansas grants women municipal suffrage. 1890: American Federation of Labor declares support for a woman suffrage amendment. -
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson was a landmark 1896 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation under the “separate but equal” doctrine. The case stemmed from an 1892 incident in which African American train passenger Homer Plessy refused to sit in a car for Black people. -
NAACP is founded
The NAACP or National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was established in 1909 and is America's oldest and largest civil rights organization. It was formed in New York City by white and Black activists, partially in response to the ongoing violence against African Americans around the country. -
19th Amendment
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. -
Shelly v. Kramer
Shelley v. Kraemer (1948) is a U.S. Supreme Court case that held that restrictive covenants in real property deeds which prohibited the sale of property to non-Caucasians unconstitutionally violate the equal protection provision of the Fourteenth Amendment. -
Brown v. Board of Education
the Court declared that racial segregation in public schools violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, effectively overturning the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision mandating "separate but equal." The Brown ruling directly affected legally segregated schools in twenty-one -
Rosa Parks refuses to give up her bus seat
Parks was arrested on December 1, 1955, after she refused to give up her seat on a crowded bus to a white passenger. ... The NAACP realized that Parks was the right person to work on its battle against the system of segregation in Montgomery. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. ... The Act prohibited discrimination in public accommodations and federally funded programs. It also strengthened the enforcement of voting rights and the desegregation of schools. -
NOW (National Organization of Women) formed
the National Organization for Women was founded by a group of activists who wanted to end sex discrimination. Today, the organization remains as a cornerstone of the women's rights movement. -
Green v. County School Board of New Kent County
Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, 391 U.S. 430, was an important United States Supreme Court case involving school desegregation. Specifically, the Court dealt with the freedom of choice plans created to avoid compliance with the Supreme Court's mandate in Brown II in 1955. -
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, case in which, on April 20, 1971, the Supreme Court of the United States unanimously upheld busing programs that aimed to speed up the racial integration of public schools in the United States. -
Proposition 209 – California
Proposition 209 is a California ballot proposition which, upon approval in November 1996, amended the state constitution to prohibit state governmental institutions from considering race, sex, or ethnicity, specifically in the areas of public employment, public contracting, and public education.