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13th Amendment
-the Constitution stated that: "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."
-This amendment abolished slavery and involuntary solitude.
-Equal rights were slowly beginning to take place. -
14th Amendment
-All persons born in the US, including former slaves and citizens, were given equal protection under the law.
-This amendment greatly increased the protection of civil rights for all Americans. -
15th Amendment
-Prohibited denial of voting rights to people because of race or color or the fact that they had been slaves.
-The promise of this law was not fully experienced until about a century later due to literacy tests and poll taxes used in the Southern states. -Pushes for equal voting rights were forming. -
Plessy vs. Ferguson
-Declares seperate but equal rights for whites and blacks will still be upheld.
-This decision made the push for equal Civil rights for all even stronger. -
19th Amendment
-Prohibited any US citizen to be denied the right to vote based on sex.
-This amendment was the culmination of the Women's Suffrage Movement.
-Voting in America was forever changed. -
Executive Order of 1948
-Executive order by President Harry S. Truman that abolished racial segregation in the armed forces.
-Now whites and blacks could fight side by side in combat. -
Brown v. Board of Education
-Declared state laws establishing seperate public schools for black and white students unconstitutional.
-Stated that the "seperate but equal" doctrine had no place in public education.
-Overturned the Plessy v. Ferguson decision.
-Now black and whites had access to the same quality education. -
Rosa Parks Refuses to Give Up Her Seat
-Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat for a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama.
-Her arrest for this incident led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott led by Martin Luther King Jr.
-After the 381 day boycott, the Supreme Court ruled bus segregation as unconstitutional on December 20, 1956
-American buses were no longer segregated between blacks and whites; they were equal to all. -
Civil Rights Act of 1957
-Gave attorney general greater power to desgregate schools
-Federal Government had authority over African American voting violations.
-Began a new era in civil rights legislation and enforcment of it.
-African Americans now had Federal protection of their civil rights. -
24th Amendment
-Ended the poll tax
-Now Americans had the ability to vote in elections even if they failed to pay poll taxes or other taxes.
-Voting rights were becoming equal to all Americans. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
-Outlawed major forms of discrimination against African Americans and women.
-Ended segregation in the South and in pubic places.
-This act was of major importance to America's social and politcal development. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
-outlawed voting practices that discriminated against African Americans
-the act declares that states shall not have a : "voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure ... to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color."
-All Americans now had the right to vote. -
Civil Rights Act of 1968
-this act enacted that equal housing opportunities regardless of orgin, creed, or color shall be proivided for American citizens.
-also known as "The Fair Housing Act"
-The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is in charge of enforcing this act today.
-All Americans now had the right to equal housing.
