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The Impact of the Civil Rights Act

The history of how the law shaped equal rights for us all

  • The 2014 Civil Rights Act of 1964 Silver Dollar features three people holding hands at a civil rights march.
    U.S. Mint

    Golden Jubilee Silver Dollar

    En español | In January 2014, a commemorative coin marks the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Profits on sales of the coin aid the United Negro College Fund. The path to enactment of the 1964 law began a century earlier.

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  • Frederick Douglass, American social reformer, orator, writer, statesman and former slave, Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Getty Images

    Civil Rights Act of 1866

    This law granted rights of citizenship to all men, regardless of race. But for abolitionist Frederick Douglass, it fell short. Only guaranteed voting rights for all citizens, he said in 1866, could form a “wall of fire” that would make the country live up to its promise of universal freedom.

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  • An African American citizen inserting the voting paper in the ballot box during the United States presidential elections in 1956, Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Mondadori Portfolio/Getty Images

    ‘Much Remains to Be Done’

    Enacted in 1957, the first civil rights act since Reconstruction emphasizes voting rights and establishes the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, as well as the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. President Dwight Eisenhower, whose support of civil rights has been called “tepid,” promotes and signs the bill.

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  • University of Alabama student Vivian Malone registers for classes. Miss Malone and fellow student Jimmy Hood were the first African American students to attend the University, Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Bettmann/CORBIS

    ‘Time to Act’

    On June 11, 1963, the day two African American students desegregate the University of Alabama, President Kennedy details his plan for legislation to end discrimination in public facilities, to end segregation in public education and to enhance protections for voting.

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  • Overhead view of the massive crowd assembled on the Mall during the civil rights March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, Washington DC, August 28, 1963., Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Time & Life Pictures/Getty Image

    March for Jobs and Freedom

    The organizers of the 1963 march, including A. Phillip Randolph and Martin Luther King Jr., believe that a great show of strength in the nation’s capital will boost support for civil rights legislation.

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  • People marching with placards during an anti-segregation demonstration on a sidewalk in front of Horn and Hardart Automat Cafeteria, New York City., Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Getty Images

    Unfinished Business

    “No memorial oration or eulogy could more eloquently honor President Kennedy’s memory than the earliest possible passage of the civil rights bill for which he fought so long. … It is time now to write the next chapter, and to write it in the books of law.” – President Lyndon B. Johnson, five days after the JFK assassination.

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  • Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Alamy

    Standing Watch

    When the Civil Rights Act of 1964 reaches the Senate floor, activists sitting in on the debate include Rev. King and Malcolm X. On March 26 at the U.S. Capitol, they meet for the first and only time.

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  • Senator Strom Thurmond is mobbed by reporters as he steps from the Senate Chamber after ending his 24-hour, 18-minutes talkathon against the Civil Rights Bill, Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Bettmann/CORBIS

    Talking the Bill to Death?

    Sens. Richard Russell, Strom Thurmond, Robert Byrd and others begin a filibuster that won’t end for more than two months. Thurmond (pictured) calls the act “unconstitutional, unnecessary and unwise.”

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  • U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson shakes the hand of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at the signing of the Civil Rights Act while officials look on, Washington D.C., Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Hulton Archive/Getty Images

    Signed at Last

    In early June, Sen. Everett Dirksen (R-Ill.) engineers a compromise allowing debate to end. The bill prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. It passes June 19; Johnson signs it into law on July 2.

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  • African-Americans registering to vote as part of National Association for the Advancement of Colored People voter registration drive, April 7, 1964., Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    Getty Images

    Voting Rights, With Teeth

    The 1964 act doesn’t end violence against African Americans trying to vote in the South. Congress passes the 1965 Voting Rights Act empowering the government to target states and counties for special enforcement; a 2013 Supreme Court decision alters that power.

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  • Beverly Boatwright assembles parts for a movie camera on April 7, 1967 in Rochester, N.Y., Golden Jubilee of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
    AP Photo

    Equal Opportunity Still Elusive

    The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is founded July 2, 1965, to enforce the part of the 1964 act barring job bias based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin. In 2011 through 2013, about 100,000 charges are filed each year with the EEOC.

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  • Demonstrators opposing the Allan Bakke
    AP Photo/Charles Tasnadi

    Affirmative Action

    In 1978, the case of Allan Bakke, a white applicant to the University of California, Davis, medical school, splits the U.S. Supreme Court. Citing the 1964 act, the court rules against strict racial quotas, but allows schools some leeway in addressing historic discrimination in admissions.

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  • A diverse crowd chants
    Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post/Getty Images

    ‘We Cannot Yet Be Satisfied’

    Speaking on the 49th anniversary of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder acknowledges progress but underscores the law’s unfulfilled promise: “We will never stop fighting to ensure equal rights, equal opportunity and equal justice for all.”

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  • AARP Baby Boomers (Sean McCabe)
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