Landmark Civil Rights Judicial Decisions and Legislation

1954 Brown v. Board of Education: U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that segregation in public schools was unconsitutional. This ruling paved the way for large-scale desegragation (e.g. via forced busing) in cities around the country.

1963 24^th Amendment to U.S. Constitution: Abolished poll tax which had been established in eleven Southern states after Reconstruction to make it difficult for poor blacks to vote.

1964 Civil Rights Act of 1964: Prohibited discrimination of all kinds base on race, color, religion or national origin. Validates federal government power over desegregation. Its many provisions dealing with issues such as voting and public accomodations have been expanded and altered through other “CRAs” in 1968, 1970, 1982, and 1991.

1967 Loving v. Virginia: Supreme Court ruled prohibiting interracial marriage is unconstitutional.

1968 Civil Rights Act of 1968: Prohibited discrimination in sale, rental and financing of housing.

1971 Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education: Upheld busing as a legitimate means for achieving integration (this ruling has been sometimes violently opposed).

1991 Civil Rights Act of 1991: Strenghtened existing federal civil rights laws by providing for damages in cases of intentional employment discrimination. Over its many iterations, the CRA has broadened to include discrimination against the aged, pregnant, disabled, and other groups.

2003 Grutter v. Bollinger: U.S. Supreme Court upholds that law schools can consider race and ethnicity in their admissions. “Affirmative action” or the granting of preference to races/ethnicity as a means to correct racial/ethnic imbalances in law schools, etc., was thus upheld.

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