The 1964 Civil Rights Act, in conjunction with the Voting Rights
Act of the following year, totally transformed the shape of
American race relations. Supporters of the Civil Rights Act sought,
at minimum, the elimination of racial segregation in publicly
supported schools, hospitals, public transport, and other public
spaces, and an end to open and blatant racial discrimination in
employment practices.
Judged in those terms, the act is a remarkable success story. It
has shown the power of the central government to change deeply
entrenched patterns of behavior. In terms of the law, blacks are no
longer second-class citizens. From other perspectives, however, the
act is seen as a failure. Either it went too far, by
institutionalizing race-specific forms of preferences, or it did
not go far enough, leaving untouched the socioeconomic differences
and lingering effects of past discrimination that perpetuate
race-based inequities.
Legacies of the 1964 Civil Rights Act brings together a
distinguished group of political scientists, historians, lawyers,
statisticians, and sociologists who have written extensively on
civil rights issues. The editor, Bernard Grofman, has asked the
contributors to stand back from the immediate controversies about
civil rights reflected in today's news and to provide historical
and comparative perspective about this important legislation.
Organized into four sections, the book covers the origins of the
act and its historical evolution, its consequences in several
different policy domains, and the future of civil rights in the
United States. An appendix contains two somewhat more technical
essays on legal standards for statutory violations and statistical
issues in measuring discrimination.
Because the moral urgency of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was
triggered by revulsion against racial segregation, the act's legacy
is primarily seen in the life chances of African Americans. This
volume provides a broad and detailed picture of the act's impact on
African Americans' lives.
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