Free
To some, the passage of civil rights legislation and the death of Martin Luther King Jr. meant the end of the civil rights movement.
But others recognize that the struggle still goes on everywhere.
◀ The civil rights movement focused mainly on segregation in the South. But the North also had segregated neighborhoods, as well as segregated schools and other institutions. In 1974, a judge ruled that the Boston School Committee had deliberately promoted school segregation and had to end it. A plan to bus students out of neighborhood schools to achieve integration met with violent resistance.
Hundreds of years of discrimination have left Black people, as well as other minority groups and women, at a disadvantage. They have fewer educational and economic opportunities than White men. Affirmative action is a policy that calls for colleges and employers to make special efforts to recruit and hire qualified members of minority groups. Some call this reverse discrimination. Others note that women and minorities still earn less and have fewer opportunities than White men. ▶
▲ In many cities, school integration produced a phenomenon called “White flight” to the suburbs. As a result of that and a backlash against busing for integration, many schools have become resegregated. In 1979, Linda Brown, subject of the 1954 Supreme Court case that ruled against segregation, brought a new lawsuit against the Topeka school system. It said that her own children were receiving a segregated education. In 1989, a district court determined that segregation did exist in the Topeka schools. In 1993, the Supreme Court refused to review the case, returning it to the district court. In 1994, a plan to better integrate the schools was put into effect. This resulted in the Topeka schools reaching court standards of racial balance by 1998.
◀ The end of legal segregation did not wipe out racism directed against Black people. Studies have shown that in many communities, the police are more likely to stop and question Black citizens than White citizens without cause. This practice is a form of discrimination known as racial profiling.
Twenty-First-Century Firsts
The civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s left a living legacy in many areas, including government. In 2008, Americans elected the first Black president. That was possible because of the efforts of the men and women who fought so hard and so bravely for civil rights and equality. We can’t say inequality has been wiped out. But we can be proud that, in the twenty-first century, we have seen many historic “firsts.”
Barack Obama
First Black President
2008–2012
2012–2016
Here are a few more notable twenty-first-century firsts: ▼
Colin Powell
First Black Secretary of State—principal advisor to President George W. Bush on U.S. foreign policy
2001–2004
Condoleezza Rice
First Black National Security Advisor—principal advisor to President George W. Bush on national security issues
2001–2005
First Female Black Secretary of State—principal advisor to President George W. Bush on U.S. foreign policy
2005–2009
Eric Holder
First African American Attorney General—head of the Department of Justice and chief law officer of the federal government
