Civil Rights

Question 1

What are Civil Rights?

Answer 1

Citizenship rights guaranteed to the people (primarily in 13th, 14th, 15th, 19th and 26th amendments) and protected by the government.

Question 2

What is the difference between Civil Rights and Civil Liberties?

Answer 2

Civil Liberties are rights individuals hold against the government. Civil Rights concern how fairly and equal groups are being treated.

Question 3

What is the Equal Protection Clause?

Answer 3

Is found in the 14th amendment. All persons born or naturalized in the US are citizens and no state shall make a laws that abridges the priviledge of those.

Question 4

Equal Protection Test?

Answer 4

-Strict Scrutiny
-Intermediate scrutiny
-Rational Basis

Question 5

What is Equality of Opportunity?

Answer 5

Is no discrimination based on group membership, like races, sex, religion, age, etc. Social and economic inequalities between groups are tolerated so long as the differences are not caused by invidiuos discrimination.

Question 6

What is Equality of Result?

Answer 6

Laws and policies enacted to ensure certain preferred outcomes.

Question 7

What is the 13th Amendment?

Answer 7

It works against slavery. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Question 8

14th Amendment

Answer 8

-No state shall pass laws that abridge privileges and immunities.
-All persons born in the US are citizens.
-All persons are due process and equal protection of the law.

Question 9

What is the 15th Amendment?

Answer 9

Right to vote cannot be denied by race, color or previous condition of servitude.

Question 10

What is teh Reconstruction era?

Answer 10

1865-1877
Federal troops occupy southern states and help enforce racial equality.
-Civil rights act of 1866
-Civil RIghts act of 1875

Response to the black codes

Black are elected to the us senate and house.

Question 11

What Jim Crow laws?

Answer 11

Southern laws designed to circumvent the Thirteenth, Fourthteenth and Fifthteenth amendments and to deny Black people rights on bases other than race.

Separate sections in hospitals, separate cemeteries, separate drinking and
toilet facilities, separate schools, and separate public accommodations (inns,
trains, jails, parks, streetcars, lunch counters, etc.)

Question 12

What is Poll tax?

Answer 12

Taxes levied as a qualification for voting

Question 13

What are the grandfather clauses?

Answer 13

Provisions exempting from voting restriction the descendants of those able to vote in 1867.

Question 14

What is the case of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)?

Answer 14

Homer Adolph Plessy sits in a white only section of a train in Luoisiana. The court upholds Plessy’s conviction.

It gives green ligth to the Jim Crow system.

“Separated but equal”

Question 15

What is Brown v. Topeka Board of Education case?

Question 16

What is the case of Heart of Atlanta Motel v. US?

Answer 16

Private discrimination

Question 17

What is the strict scrutiny test?

Answer 17

Applies to classes of people for which discrimination is inherently suspect…Court currently applies this standard to race or religion. Or if a fundamental liberty is at issue.

Question 18

What is Intermediate scrutiny test?

Answer 18

Law or policy must be substantially related to the achievement of an important state interest. Court currently applies this standard to sex.

Question 19

What is the Rational basis test?

Answer 19

Law or policy must be reasonably designed to achieve a legitimate state interest. Applies when groups other than race, religion, or sex treated differently
under the law.

Question 20

What is the suspect category?

Question 21

What is the Quasi-suspect category?

Answer 21

Legal term used in constitutional law to describe a classification based on gender or legitimacy

Question 22

What is Civil Disobedience?

Answer 22

The refusal to comply with certain laws or to pay taxes and fines, as a peaceful form of political protest. Breaking the law – and willfully accepting punishment – to draw attention to unjust laws

Civil Rights Protest Movement

Question 23

What is the Civil Rights Act of 1964?

Answer 23

Prohibits against employment discrimination “because of . . . sex” encompass discrimination based on an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity

Question 24

What is the 24th Amendment?

Answer 24

Banning Poll Taxes (1964)

Question 25

What is the Voting Rights Act of 1965?

Answer 25

1. Bans any voting (e.g., literacy tests, gerrymandering, etc.) requirement or practice that “denies or abridges” the right to vote based on race
2. Vote registration monitoring – Empowers U.S. attorney general to send voter registration supervisors to areas in which fewer than half the eligible minority voters had been registered
3. Preclearance: Voting requirement changes in (mostly) Southern states require pre-approval of Justice
   Dept. or US federal district court of D.C.

Question 26

What is the case of Shelby County v. Holder?

Answer 26

Established formula for determining districts subject to Section 5 “preclearance”. Effectively ends pre-clearance requirement. Court rules that formula was too old, violated state sovereignty

Question 27

What is the case of Romer v. Evans?

Answer 27

Colorado’s Amendment 2 law
prohibited local and state government from
granting the same anti-discrimination protections
enjoyed by minorities and women

Question 28

What is the case of Obergefeel v. Hodges?

Answer 28

Gay couples in Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, Tennessee challenge their states’ bans on gay marriage
* 2014 - U.S. Court of Appeal for the 6th. Circuit upholds the ban
High Court (5-4): Bans on same-sex marriage violate the the 14th Amendment.
* Due Process Clause guarantees certain fundamental liberties associated with personal identity, dignity, and autonomy. Marriage is a liberty.

Question 29

What is the Bakke v. California case?

Answer 29

Allan Bakke = 38-year-old white engineer
* Applies to University of California at Davis
medical school, is rejected
* Sues, claiming “reverse discrimination”
* Cites 14th Amendment, ’64 Civil Rights Act
* UC Davis medical school had special admissions
policy setting aside 16 out of 100 slots for
minorities only. diversity may be a legitimate goal
of an educational institution insofar as it
enhances the education experience.

Question 30

What is the case of SFFA v. Harvard?

Answer 30

Supreme Court (6-3) effectively
nullifies Bakke “diversity” precedent
* Chief Justice Roberts: A college applicant “must
be treated based on his or her experiences as an
individual — not on the basis of race.”
* Suit brought on behalf of Asian students
* Presented evidence that it was more difficult
for Asians to be admitted to Harvard and
UNC than other students (including whites)

Question 31

What is the case of SFFA v. University of North Carolina?