| Term | Definition |
|---|
| civil rights | Policies designed to protect people against arbitrary or discriminatory treatment by government officials or individuals |
| Fourteenth Amendment | The constitutional amendment adopted after the Civil War that states, "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." |
| equal protection of the laws | Part of the Fourteenth Amendment emphasizing that the laws must provide equivalent "protection" to all people. |
| Thirteenth Amendment | The constitutional amendment ratified after the Civil War that forbade slavery and involuntary servitude. |
| Civil Rights Act of 1964 | The law that made racial discrimination against any group in hotels, motels, and restaurants illegal and forbade many forms of job discrimination |
| suffrage | The legal right to vote, extended to African Americans by the Fifteenth Amendment, to women by the Nineteenth Amendment, and to people over the age of 18 by the Twenty-sixth Amendment. |
| Fifteenth Amendment | The constitutional amendment adopted in 1870 to extend suffrage to African Americans. |
| poll taxes | Small taxes levied on the right to vote that often fell due at a time of year when poor African-American sharecroppers had the least cash on hand. This method was used by most Southern states to exclude African Americans from voting. Poll taxes were declared void by the Twenty-fourth Amendment in 1964. |
| White primary | One of the means used to discourage African-American voting that permitted political parties in the heavily Democratic South to exclude African Americans from primary elections, thus depriving them of a voice in the real contests. The Supreme Court declared White primaries unconstitutional in 1944. |
| Twenty-fourth Amendment | The constitutional amendment passed in 1964 that declared poll taxes void in federal elections. |
| Voting Rights Act of 1965 | A law designed to help end formal and informal barriers to African American suffrage. Under the law, hundreds of thousands of African Americans were registered and the number of African American elected officials increased dramatically. |
| Nineteenth Amendment | The constitutional amendment adopted in 1920 that guarantees women the right to vote. |
| Equal Rights Amendment | A constitutional amendment originally introduced in Congress in 1923 and passed by Congress in 1972, stating that "equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex." Despite public support, the amendment failed to acquire the necessary support from three-fourths of the state legislatures. |
| comparable worth | The issue raised when women who hold traditionally female jobs are paid less than men for working at jobs requiring comparable skill |
| Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 | A law passed in 1990 that requires employers and public facilities to make "reasonable accommodations" for people with disabilities and prohibits discrimination against these individuals in employment. |
| affirmative action | A policy designed to give special attention to or compensatory treatment for members of some previously disadvantaged group |
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