Civil Liberties and Civil Rights

Civil Liberties or Civil Rights? Civil liberties are those personal freedoms that are protected for all individuals and that generally deal with individual freedom. Civil liberties typically involve restraining the government’s actions against individuals. Civil rights are those rights rooted in the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection under the law. The term refers to the positive acts of government that seek to make constitutional guarantees a reality for all people. Protections FROM discrimination based on such characteristics as race, gender, religion and national origin.

The Bill of Rights The Bill of Rights are the first ten amendments to the Constitution. They were added to the document as a compromise between the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists.

Civil Liberties Bill of Rights First Amendment Establishment Clause (Engle v. Vitale* 1962, Lemon v. Kurtzman 1971, “Lemon Test”) The Free Exercise Clause (Wisconsin v. Yoder*) 1972 Freedom of Expression Clear & Present Danger Test (Schenck v. United States 1919)* Symbolic Expression (Tinker v. DesMoines* 1969, Texas v. Johnson 1989) Obscene Material (Miller v. California 1973) Press (New York Times Co. v. United States* 1971)

The Second Amendment – the “true” meaning? McDonald v. Chicago 2010 Fourth Amendment ( Weeks v. United States 1914 (exclusionary rule,) Mapp v. Ohio 1961) Fifth Amendment (Miranda v. Arizona 1966) Sixth Amendment (Gideon v. Wainwright*1963) Eighth Amendment (Furman v. Georgia 1972, Gregg v. Georgia 1976) Ninth Amendment (Griswold v. Connecticut 1965, Roe v. Wade* 1973)

Civil Rights The “Slavery” Amendments – 13th, 14th, 15th The Thirteenth Amendment (1865) abolished slavery The Fourteenth Amendment (1868) guaranteed citizenship, privileges and immunities, due process and equal protection The Fifteenth Amendment (1870) extended the right to vote to African American men

Civil Rights Barriers to Civil Rights – poll tax, racial segregation, separate-but-equal (Plessy v. Ferguson 1896) Civil Rights Movement: NAACP, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas* 1954, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Civil Disobedience, Letter from a Birmingham Jail* 1963 The Civil Rights Act of 1964, The Voting Rights Act of 1965 (ended the literacy test), Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg 1971 De Jure v. De Facto Segregation

Extension of Civil Rights Native Americans Women, 19th Amendment, Equal Pay Act of 1963, NOW, and Title IX, Defeat of the ERA 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act Aegism Gay Rights (LGBTQ) and Equality, DOMA, Obergefell v. Hodges Affirmative Action