The Civil Rights Act of 1968, also known as the Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968, (Pub.L. 90-284, 82 Stat. 73, enacted April 11, 1968) was a landmark piece of legislation in the United States that provided for equal housing opportunities regardless of race, creed, or national origin. The Act was signed into law during the King assassination riots by President Lyndon B. Johnson, who had previously signed the landmark Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act into law.
Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 is commonly known as the Fair Housing Act and was meant as a follow-up to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. While the Civil Rights Act of 1866 prohibited discrimination in housing, there were no federal enforcement provisions. The 1968 act expanded on previous acts and prohibited discrimination concerning the sale, rental, and financing of housing based on race, religion, national origin, and since 1974, gender; since 1988, the act protects people with disabilities and families with children.
Victims of discrimination may use both the 1968 act and the 1866 act via section 1983 to seek redress. The 1968 act provides for federal solutions while the 1866 act provides for private solutions (i.e., civil suits). A rider attached to the bill makes it a felony to "travel in interstate commerce... with the intent to incite, promote, encourage, participate in and carry on a riot..." This provision has been criticized for "equating organized political protest with organized violence."
Read more about Civil Rights Act Of 1968: Political Context, Types of Banned Discrimination, Subsequent Legislative and Judicial Changes, Lawful Discrimination, Housing Discrimination, Social Steering, Redlining, Segregation Index, Legislation, Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity, Violations of The Fair Housing Act, Hate Crimes Provisions
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“He was one whose glory was an inner glory, one who placed culture above prosperity, fairness above profit, generosity above possessions, hospitality above comfort, courtesy above triumph, courage above safety, kindness above personal welfare, honor above success.”
—Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 1, ch. 1 (1962)
“Virtue and vice suppose the freedom to choose between good and evil; but what can be the morals of a woman who is not even in possession of herself, who has nothing of her own, and who all her life has been trained to extricate herself from the arbitrary by ruse, from constraint by using her charms?... As long as she is subject to man’s yoke or to prejudice, as long as she receives no professional education, as long as she is deprived of her civil rights, there can be no moral law for her!”
—Flora Tristan (1803–1844)
“Standards of conduct appropriate to civil society or the workings of a democracy cannot be purely and simply applied to the Church.”
—Joseph Ratzinger (b. 1927)
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—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one’s self-esteem. That is why young children, before they are aware of their own self-importance, learn so easily; and why older persons, especially if vain or important, cannot learn at all.”
—Thomas Szasz (b. 1920)