List of landmark African-American legislation

This is a list of landmark legislation, court decisions, executive orders, and proclamations in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

significantly affecting African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

Bills not passed

Lodge Fair Elections bill
Lodge Bill
The Lodge Bill or Federal Elections Bill of 1890 was a bill drafted by Representative Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts, and sponsored in the Senate by George Frisbie Hoar; it was endorsed by President Benjamin Harrison. The bill would have allowed the federal government to ensure that elections...

(1890)
Dyer antilynching bill (1921)
Costigan-Wagner antilynching bill (1934)
Wagner-Gavagan antilynching bill (1940)

Bills signed into law

Ordinance of 1787: The Northwest Territorial Government
Northwest Ordinance
The Northwest Ordinance was an act of the Congress of the Confederation of the United States, passed July 13, 1787...

("Northwest Ordinance")
Fugitive Slave Law of 1793
An Act to prohibit the importation of slaves 1807
Fugitive Slave Law of 1850
Fugitive Slave Law of 1850
The Fugitive Slave Law or Fugitive Slave Act was passed by the United States Congress on September 18, 1850, as part of the Compromise of 1850 between Southern slave holding interests and Northern Free-Soilers. This was one of the most controversial acts of the 1850 compromise and heightened...

- Made any federal marshal
United States Marshals Service
The United States Marshals Service is a United States federal law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice . The office of U.S. Marshal is the oldest federal law enforcement office in the United States; it was created by the Judiciary Act of 1789...

or other official who did not arrest an alleged runaway slave liable to a fine of $1,000
Missouri Compromise
Missouri Compromise
The Missouri Compromise was an agreement passed in 1820 between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in the United States Congress, involving primarily the regulation of slavery in the western territories. It prohibited slavery in the former Louisiana Territory north of the parallel 36°30'...

(1850) - Series of Congressional
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....

legislative measures addressing slavery
Slavery
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...

and the boundaries of territories acquired during the Mexican-American War (1846–1848)
Kansas-Nebraska Act
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854 created the territories of Kansas and Nebraska, opening new lands for settlement, and had the effect of repealing the Missouri Compromise of 1820 by allowing settlers in those territories to determine through Popular Sovereignty if they would allow slavery within...

(1854)
Enrollment Act
Enrollment Act
The Enrollment Act, , enacted March 3, 1863, was legislation passed by the United States Congress during the American Civil War to provide fresh manpower for the Union Army. A form of conscription, the controversial act required the enrollment of every male citizen and those immigrants who had...

(Conscription) - Resulted in Draft Riots
New York Draft Riots
The New York City draft riots were violent disturbances in New York City that were the culmination of discontent with new laws passed by Congress to draft men to fight in the ongoing American Civil War. The riots were the largest civil insurrection in American history apart from the Civil War itself...

in several American cities. Noted for the devastating loss of life and property among African-Americans in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
Civil Rights Act of 1866
Civil Rights Act of 1866
The Civil Rights Act of 1866, , enacted April 9, 1866, is a federal law in the United States that was mainly intended to protect the civil rights of African-Americans, in the wake of the American Civil War...

- Declared that all persons born in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

were now citizens, without regard to race, color, or previous condition
Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands
Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands
The Freedmen's Bureau, was a U.S. federal government agency that aided distressed freedmen in 1865–1869, during the Reconstruction era of the United States....

(1866)
Reconstruction Act
Reconstruction Act
After the end of the Civil War, as part of the on-going process of Reconstruction, the United States Congress passed four statutes known as Reconstruction Acts...

- A series of four acts provided for the division of all former Confederate states into five military districts; Each district would be headed by a military commander, who was charged with ensuring that the states would create new constitutions and ratify the Fourteenth Amendment
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments.Its Citizenship Clause provides a broad definition of citizenship that overruled the Dred Scott v...
Southern Homestead Act of 1866
Southern Homestead Act of 1866
The Southern Homestead Act of 1866 is a United States federal law enacted to break a cycle of debt during the Reconstruction following the American Civil War. Prior to this act, blacks and whites alike were having trouble buying land. Sharecropping and tenant farming had become ways of life. This...
Enforcement Act of 1870 - enacted 31 May 1870
Enforcement Act of 1871 - enacted 20 April 1871
Enforcement Act of 1871 - enacted February 1871
Civil Rights Act of 1871
Civil Rights Act of 1871
The Civil Rights Act of 1871, , enacted April 20, 1871, is a federal law in force in the United States. The Act was originally enacted a few years after the American Civil War, along with the 1870 Force Act. One of the chief reasons for its passage was to protect southern blacks from the Ku Klux...

- Designed to protect southern blacks from the Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...

by providing a civil remedy for abuses then being committed in the South
Amnesty Act
Amnesty Act
The Amnesty Act of May 22, 1872 was a United States federal law that removed voting restrictions and office-holding disqualification against most of the secessionists who rebelled in the American Civil War, except for some 500...

(1872)
Civil Rights Act of 1875
Civil Rights Act of 1875
The Civil Rights Act of 1875 was a United States federal law proposed by Senator Charles Sumner and Representative Benjamin F. Butler in 1870...
Posse Comitatus Act
Posse Comitatus Act
The Posse Comitatus Act is an often misunderstood and misquoted United States federal law passed on June 18, 1878, after the end of Reconstruction. Its intent was to limit the powers of local governments and law enforcement agencies from using federal military personnel to enforce the laws of...

(1878)
Morrill Land Grant Colleges Act (1890) - Required each state to show that race was not an admissions criterion, or else to designate a separate land-grant institution for persons of color. Among the seventy colleges and universities which eventually evolved from the Morrill Acts are several of today's Historically Black colleges and universities
Historically Black Colleges and Universities
Historically black colleges and universities are institutions of higher education in the United States that were established before 1964 with the intention of serving the black community....
Racial Integrity Act of 1924
Racial Integrity Act of 1924
On March 20, 1924 the Virginia General Assembly passed two laws that had arisen out of contemporary concerns about eugenics and race: SB 219, entitled "The Racial Integrity Act" and SB 281, "An ACT to provide for the sexual sterilization of inmates of State institutions in certain cases",...
Civil Rights Act of 1957
Civil Rights Act of 1957
The Civil Rights Act of 1957, , primarily a voting rights bill, was the first civil rights legislation enacted by Congress in the United States since Reconstruction following the American Civil War.Following the historic US Supreme Court ruling in Brown v...
Civil Rights Act of 1960
Civil Rights Act of 1960
The Civil Rights Act of 1960 was a United States federal law that established federal inspection of local voter registration rolls and introduced penalties for anyone who obstructed someone's attempt to register to vote or to vote...
Civil Rights Act of 1964
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a landmark piece of legislation in the United States that outlawed major forms of discrimination against African Americans and women, including racial segregation...
Economic Opportunity Act of 1964
Economic Opportunity Act of 1964
Signed by Lyndon B. Johnson on August 20, 1964, the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 was central to Johnson's Great Society campaign and its War on Poverty. Implemented by the since disbanded Office of Economic Opportunity, the Act included several social programs to promote the health, education,...
Voting Rights Act of 1965
Civil Rights Act of 1968
Civil Rights Act of 1968
On April 11, 1968 U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968, also known as the Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968. Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 is commonly known as the Fair Housing Act, or as CRA '68, and was meant as a follow-up to the Civil Rights Act of 1964...
Civil Rights Act of 1982
Civil Rights Act of 1991
Civil Rights Act of 1991
The Civil Rights Act of 1991 is a United States statute that was passed in response to a series of United States Supreme Court decisions which limited the rights of employees who had sued their employers for discrimination...

U.S. Constitutional Amendments

Thirteenth Amendment
Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution officially abolished and continues to prohibit slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. It was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, passed by the House on January 31, 1865, and adopted on December 6, 1865. On...

(1865)
Fourteenth Amendment
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments.Its Citizenship Clause provides a broad definition of citizenship that overruled the Dred Scott v...

(1868)
Fifteenth Amendment
Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits each government in the United States from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of servitude"...

(1870)
Nineteenth Amendment
Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits any United States citizen to be denied the right to vote based on sex. It was ratified on August 18, 1920....

(1920)
Twenty-fourth Amendment
Twenty-fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Twenty-fourth Amendment prohibits both Congress and the states from conditioning the right to vote in federal elections on payment of a poll tax or other types of tax...

(1964)

Decisions

Prigg v. Pennsylvania
Prigg v. Pennsylvania
Prigg v. Pennsylvania, , was a United States Supreme Court case in which the court held that the Federal Fugitive Slave Act precluded a Pennsylvania state law that gave procedural protections to suspected escaped slaves, and overturned the conviction of Edward Prigg as a result.-Federal Law:In June...

(1842)
Dred Scott v. Sandford
Dred Scott v. Sandford
Dred Scott v. Sandford, , also known as the Dred Scott Decision, was a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that people of African descent brought into the United States and held as slaves were not protected by the Constitution and could never be U.S...

(1857)
Slaughterhouse Cases
Slaughterhouse Cases
The Slaughter-House Cases, were the first United States Supreme Court interpretation of the relatively new Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution...

(1873)
United States v. Cruikshank
United States v. Cruikshank
United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 was an important United States Supreme Court decision in United States constitutional law, one of the earliest to deal with the application of the Bill of Rights to state governments following the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment.-Background:On Easter...

(1876)
United States v. Reese
United States v. Reese
United States v. Reese was an 1876 voting rights case in which the United States Supreme Court upheld such practices as the poll tax, the literacy test, and the grandfather clause...

(1876)
Strauder v. West Virginia
Strauder v. West Virginia
Strauder v. West Virginia, , was a United States Supreme Court case about racial discrimination.-Background:At the time, West Virginia excluded African-Americans from juries. Strauder was a Black man who, at trial, had been convicted of murder by an all-white jury...

(1880)
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 , is a landmark United States Supreme Court decision in the jurisprudence of the United States, upholding the constitutionality of state laws requiring racial segregation in private businesses , under the doctrine of "separate but equal".The decision was handed...

(1896)
Williams v. Mississippi
Williams v. Mississippi
Williams v. Mississippi, 170 U.S. 213 is a United States Supreme Court case that reviewed provisions of the state constitution that set requirements for voter registration...

(1898)
Cumming v. Richmond County Board of Education
Cumming v. Richmond County Board of Education
Cumming v. Richmond County Board of Education, 175 U.S. 528 was a class action suit decided by the Supreme Court of the United States. It is a landmark case, in that it sanctioned de jure segregation of races in American schools. The decision was overruled by Brown v...

(1899)
Guinn v. United States
Guinn v. United States
Guinn v. United States, 238 U.S. 347 , was an important United States Supreme Court decision that dealt with provisions of state constitutions that set qualifications for voters. It found grandfather clause exemptions to literacy tests to be unconstitutional...

(1915)
Nixon v. Herndon
Nixon v. Herndon
Nixon v. Herndon, 273 U.S. 536 , was a United States Supreme Court decision in which the Court struck down a Texas law which forbade blacks from voting in the Texas Democratic primary. Because Texas was a one-party state, the Democratic Party primary was the only competitive process and chance to...

(1927)
Nixon v. Condon
Nixon v. Condon
Nixon v. Condon, 286 U.S. 73 , was a voting rights case decided by the United States Supreme Court, which found the all-white Democratic Party primary in Texas unconstitutional. This was one of four cases brought to challenge the Texas all-white Democratic Party primary...

(1932)
Powell v. Alabama
Powell v. Alabama
Powell v. Alabama was a United States Supreme Court decision which determined that in a capital trial, the defendant must be given access to counsel upon his or her own request as part of due process.-Background of the case:...

(1932)
Grovey v. Townshend (1935)
Breedlove v. Suttles (1937)
Gaines v. Canada
Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada
Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, 305 U.S. 337 , was a United States Supreme Court decision holding that states that provide a school to white students must provide in-state education to blacks as well...

(1938)
New Negro Alliance v. Sanitary Grocery Co.
New Negro Alliance v. Sanitary Grocery Co.
New Negro Alliance v. Sanitary Grocery Co., 303 U.S. 552 , was a landmark United States Supreme Court decision in the jurisprudence of the United States, safeguarding a right to boycott and in the struggle by African Americans against discriminatory hiring practices.-External links:**...

(1938)
Lane v. Wilson (1939)
Chambers v. Florida
Chambers v. Florida
Chambers v. Florida, 309 U.S. 227 , was an important United States Supreme Court case that dealt with the extent that police pressure resulting in a criminal defendant's confession violates the Due Process clause.-Case:...

(1940)
Smith v. Allwright
Smith v. Allwright
Smith v. Allwright , 321 U.S. 649 , was a very important decision of the United States Supreme Court with regard to voting rights and, by extension, racial desegregation. It overturned the Democratic Party's use of all-white primaries in Texas, and other states where the party used the...

(1944)
Shelley v. Kraemer
Shelley v. Kraemer
Shelley v. Kraemer, 334 U.S. 1 , is a United States Supreme Court case which held that courts could not enforce racial covenants on real estate.-Facts of the case:...

(1948)
McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents
McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents
McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, 339 U.S. 637 , was a United States Supreme Court case that reversed a lower court decision upholding the efforts of the state-supported University of Oklahoma to adhere to the state law requiring African-Americans to be provided graduate or professional education...

(overturned low court decision by same name) (1950)
Sweatt v. Painter
Sweatt v. Painter
Sweatt v. Painter, , was a U.S. Supreme Court case that successfully proved lack of equality, in favor of a black applicant, the "separate but equal" doctrine of racial segregation established by the 1896 case Plessy v. Ferguson. The case was also influential in the landmark case of Brown v...

(1950)
Henderson v. United States
Henderson v. United States
Henderson v. United States, 339 U.S. 816 , was a landmark United States Supreme Court decision in the jurisprudence of the United States that abolished segregation in railroad dining cars.-The decision:On May 17, 1942, Elmer W...

(1950)
Brown v. Board of Education - composed of four cases arising from states and a related federal case arising from the District of Columbia
- Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County
  Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County
  Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County was one of the five cases combined into Brown v. Board of Education, the famous case in which the U.S. Supreme Court, in 1954, officially overturned racial segregation in U.S. public schools...
  
  (1951) - the case arising from Virginia
  Virginia
  The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
- Briggs v. Elliott
  Briggs v. Elliott
  Briggs et al. v. Elliott et al., , commonly Briggs v. Elliott, was the first of the five cases combined into Brown v. Board of Education , the famous case in which the U.S. Supreme Court officially overturned racial segregation in U.S. public schools...
  
  (1952) - the case arising from South Carolina
  South Carolina
  South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...
- Gebhart v. Belton
  Gebhart v. Belton
  Gebhart v. Belton, 33 Del. Ch. 144, 87 A.2d 862 , aff'd, 91 A.2d 137 , was a case decided by the Delaware Court of Chancery in 1952 and affirmed by the Delaware Supreme Court in the same year. Gebhart was one of the five cases combined into Brown v...
  
  (1952) - the case arising from Delaware
  Delaware
  Delaware is a U.S. state located on the Atlantic Coast in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered to the south and west by Maryland, and to the north by Pennsylvania...
- Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) - the case arising from Kansas
- Bolling v. Sharpe
  Bolling v. Sharpe
  Bolling v. Sharpe, 347 U.S. 497 , is a landmark United States Supreme Court case which deals with civil rights, specifically, segregation in the District of Columbia's public schools. Originally argued on December 10–11, 1952, a year before Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S...
  
  (1954) - a related case arising from Washington, D.C.
  Washington, D.C.
  Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
Lucy v. Adams
Lucy v. Adams
Lucy v. Adams, , was a U.S. Supreme Court case that successfully established the right of all citizens to be accepted as students at the University of Alabama....

(1955)
NAACP v. Alabama (1958)
Gomillion v. Lightfoot
Gomillion v. Lightfoot
Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 364 U.S. 339 , was a United States Supreme Court decision that found an electoral district created to disenfranchise blacks violated the Fifteenth Amendment.- Decision :...

(1960)
Boynton v. Virginia
Boynton v. Virginia
Boynton v. Virginia, 364 U.S. 454 was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States. The case overturned a judgment convicting an African American law student for trespassing by being in a restaurant in a bus terminal which was "whites only." It held that racial segregation in public...

(1960)
Baker v. Carr
Baker v. Carr
Baker v. Carr, , was a landmark United States Supreme Court case that retreated from the Court's political question doctrine, deciding that redistricting issues present justiciable questions, thus enabling federal courts to intervene in and to decide reapportionment cases...

(1962)
Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States
Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States
Heart of Atlanta Motel Inc. v. United States, 379 U.S. 241 , was a landmark United States Supreme Court case holding that the U.S. Congress could use the Constitution's Commerce Clause power to force private businesses to abide by the Civil Rights Act of 1964.- Background :This important case...

(1964)
McLaughlin v. Florida
McLaughlin v. Florida
McLaughlin v. Florida 379 U.S. 184 , was a case in which the United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously that a cohabitation law of Florida, part of the state's anti-miscegenation laws, was unconstitutional. The law prohibited habitual cohabitation by two unmarried people of opposite sex, if one...

(1964)
New York Times Co. v. Sullivan
New York Times Co. v. Sullivan
New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 , was a United States Supreme Court case which established the actual malice standard which has to be met before press reports about public officials or public figures can be considered to be defamation and libel; and hence allowed free reporting of the...

(1964)
Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections
Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections
Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections, , was a case in which the U.S. Supreme Court found that Virginia's poll tax was unconstitutional under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment...

(1966)
South Carolina v. Katzenbach
South Carolina v. Katzenbach
South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U.S. 301 is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court rejected a challenge by the state of South Carolina to the preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which required that some states submit changes in election districts to the...

(1966)
Loving v. Virginia
Loving v. Virginia
Loving v. Virginia, , was a landmark civil rights case in which the United States Supreme Court, in a unanimous decision, declared Virginia's anti-miscegenation statute, the "Racial Integrity Act of 1924", unconstitutional, thereby overturning Pace v...

(1967)
Jones v. Mayer
Jones v. Mayer
Jones v. Alfred H. Mayer Co., 392 U.S. 409 , is a United States Supreme Court case which held that Congress could regulate the sale of private property in order to prevent racial discrimination: " bars all racial discrimination, private as well as public, in the sale or rental of property, and that...

(1968) - A United States Supreme Court case which held that Congress could regulate the sale of private property in order to prevent racial discrimination
Green v. School Board of New Kent County (1968)
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, 402 U.S. 1 was an important United States Supreme Court case dealing with the busing of students to promote integration in public schools...

(1971)
Milliken v. Bradley
Milliken v. Bradley
Milliken v. Bradley, 418 U.S. 717 , was a significant United States Supreme Court case dealing with the planned desegregation busing of public school students across district lines among 53 school districts in metropolitan Detroit. It concerned the plans to integrate public schools in the United...

(allowed for interdistrict integration) (1974)

Executive Orders and Proclamations

Emancipation Proclamation
Emancipation Proclamation
The Emancipation Proclamation is an executive order issued by United States President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, during the American Civil War using his war powers. It proclaimed the freedom of 3.1 million of the nation's 4 million slaves, and immediately freed 50,000 of them, with nearly...

(1862) - Issued by President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

. It declared that all slaves
Slavery
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...

in Confederate
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...

territory still in rebellion were freed.
Executive Order 8802
Executive Order 8802
Executive Order 8802 was signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 25, 1941, to prohibit racial discrimination in the national defense industry...

(1942) - Issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

. It banned racial discrimination in government departments and defense industries. It also established Fair Employment Practice Committee directed to oversee compliance with the order.
Executive Order 9908 (1946)
Executive Order 9980 (1948)
Executive Order 9981
Executive Order 9981
Executive Order 9981 is an executive order issued on July 26, 1948 by U.S. President Harry S. Truman. It expanded on Executive Order 8802 by establishing equality of treatment and opportunity in the Armed Services for people of all races, religions, or national origins."In 1947, Randolph, along...

(1948) - Issued by President Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...

. It desegregated the armed forces
Armed forces
The armed forces of a country are its government-sponsored defense, fighting forces, and organizations. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body, and to defend that body and the nation it represents from external aggressors. In some countries paramilitary...

.
Executive Order 10577 (1954)
Executive Order 10590 (1955) - Issued by President Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...

. It established the President's Committee on Government Employment Policy. It aimed to eliminate discrimination in federal hiring.
Executive Order 10925
Executive Order 10925
Executive Order 10925 was signed by President John F. Kennedy on March 6, 1961, requiring government contractors to "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin." It...

(1961) - Issued by President John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

. It established the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, which later became the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an independent federal law enforcement agency that enforces laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, perceived intelligence,...

, and requires equal opportunity in placement and promotion in the U.S. military.
Executive Order 11063
Executive Order 11063
Executive Order 11063 was signed by President John F. Kennedy on November 20, 1962. This Order "prohibits discrimination in the sale, leasing, rental, or other disposition of properties and facilities owned or operated by the federal government or provided with federal funds." -References:*...

(1962) - Issued by President John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

. It banned segregation in federally funded housing.
Executive Order 11114 (1963)
Executive Order 11246
Executive Order 11246
Executive Order 11246, signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson on September 24, 1965 required Equal Employment Opportunity. The Order "prohibits federal contractors and federally assisted construction contractors and subcontractors, who do over $10,000 in Government business in one year from...

(1965) - Issued by President Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

. It prohibited discrimination in employment decisions on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
Executive Order 11478
Executive Order 11478
Executive Order 11478, signed by U.S. President Richard M. Nixon on August 8, 1969, prohibited discrimination in the competitive service of the federal civilian workforce on certain grounds...

(1969) - Issued by President Richard M. Nixon. It prohibited discrimination
Discrimination
Discrimination is the prejudicial treatment of an individual based on their membership in a certain group or category. It involves the actual behaviors towards groups such as excluding or restricting members of one group from opportunities that are available to another group. The term began to be...

on certain grounds in the competitive service
Competitive service
The competitive service is a part of the United States federal government civil service. Applicants for jobs in the competitive civil service must compete with other applicants in open competition under the merit system administered by the Office of Personnel Management.According to U.S...

of the federal civilian workforce, including the United States Postal Service
United States Postal Service
The United States Postal Service is an independent agency of the United States government responsible for providing postal service in the United States...

and civilian employees of the United States Armed Forces
United States armed forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. They consist of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard.The United States has a strong tradition of civilian control of the military...

.

Federal bureaucracy

Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands
Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands
The Freedmen's Bureau, was a U.S. federal government agency that aided distressed freedmen in 1865–1869, during the Reconstruction era of the United States....

(June 1865 through December 1868)
Fair Employment Practice Committee
Fair Employment Practices Commission
The Fair Employment Practices Commission implemented US Executive Order 8802, requiring that companies with government contracts not to discriminate on the basis of race or religion. It was intended to help African Americans and other minorities obtain jobs in the homefront industry...

(1941)
President's Committee on Civil Rights
President's Committee on Civil Rights
The President's Committee on Civil Rights was established by Executive Order 9808, which Harry Truman, who was then President of the United States, issued on December 5, 1946. The committee was instructed to investigate the status of civil rights in the country and propose measures to strengthen...

(December 1946 through December 1947)
Civil Rights Commission
United States Commission on Civil Rights
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is historically a bipartisan, independent commission of the U.S. federal government charged with the responsibility for investigating, reporting on, and making recommendations concerning civil rights issues that face the nation.-Commissioners:The Commission is...

(created 1957)
Civil Rights Division in the Department of Justice
United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division
The U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division is the institution within the federal government responsible for enforcing federal statutes prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, sex, disability, religion, and national origin. The Division was established on December 9, 1957, by...

(created 1957)
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an independent federal law enforcement agency that enforces laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, perceived intelligence,...

(created 1964)
Head Start (created 1965)
National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders
Kerner Commission
The National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as the Kerner Commission after its chair, Governor Otto Kerner, Jr. of Illinois, was an 11-member commission established by President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the causes of the 1967 race riots in the United States and to provide...

(created 1967)

Important Organizations and Individuals

NAACP
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund
The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. is a leading United States civil rights organization and law firm based in New York City....
The Communist Party USA and African-Americans
Congressional Black Caucus
Congressional Black Caucus
The Congressional Black Caucus is an organization representing the black members of the United States Congress. Membership is exclusive to blacks, and its chair in the 112th Congress is Representative Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri.-Aims:...