“C” is for Civil Rights Act (1964)

“C” is for Civil Rights Act (1964). The Civil Rights Act of 1964 addressed all spheres of public life--social, political, and economic. It guaranteed all American citizens access to public facilities, accommodations, and schools that received federal money, as well as ensuring their ability to vote in federal elections and to be employed on a nondiscriminatory basis. The act proved to be important in ending segregation and discrimination in South Carolina's public schools and public accommodations. Prior to the passage of the act, the sit-in movement of 1960 as well as other civil rights agitation in South Carolina had made some progress. The Civil Rights Act of 1964—the most comprehensive federal civil rights legislation since Reconstruction-- served to encourage and to legitimize the process of desegregation that the state’s African American and White leaders had already undertaken.