(Selectively) Celebrating LBJ and the Civil Rights Act

I have a short piece on Minding The Campus today, “Misremembering the Civil Rights Act of 1964,” that I encourage you to read. It discusses the hypocritical praise of Lyndon Johnson and the 1964 Civil Rights Act offered by presidents Obama, Clinton, and Carter, plus assorted civil rights luminaries, at a recent 50th Anniversary celebration at the LBJ Library of that Act’s passage.

I call your attention particularly to my comments about the 1964 Democratic Party platform and LBJ’s famous Howard University speech (“Freedom is not enough …” etc.), which, in my opinion, nearly everyone misinterprets as an early justification for race preference policies.

The Civil Rights Act was signed on July 2, 1964, and there will no doubt be many more 50th Anniversary celebrations misinterpreting it the same way our Democratic presidents have just shamelessly done.

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  1. CaptDMO April 22, 2014 at 10:38 am | | Reply

    Hmmmm…probably why the SCOTUS found that AA actually means what the SCOTUS initially said.

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