Month: December 2016

When we think of civil rights, most of us think about the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, when our nation made huge forward leaps in racial equality. However, the most important moment for civil rights in American happened long before the 1960s. We need to look back further to the creation of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, which represent the most pivotal expansions of civil rights in America. The Thirteenth Amendment -- ratified by the states in 1865 -- officially abolished slavery in the United States. What happened after the Thirteenth Amendment is...

While the fight against segregation was supposedly settled years ago, researchers are finding that there is still evidence of racial separation. Scientists at UCLA began a research project 60 years after the famous Brown v Board of Education ruling to discern whether or not the United States has become truly equal for all races. The Latino influx   Researchers found that, while original segregation issues focused on the mistreatment of blacks, Latinos are now being separated just as dramatically. Metropolitan areas with the biggest populations proved to be the most segregated,...

A police chief in a neighboring state was accused of promoting racial profiling tactics after an email he wrote surfaced publicly. The email stated that racial profiling serves a purpose in law enforcement when carried out correctly. More specifically, the email, written in 2014, said that black gang members from a neighboring city frequently carry out crimes in their city, Wyckoff, and this is why officers target black individuals present in white neighborhoods. After the email surfaced, the police chief announced that he would resign from his position following a 180-day suspension that...