Time to Put an End to Affirmative Action Essay - 1974 Words

Time to Put an End to Affirmative Action Affirmative action is the set of public policies and initiatives designed to help eliminate past and present discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. This set of public policies has had quite a history beginning with the Thirteenth Amendment, which made slavery illegal. The Thirteenth Amendment was followed by the Fourteenth, that guarantees equal protection under the law. The Fifteenth Amendment brought up the rear, which forbids racial discrimination in access to voting. When affirmative action was set into place during the 1960s it was needed and very necessary. Although in history the need for affirmative action is obvious, it has reached the point where†¦show more content†¦Roosevelt signed Executive Order 8802 which outlawed segregationist hiring policies by defense-related industries which held federal contacts (Sykes, 1995). This order was brought about because of the actions of a Black trade union leader, A. Philip Randolph. During Har ry Trumans second term, in 1953, his Committee on Government Contract Compliance urged the Bureau of Employment Security to act positively and affirmatively to implement the policy of nondiscrimination (ibid). Finally, after 58 years, the Supreme Court overturned Plessy v. Ferguson, and therefore the separate, but equal doctrine with Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. The term affirmative action was first used in 1965 by President Lyndon Johnson in Executive Order 11246, which mandated federal employees 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 (ibid). This Executive Order was expanded 2 years later, in 1967, to include affirmative action requirements to cover women. There were two more laws passed in the 1960s to make discrimination illegal. The first of which was the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Within this act, Titles II and VII forbid racial discr imination in public accommodations and race and sex discrimination in employment. The next act to make discrimination illegal was the 1965 Voting Rights Act, adopted after a probe by Congress foundShow MoreRelated Its Time to Put and End to Affirmative Action Essay1586 Words   |  7 Pages Affirmative action should be changed or ended altogether In the late Sixties, Martin Luther King Jr. fought hard for equal rights. Before he was assassinated in 1968, he made a speech about his vision of human equality. â€Å"I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.† (King) The Sixties were a turning point for racial equality. 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Therefore, in situations like job and university applications, we should consider minorities to be as feasible a choice for hire as a white male candidate, taking into consideration their background. In short, it tries to give minorities that have been at a disadvantage their wholeRead MoreAffirmative Action Is The Current Method For Combating Systematic Racism1602 Words   |  7 PagesAffirmative action is the current method for combatting the systematic racism and general bigotry that has long plagued American society. It is a source of much debate, both from the legal and moral perspectives. When it comes to higher education, it has been the subject of serval Supreme court decisions and many philosophical papers. Affirmative action’s stance makes a statement about how American society intends to handle its problems of bigotry; if it wants to ignore them, or if it wants to choose