Albany Government Law Review, 2012/01/01, Vol: 5, p440
Subjects
civil procedure, civil rights law, constitutional law, copyright law, education law, family law, governments, healthcare law, labor employment law, military veterans law, public health welfare law, and transportation law
Abstract
Introduction Presidents, using their executive power, play a central role in the advancement of civil rights in America. One of the most noteworthy acts in this regard was President Harry S. Truman's decision to end racial segregation of the U.S. military, 1 which took place before the Supreme Court decided Brown v. Board of Education 2 in 1954, and before Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. 3 President Truman accomplished this, not through legislation, but through an executive order. 4 His executive order, in turn, built on an earlier one signed by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, prohibiting racial discrimination in the defense industry. 5 Both presidents nudged the federal government closer towards the goal of greater racial equality at a time when it was extremely difficult to move affirmative civil rights legislation through the Congress. Only after these executive orders did Congress pass important civil rights legislation - landmark bills to prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, religion, national origin, gender, and disability in employment, public accommodations, housing, and education, ensuring equal opportunities to millions of Americans. 6 For lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals, whose efforts to achieve equal opportunity and protection from discrimination are only measurably advanced in recent decades, the trajectory is arguably similar. Executive branch actions to expand civil rights preceded legislative advances, but that was not always the case when it came to equal opportunity for LGBT individuals. During the mid-twentieth century, as executive ...