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Article: How civil rights became affirmative action
- Article from:
- Chicago Sun-Times
- Article date:
- July 11, 1986
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright (null) Chicago Sun-Times. (Hide copyright information)
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The recent Supreme Court decisions upholding affirmative action
have been praised by many as advancing the cause of civil rights. In
fact, however, the decisions perpetuate a radical concept of civil
rights that has little to do with the original ideals of the civil
rights movement or the explicit provisions of the 1964 Civil Rights
Act.
As originally understood, civil rights meant that individuals
were to be treated equally under the law. The leaders of the civil
rights movement repeatedly stressed the irrelevance of race as a
criteria in evaluating people. In 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
said he dreamed of the day when his children would live in a nation
where "they will not be ...