The Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Passage of the Law That Ended Racial Segregation
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Tells the story (in the participants' own words) of how a determined southern filibuster was turned back in the U. S. Senate and the 1964 Civil Rights Act made into law.
Description
This book details, in a series of first-person accounts, how Hubert Humphrey and other dedicated civil rights supporters fashioned the famous cloture vote that turned back the determined southern filibuster in the U. S. Senate and got the monumental Civil Rights Act bill passed into law. Authors include Humphrey, who was the Democratic whip in the Senate at the time; Joseph L. Rauh, Jr., a top Washington civil rights lobbyist; and John G. Stewart, Humphrey's top legislative aide. These accounts are essential for understanding the full meaning and effect of America's civil rights movement.
Robert D. Loevy is Professor of Political Science at Colorado College. He is the author of To End All Segregation: The Politics of the Passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and The Flawed Path to the Presidency 1992: Unfairness and Inequality in the Presidential Selection Process, the latter published by SUNY Press. He is also the co-author of Colorado Politics and Government: Governing the Centennial State (with Thomas E. Cronin) and American Government: We Are One (with John R. Whitman, et al.).
Reviews
"Loevy's volume supplements the academic studies with contemporaneous, first-person accounts by participants in this historic legislative struggle. Senator Humphrey and Joe Rauh were major participants, and although not as well known, Professor Stewart was an important behind-the-scenes staffperson. The material therefore constitutes an important supplement to the documentary record on the civil rights era. Even the specialist thoroughly familiar with the civil rights movement generally and the Civil Rights Act specifically will find useful information and insights, especially in Stewart's essay. The specialist on Congress will also find in the volume interesting anecdotes about the interactions and interrelationships of Senate norms, rules, and procedures and personalities in the shaping of intensely controversial legislation." — Robert C. Smith, San Francisco State University
"Loevy does a wonderful, almost incredible job of summarizing 200 years of civil rights in the Introduction, and the selections in the book shed new light on the 1964 civil rights legislative struggle." — James W. Riddlesperger, Jr., Texas Christian University
"This book brings together in one volume material that is not available elsewhere, and which is fascinating and very informative for students and scholars studying this period. It is a very valuable addition for all undergraduate and graduate libraries, as well as public libraries." — Janet M. Martin, Bowdoin College