Tea Party Senate Candidate Rand Paul Draws Fire over Civil Rights Criticism

The Afro
Originally published May 23, 2010
by AFRO Staff

The Tea Party supported, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Rand Paul of Kentucky has come under fire for comments he recently made about segregation and the Civil Rights Act of 1964.During the week of May 17, Paul questioned the federal government’s right to desegregate private businesses under the act decades ago. This had been a part of his campaign platform promoting greater restrictions on the federal government’s reach. He nevertheless later said he would have voted in favor of the Civil Rights Act.“I’m opposed to any form of governmental racism or discrimination or segregation,” he told MSNBC's Rachel Maddow. But he said the question of imposing standards on private businesses was “still a valid discussion.”

Full Story: http://www.afro.com/sections/news/national/story.htm?storyid=1300

Transsexual Wins $500, 000 Lawsuit

The New York Times
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:00 a.m. ET
April 29, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A federal judge has awarded a former Army Special Forces commander nearly $500,000 because she was rejected from a job at the Library of Congress while transitioning from a man to a woman.
Diane Schroer of Alexandria, Va., applied for the terrorism analyst job while she was still a man named David Schroer. He was offered the job, but the offer was pulled after he told a library official that he was having surgery to change his gender.
U.S. District Judge James Robinson ruled Tuesday that Schroer was entitled to $491,190 in back pay and damages because of sex discrimination.
The Library of Congress and the Justice Department argued unsuccessfully that discrimination because of transsexuality was not illegal sex discrimination under the Civil Rights Act.
The American Civil Liberties Union had argued the case on Schroer's behalf. Paul Cates with the ACLU's Lesbian and Gay Rights Project said the ruling was significant because a federal judge said that discriminating against someone for changing genders is sex discrimination under federal law.
Schroer is a former U.S. Army colonel who directed a classified group that tracked and targeted terrorists. Schroer retired in 2004 and worked briefly in the private sector before applying for the Congressional Research Service job at the Library of Congress.
After being offered the job, Schroer had lunch with a Library of Congress official and explained the upcoming surgery. Schroer testified the official called the next day and said the position would not be a ''good fit.''

Full Story: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/04/29/us/politics/AP-US-Transsexual-Lawsuit.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

June 19, 1964: Civil Rights Bill Passed, 73-27; Johnson Urges All To Comply; Dirksen Berates Goldwater

The New York Times On this Day
Action By Senate
Revised Measure Now Goes Back to House for Concurrence
By E. W. KENWORTHY

Washington, June 19--The Senate passed the civil rights bill today by a vote of 73 - 27.
The final roll-call came at 7:40 P.M. on the 83d day of debate, nine days after closure was invoked.
Voting for the bill were 46 Democrats and 27 Republicans. Voting against it were 21 Democrats and six Republicans.
Except for Senator Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, all the Democratic votes against the bill came from Southerners.
Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona voted against the bill, as he said yesterday he would. The five other Republicans opposing it all support Mr. Goldwater's candidacy for the Republican Presidential nomination.
They were Bourke B. Hickenlooper of Iowa, chairman of the Senate Republican Policy Committee; Norris Cotton of New Hampshire, Edwin L. Mechem of New Mexico, Milward L. Simpson of Wyoming and a John G. Tower of Texas.
2 Pledge Acceptance
The bill will now go back to the House for concurrence in the changes that the Senate made in the measure the House passed last Feb. 10 by a vote of 290 to 130.
Tonight, Representatives Emanuel Celler, Democrat of New York, and William M. McCulloch, Republican of Ohio, who are the chairman and ranking minority member of the House Judiciary Committee, said that they would accept the Senate version of the bill.
"We believe that the House membership will take the same position," they said.
With the support of these two men, who were responsible for the House bill, acceptance of the Senate bill in the House is assured.
President Johnson hopes to have the bill on his desk by July 3 at the latest so that he can sign it on the Fourth of July.
Powers of the Bill
The bill passed by the Senate outlaws discrimination in places of public accommodation, publicly owned facilities, employment and union membership and Federally aided programs. It gives the Attorney General new powers to speed school desegregation and enforce the Negro's right to vote.
The Senate bill differs from the House measure chiefly in giving states and local communities more scope and time to deal with complaints of discrimination in hiring and public accommodations. It allows the Attorney General to initiate suits in these areas where he finds a "pattern of discrimination, but does not permit him, as did the House bill, to file suits on behalf of individuals.
After the roll-call, several thousand people gathered in the plaza before the floodlit Capitol to applaud the Senate Democratic leader, Mike Mansfield of Montana, and the Republican leader, Everett McKinley Dirksen of Illinois. Mr. Dirksen was instrumental in shaping the compromise that the Senate passed.
Burke Marshall, the Justice Department's civil rights chief, said after the bill was passed tonight that the department would move promptly to enforce the measure.
"I think there is going to be compliance with this bill," Mr. Marshall said. "That's the first thing."
"But where there is a pattern of noncompliance, we will move as expeditiously as possible in the courts."
It was a year ago today, a few weeks after the riots in Birmingham, Ala. that President Kennedy sent a draft civil rights bill to Congress. He concluded his message with these words:
"I ask you to look into your hearts--not in search of charity, for the Negro neither wants nor needs condescension--but for the one plain, proud and priceless quality that united us all as Americans: A sense of justice.
"In this year of the emancipation centennial, justice requires us to insure the blessings of liberty for all Americans and their posterity--not merely for reasons of economic efficiency, world diplomacy and domestic tranquility--but, above all, because it is right."
Tonight the first sign that a vote on the bill was imminent came about 7 o' clock when Senator Mansfield rose and paid tribute to Senator Dirksen, who framed the substitute bill.
"This is his finest hour," Mr. Mansfield said. "The Senate and the whole country are in debt to the Senator from Illinois."
Mr. Mansfield then paid tribute to the "great service" rendered by Senator Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota, the Democratic floor manager of the bill, and Senator Thomas H. Kuchel of California, the Republican floor manager.
'No Sense of Triumph'
Mr. Mansfield said that there was "no room for unwarranted sentiments of victory," and that there should be "no sense of triumph but a profound humility" upon the part of those who had labored and voted for the bill.
Then Mr. Dirksen got up, thanked Mr. Mansfield for his "patience and tolerance" and then went into what will probably be remembered as one of the finest speeches of his career.
The Illinois Republican proceeded to answer Mr. Goldwater's implied rebuke of yesterday when the Arizonan called the rights measure an "unconstitutional" bill.
Mr. Dirksen recalled that on June 5 last year the Republican Conference of the Senate urged the Administration to produce a program to guarantee the rights and privileges of all citizens.
He then addressed himself to Mr. Goldwater's argument that the sections of the bill dealing with public accommodations and employment were an unwarranted extension of the commerce clause of the Constitution.
Social Legislation Cited
Mr. Dirksen tolled a long list of social and economic legislation that had been similarly called unconstitutional when first proposed.
"Today they are accepted," he said, "because they were a forward thrust in the whole effort of mankind." [To read the entire article, go to: http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/big/0619.html#article ]

Restoring Civil Rights

New York Times
Editorial
Restoring Civil Rights
Published: January 30, 2008

In recent decades, and to much public acclaim, Congress passed a series of landmark laws designed to ensure equal rights for all Americans. Lately, and without much notice, the Supreme Court has been gutting them.
Senator Edward Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, has introduced a pair of bills designed to undo the damage done by the court’s badly reasoned decisions. Congress should pass both without delay.
One of the most troubling rulings was in the case of Lilly Ledbetter, a supervisor at a Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company plant who was paid less than her male colleagues after she was given smaller raises over several years. The court’s conservative majority ruled that Ms. Ledbetter had not met the 180-day deadline to file her complaint. It insisted that the 180 days ran from the day the company had made the original decision to give her a smaller raise than the men.
The ruling made no sense, since Ms. Ledbetter was being discriminated against when she made her complaint. As a practical matter, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg noted in a strongly worded dissent, it would have been exceptionally difficult for Ms. Ledbetter to complain when she was first given a lower raise than the male supervisors because Goodyear, like many employers, kept salaries and raises confidential.
The Fair Pay Restoration Act, one of Senator Kennedy’s bills, would undo the injustice of the Ledbetter decision by establishing that the 180-day deadline runs from when a worker receives the unequal pay, not when the employer decided to discriminate. It would make clear that each discriminatory paycheck restarts the clock.
Mr. Kennedy’s other bill, the Civil Rights Act of 2008, would reverse more bad decisions. One of these is a 2001 ruling that says that people who are discriminated against in programs using federal funds can sue only for intentional discrimination, not for actions that have a discriminatory effect. This decision dramatically scaled back protections against discrimination of all kinds.
The civil rights bill would also strengthen age discrimination laws, which the court has repeatedly and shamefully weakened. It would make clear that, contrary to the court’s recent interpretation, federal law barring age discrimination requires the same standard of proof as cases of race, gender and other forms of discrimination. Another provision of the bill would give students in schools that receive federal funds greater protection against harassment.
In the House of Representatives, John Lewis, Democrat of Georgia, has introduced a companion bill to the Senate civil rights bill. The House has already passed its own version of the fair pay law.
Conservatives like to say that the court’s conservative justices believe in applying the law, not making it. But in recent years, the court’s majority has been reading federal anti-discrimination laws far more narrowly than Congress intended — not applying the law, but unmaking it. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/30/opinion/30wed2.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

Former Congressman Hawkins Dies at 100

The Associated Press
Tuesday, November 13, 2007; 5:55 AM

LOS ANGELES -- Augustus Hawkins, who was California's first black congressman and helped form the Congressional Black Caucus, has died. He was 100.
Hawkins died Saturday at Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, Md., of symptoms related to old age, his niece, Susan Jefferson, said Monday.
Hawkins, a Democrat, represented South Los Angeles for more than half a century, first starting off in the state Legislature in 1935 and then getting elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1962.
Black politicians called Hawkins an inspiration and mentor.
"It was Gus Hawkins who gave us the credibility," said Rep. Diane Watson, D-Los Angeles. "It was Gus Hawkins who gave us the ideas. . . . He has left a sterling legacy."
Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Los Angeles, who holds Hawkins' former seat, said in a statement that he was "the author of some of the most significant legislation ever passed in the House . . . particularly in the areas of education and labor. He cared about poor and working people."
Hawkins sponsored the equal employment section of the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act that created the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. He helped create the Congressional Black Caucus in 1971.
Hawkins also co-wrote the Humphrey-Hawkins Act of 1978 that was designed to reduce unemployment and inflation.
Hawkins retired in 1990 and lived in the Washington, D.C., area. He was director of the Hawkins Family Memorial Foundation of Educational Research and Development, which he founded in 1969 to give college scholarships to young women in his district.
Hawkins' first wife, Pegga Adeline Smith, a concert singer, died in 1966. His second wife, Elsie, whom he married in 1977, died two months ago. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/13/AR2007111300332.html