The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

Civil Rights Expanded: Contemporary Efforts

CIVIL RIGHTS, at least for many Americans in the 20th century, is often considered synonymous with the African American and Latino freedom struggles - the protests and demonstrations led by Martin Luther King, Jr. in the South and the marches of striking farmworkers led by Cesar Chavez in the West. Both were - and continue as - nonviolent movements by people of color, victims of discrimination because of their race and national origin as they sought equal opportunity under the law.

BUT AFRICAN AMERICANS AND LATINOS have not been alone in their quest for equality. Others who faced discrimination for a variety of reasons -- such as gender, sexual orientation, disability, age, religion -- have also waged campaigns to end bias and to receive equal treatment on the American political and economic landscape.

THE 1954 SCHOOL DESEGREGATION DECISION and 1956 Montgomery bus boycott, while focusing public attention on discrimination against African Americans, also rekindled a drive for equality that spread well beyond the African American community. The civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s inspired Latinos, Native Americans, Asian Americans, women, and, more recently, people with disabilities and gay and lesbian people. The African American civil rights struggle provided not only the vision of equal opportunity, but also many of the tools and techniques for the movements that followed, including the use of the law, lobbying, and nonviolent direct action.