Affirmative Action Essay Research Paper Affirmativeaction is

Affirmative Action Essay, Research Paper

Affirmative

action is described as the term meant taking appropriate steps to eradicate the

then widespread practices of racial, religious, and ethnic discrimination. The

history of affirmative action starts a long time before this definition was

stated during the early 1960’s. It starts back to the Declaration of

Independence where it states all men are created equal. It moves toward the

Emancipation Proclamation, the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments which involved

the freeing of slaves, abolishing slavery, conferred citizenship on all persons

born in the United States, and guaranteeing voting rights to all citizens. There

were also many court cases that helped move forth into affirmative action. A few

examples would be Buchanan v. Warley, Plessy v. Ferguson, and Brown v. Board of

Education. The latter court case was a real firestorm over affirmative action,

which ruled that all local, state, and federal laws that enforced segregation in

education was striked down. President John F. Kennedy first used the phrase

"Affirmative Action" when he issued Executive Order 10952. This order

created the Equal Opportunity Commission or the EEOC and contractors on projects

financed with federal funds to "take affirmative action to ensure that

applicants are employed, ant employees are treated during their employment

without regard to race, creed, color, or national origin." President

Kennedy also pushed for more legislation but was not alive to see it go through.

Proceeding Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson took over the fight and pushed for the

passing of Civil Rights Act of 1964, which barred discrimination in the variety

of private and public settings. It included prohibiting discrimination in

private facilities, outlawed discrimination in federally-funded-programs, and

prohibited discrimination by both private and public employers and so forth.

Still under Johnson’s control, the Executive Order 11246, placed the

responsibility for affirmative action enforcement with the Department of Labor.

This lead to the OFCCP, which is the Department’s Office of Federal Contract

Compliance Program, which made Affirmative Action stronger in for contractors

and made them submit affirmative action plans. LBJ did much for affirmative