Civil Rights Commission

• Author: Theodore Eisenberg
• Pages: 410

Page 410

THE CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1957 created the Commission on Civil Rights to investigate alleged deprivations of VOTING RIGHTS, to study and collect information concerning denials of EQUAL PROTECTION, and to appraise federal laws and policies with respect to equal protection of the laws. Subsequent legislation restated and expanded the commission's concerns to include denials of rights on the basis of color, race, religion, national origin, sex, age, or handicap. Initially, the commission was to issue a series of reports and expire upon issuance of its final report, but Congress repeatedly has extended the commission's reporting duties and life. The commission lacks power to enforce any antidiscrimination or other CIVIL RIGHTS laws.

By the standards of later civil rights legislation, creation of the commission seems an innocuous event. But at the time even this mild gesture drew substantial southern opposition. The commission's "snoopers," one southern congressman argued, "would cause inestimable chaos, confusion, and unrest among [the South's] people and would greatly increase the tension and agitation between the races there."

Because of the commission's advisory nature, measuring its accomplishments is difficult. In the 1960s, the commission's early reports helped to inform Congress about the need for voting rights legislation. And it clearly has served the function, added to its mandate in 1964, of a national clearinghouse for information about denials of equal protection...