'A Stone of Hope': The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Its Impact on the Economic Status of Black Americans

• Author: Jenny Bourne
• Pages: 1194-1225

Louisiana Law Review

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“A Stone of Hope”: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and

Its Impact on the Economic Status of Black

Americans1

Jenny Bourne∗

INTRODUCTION

Fifty years ago, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (CRA) carved

American law anew.2 In particular, Title VII forbade employers,

employment agencies, and labor organizations larger than a certain

size from discriminating against individuals due to their race, color,

religion, sex, or national origin.3 Some have viewed Title VII as

mostly symbolic because the Equal Employment Opportunity

Commission (EEOC) established by the CRA initially had very

limited power and resources. Others have considered it merely a

continuation of change already in progress or a minor factor in

improving the economic status of black Americans. In this Article, I

examine the impact of Title VII on labor-market outcomes with

high-precision data samples drawn from the U.S. federal censuses

for 1940 through 2000 and the 2010 American Community Survey.4

I find that real wages among employed, black, male household

heads aged 20 to 60 years old increased sharply during the 1960s

Copyright 2014, by JENNY BOURNE.

1. T he title comes from a sermon delivered by Reverend Martin Luther

King, Jr., at the National Cathedral on March 31, 1968. Martin Luther King, Jr.,

Remaining Awake Thr ough a Great Revolution ( Mar. 31, 1968), available at

http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/encyclopedia/documentsentry/doc_re

maining_awake_through_a_great_r evolution [http://perma.cc/A4A4-5CMW]

(archived Apr. 6, 2014) (“[W]e will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair

the stone of hope.”).

∗ Professor and Chair of Economics Department, Carleton College,

Northfield, Minnesota. Professor Bourne gratefully acknowledges the superb

editorial assistance given by Katherine Dampf and other members of the

Louisiana Law Review.

2. Civil Rights Act of 1964, Pub. L. No. 88-352, 78 Stat. 241.

3. Title VII applied only to entities with 100 or more employees or members

in the first year of enactment. Title VII, § 701(b) (1964). The relevant numbers

were 75 for the second year, 50 for the third year, and 25 thereafter. Title VII,

§ 701(e) (1964). Executive Order 11246 established the Office of Federal Contract

Compliance prohibiting racial discrimination among federal contractors with at

least 50 employees. Exec. Order No. 11246, 30 Fed. Reg. 12319 (Sept. 24, 1965).

4. Steven Ruggles, J. Trent Alexander, Katie Genadek, Ronald Goeken,

Matthew Schroeder & Ma tthew Sobek, Integrated Public Use Microdata Series:

Version 5.0, IPUMS USA, https://usa.ipums.org/usa (last visited Mar. 10, 2014). I

used the 1% IPUMS samples for 1940–1970 and 2010 and the 5% samples for

1980–2000, appropriately weighted.

1196 LOUISIANA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 74

across all ages and educational levels.5 The largest spike in gains

went to black men living in states covered by the Voting Rights Act

of 1965 (VRA),6 particularly high school dropouts. On average, real

wages increased both in absolute terms and relative to the wages of

white men living in the same region. The growth rate in real wages

for black men living in VRA states exceeded that for black men

living elsewhere and for all white men from the 1960s onward, with

the largest difference occurring in the decade of the ‘60s. Notably,

employed black men living in VRA states earned less than half as

much as employed black men of comparable age and educational

background living in non-VRA states in the years 1940 to 1960, but

the discount shrank significantly—to 30%—in 1970. Some of this

was due to occupational shifts that would not have been possible

before the CRA.

These results comport with those found by Nobel laureate James

Heckman, who is a leading supporter of the view that Title VII

indeed mattered for the economic status of blacks, despite little

funding to support its lofty goals. Part of the credit may be due to

5. The sample used throughout the Article consists of male household heads

aged 20 to 60 years old. Focusing on this group isolates the experience of the

primary bread-winner in families that were headed by men. In a tiny number of

cases, these individuals were recorded as spouses of household heads. Because

market outcomes may differ across gender due to differences in non-market

activities, like housework and child care, see, e.g., Joni Hersch & Leslie S.

Stratton, Housework and Wages, 37 J. OF HUM. RES. 217 (2002), I chose to focus

on men only. In other work, I find that black women in 2000 participated more in

the labor force than white women and their wages were close to parity after

controlling for a ge, education, demographic, a nd household tr aits. Jenny Bour ne

Wahl, Residential Segregation and Labor-Market Outcomes: The Importance of

Race, Gender, and Marital Status (Carleton College Department of Economics,

Working Paper No. 2008-01, 2008), available at apps.carleton.edu/curricular

/econ/assets/2008_01.pdf . Earlier work on female labor-market outcomes by race

includes: Francine D. Blau & Andrea H. Beller, Black-White Earnings Over the

1970s and 1980s: Gender Differences in Trends, 74 REV. ECON. & STATS. 276

(1992) (finding that black women enjoyed even greater increases in annual

earnings in the 1970s and 1980s than black men, as compared to their white

counterparts) and James S. Cunningham & Nadja Zalokar, The Economic

Progress of Black Women, 1940–1980: Occupational Distribution and Relative

Wages, 45 INDUS. & LAB. REL. REV. 540 (1992).

6. Voting Rights Act of 1965, Pub. L. No. 89-110, 79 Stat. 437. The VRA

was designed to remove remaining barriers to suffrage in states or districts where

fewer than 50% of blacks were registered to vote. Id. States covered by the

original legislation were Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South

Carolina, and Virginia. Id. In addition, the 1965 Act covered several counties in

North Carolina. Id. The Act was amended to include more jurisdictions in 1970

and 1975, including the states of Alaska, Arizona, and Texas as well as various

municipalities and counties. Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1970, Pub. L. 91-

285; Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1975, Pub. L. 94-73.