A woman has a right to an abortion up to the second trimester. This Court sought to expand individual liberties. You need to know how social, legal, political, economic and systemic factors affect civil rights. The difference between strict scrutiny, rational scrutiny, and intermediate scrutiny is important. For each group discussed in the chapter, you should be able to identify the key civil rights issues for the group and some of the key legal decisions affecting the civil rights of that group.
Civil liberties are liberties proctected from governmental intrusion.
Restrictive covenants in housing, the white primary elections, and other devices were used to deprive them of civil rights. In the 1960's, Affrimative Action programas were instituted based on the idea that everyone should have a chance to compete for employment and that when candidates had comparable qualifications, opportunity should be granted to members of groups that had been victimized by discrimination. Later, diversity notions of affirmative action were introduced that substituted the notion of representation for the earlier notion of competition. More recently, the court has become suspicious of diversity and has narrowed the scope of relief through affirmative action. Racial discrimnination is treated with strict scrutiny by the court and all racial classifications are treated as suspect.