Act that reinforced the end of racial segregation.
The Civil Rights Act of 1968 passed Congress on April 11, 1968, after a two-year struggle to include an open housing act under the broad umbrella of civil rights. The assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King on April 4,1968, guaranteed the passage of this law and prompted members of Congress to attach a provision to the act that made crossing state lines for purposes of inciting disorder a federal crime.
This legislation prohibits housing discrimination in sales and rentals based on race, color, national origin, or religion. It also eliminated a major legal obstacle to racial equality and concluded an important legislative epoch that began with the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954) that ended segregation in public schools.
