Why do people give Democrats the credit for the advancement of civil rights?

Question

Since every major step forward, from the abolition of slavery, to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, has been introduced by Republicans.

Ellinorianne, the Civil Rights Act of 1875 was proposed by a Republican.

Some people seem unwilling to recognize the massive contributions that Republicans have made to the Civil Rights Movement. Very strange.

jehen, Earl Warren was a conservative Republican.

Answer 1

Do you really think if Nixon had been president in 1964 that he would have signed that bill. I doubt that it would have even come up for consideration.

Answer 2

Truman (a democrat) integrated the armed forces.

Earl Warren (the Warren Court) ushered in the modern era of civil rights with the Brown v Board of Education case that ended 'separate but equal'. He was a Republican, but was branded a traitor and liberal by the Republican power structure of the day. Eisenhower, a Republican, called the appointment of Earl Warren his biggest mistake.

LBJ (a democrat) signed the voting rights act and the civil rights legislation passed by a democrat controlled house and Senate.
Barry Goldwater (a republican) stood against all of this legislation as did Ronald Regan, then Governor of California.

So I think is manifestly clear why the democrats get credit for the advancement of civil rights. It was the Democrats that did it and it was the Republicans (and southern democrats that are all now Republican) that stood in their way.

Answer 3

Because the Civil Rights Act was signed into law by a Democrat President, LBJ, who was running for re-election that year and his running mate, Humphrey, was also a prime sponsor of that legislation, and because LBJ's opponent in that year's Presidential election was Sen. Goldwater, who had voted against that legislation. And all of the above facts I just mentioned were very widely known to the voters. Abolishment of slavery was, to say the least, "old news."

{edit}
No, jehen was completely correct to say that Warren was a disappointment to the Republican party, including to Eisenhower, and the fact that you would call Earl Warren a conservative Republican shows how little you know.

Answer 4

President Kennedy introduced the Civil Rights Act of 1964. If I'm not mistaken, he was a Democratic president. Also, more Democrats in Congress (by sheer numbers) voted for it than Republicans.
As far as comparing political parties by their labels from 200 years ago, that's like comparing apples and oranges. Lincoln was the FIRST republican president and the party was not really conservative until the 1920s.

Answer 5

Martin Luther King, Jr protested for it, Kennedy supported it, Johnson signed it into law saying "I fear we have permanently lost the South to the Republican Party." Kennedy and Johnson were Democrats and MLK, if not a Dem, certainly criticized the GOP more than he did the Dems.

To be fair, it was more of a bipartisan effort than most Democrats would have you believe. The reason they can get away with claiming it for themselves though is because the GOP has had the racist words and actions of people like Trent Lott, Strom Thurmond and David Duke associated with it - not to mention that between the two parties the KKK prefers the GOP to the Dems.

Answer 6

The bill had been exposed by President John F. Kennedy in his civil rights speech of June 11, 1963,[1] in which he asked for legislation that would provide "the kind of equality of treatment which we would want for ourselves."

He then sent a bill to Congress on June 19. Mimicking the Civil Rights Act of 1875, Kennedy's civil rights bill included provisions to ban discrimination in public accommodations, and to enable the U.S. Attorney General to sue state governments which operated segregated school systems, among other provisions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964

Answer 7

Because they deserve credit for these and other reasons:

Truman ordered the desegregation of the armed forces.

"The specific source of the 1964 Civil Rights Act was the President of the United States. John Kennedy began the process of gaining support for the legislation in a nationally televised address on June 11, 1963. Discouraged by the violence accompanying the Birmingham demonstrations, Kennedy urged in eloquent language that Americans take action to guarantee equal treatment of every individual, regardless of color.

"Kennedy proposed that Congress consider a civil rights act dealing with the following subjects: voting rights, public accommodations, desegregation of public schools, establishment of a Community Relations Service, continuation of the Civil Rights Commission, nondiscrimination in federally assisted programs, and formation of an Equal Employment Opportunities Commission. One hundred years after Abraham Lincoln announced his Emancipation Proclamation, the executive branch of government readied itself to ask Congress to pass a major civil rights bill into law".

After Kennedy's death Democratic "President Johnson pushed for the passage of the act: On February 10, 1964, the House of Representatives passed the measure by a lopsided 290-130 vote, but everyone knew that the real battle would be in the Senate, whose rules had allowed southerners in the past to mount filibusters that had effectively killed nearly all civil rights legislation. But Johnson pulled every string he knew, and had the civil rights leaders mount a massive lobbying campaign, including inundating the Capitol with religious leaders of all faiths and colors. The strategy paid off, and in June the Senate voted to close debate; a few weeks later, it passed the most important piece of civil rights legislation in the nation's history, and on July 2, 1964, President Johnson signed it into law".

AND Democratic Majority Leader Mansfield floor "took a novel approach to prevent the bill from being relegated to Judiciary Committee limbo. Having initially waived a second reading of the bill, which would have led to it being immediately referred to Judiciary, Mansfield gave the bill a second reading on February 26, 1964, and then proposed, in the absence of precedent for instances when a second reading did not immediately follow the first, that the bill bypass the Judiciary Committee and immediately be sent to the Senate floor for debate".

Answer 8

They shouldn't.

When a higher percentage of republicans voted for the Civil rights act than democrats did.

The House of Representatives passed the bill by 289 to 126, a vote in which 79% of Republicans and 63% of Democrats voted yes.

The Senate vote was 73 to 27, a vote in which 81% of Republicans and 69% of Democrats voted yes.

And as to the Nixon question.

Nixon was one of the major proponets of the civil rights act.

And LBJ had to promise Nixon, not to allow the democrats in Congress to weaken the civil rights act.

Democrats seem to forget who tried to fillabuster the civil rights act.

It wasn't a dixiecrat, it was Democrat Senators Sam Ervin, of later Watergate fame, Albert Gore Sr.(D), and Robert Byrd(D).

Senator Byrd, a former Klansman whom Democrats still call "the conscience of the Senate".

Answer 9

Repubs marched for Civil Rights, BUT LBJ and the majority of Dems voted for the Voter Rights Act. Their vote caused disenfranchised Southern Dems aka Dixiecrats to leave the party and become Republicans.

Answer 10

No. You're wrong. Democrats were more for civil rights in the 60s, then the Republicans were. They didn't believe in giving blacks the rights to do *anything*.

Answer 11

Many people have been fooled by decades of lies told by Democrats and their media allies. Democrats have always been quick to claim the accomplishments of others as their own. Here is a quote from President Johnson regarding the 1964 civil rights act that Al Gore's father, and most congressional Democrats voted against, "after I sign this we Democrats) will have the n*gg*r vote for the next 100 years".