How We Got Here, 1932 to 1968: The New Deal to Civil Rights

At 9:51 on the morning of June 10, 1964, Senator Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia finished a speech he had begun 14 hours and 13 minutes earlier. The subject was the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which had occupied the Senate for 60 working days, including seven Saturdays senate.gov.

The clerk called the roll on cloture, the motion to end debate. When he reached "Mr. Engle," there was no answer. A brain tumor had taken California's Clair Engle's ability to speak. He lifted his arm and pointed to his eye, a yes. When Delaware's John Williams cast the 67th vote, Majority Leader Mike Mansfield said, "That's it!" The tally was 71 to 29 senate.gov. The Senate had never before ended a filibuster on a civil rights bill senate.gov.

Forty-four Democrats and 27 Republicans voted yes. Of the 22 senators from the 11 states of the former Confederacy, 21 voted no voteview.com.

The one thing that changed everything

The Civil Rights Act of 1964. President Lyndon Johnson signed it on July 2, 1964, a few hours after the House gave final approval, 289 to 126 archives.govhistory.house.gov. The act outlawed segregation in businesses such as theaters, restaurants and hotels, banned discriminatory practices in employment, and ended segregation in public places such as swimming pools, libraries and public schools. The National Archives describes it as the most sweeping civil rights legislation since Reconstruction archives.gov.

What it changed, in numbers:

• The votes split by region more than by party. On final Senate passage, Democrats voted 46 to 21 and Republicans 27 to 6. Southern Democrats voted 1 to 20; Democrats from the rest of the country voted 45 to 1 voteview.com. Full tables are under Evidence.
• A senator changed parties. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, who had filibustered every civil rights bill to come before the Senate, joined the Republican Party on September 16, 1964 senate.govsenate.gov.
• The map moved. In November, Barry Goldwater, who had voted against the act, won 52 electoral votes: his home state of Arizona plus Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina. Lyndon Johnson won 486 govinfo.govarchives.gov.

Historical setting

In July 1932 Franklin D. Roosevelt accepted the Democratic nomination in Chicago. He argued that while primary responsibility for relief rested with localities, the federal government "has always had and still has a continuing responsibility for the broader public welfare," and he closed with a pledge: "I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people" presidency.ucsb.edu. President Herbert Hoover answered at Madison Square Garden on October 31, 1932 presidency.ucsb.edu.

"I say that while primary responsibility for relief rests with localities now, as ever, yet the Federal Government has always had and still has a continuing responsibility for the broader public welfare." presidency.ucsb.edu

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Democratic nominee for president, acceptance speech, Chicago, July 2, 1932

"This campaign is more than a contest between two men. It is more than a contest between two parties. It is a contest between two philosophies of government." presidency.ucsb.edu

Herbert Hoover, Republican president, address at Madison Square Garden, New York, October 31, 1932

In the same speech Hoover said, "Free speech does not live many hours after free industry and free commerce die" presidency.ucsb.edu. Roosevelt won 472 electoral votes to Hoover's 59. In 1936 he won 523 to Alf Landon's 8 archives.gov.

The coalition that elected him held two groups pulling in opposite directions. In Northern cities, Black voters began leaving the Republican Party because local Democratic organizations and New Deal relief programs reached them. In 1934 Arthur W. Mitchell of Chicago became the first Black Democrat elected to Congress history.house.gov. In the South, Democrats held enough power to shape or stop New Deal laws. The House Historian records that Southern Democrats narrowed the benefits of Social Security, worked in the House Rules Committee so that the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 excluded agricultural, domestic and service workers, and obstructed antilynching bills in the late 1930s and early 1940s history.house.gov. Senator Richard Russell of Georgia, leader of the Senate's Southern Caucus, used the filibuster to defeat bills banning lynching and abolishing the poll tax senate.gov.

War and the water's edge

On January 10, 1945, Senator Arthur Vandenberg of Michigan, the unofficial spokesman of Senate Republicans on foreign policy and a former isolationist, told the Senate he had changed his view senate.gov. The Senate approved the United Nations Charter on July 28, 1945, by 89 to 2 senate.gov. As chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee from 1947, Vandenberg called for stopping "partisan politics at the water's edge" and worked with the Truman administration on the Truman Doctrine, the Marshall Plan and NATO senate.gov.

"I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." presidency.ucsb.edu

Harry S. Truman, Democratic president, message to Congress on Greece and Turkey, March 12, 1947

"But I do not believe that any nation hereafter can immunize itself by its own exclusive action." senate.gov

Arthur H. Vandenberg, Republican senator from Michigan, Senate floor, January 10, 1945

1948: the party splits over civil rights

In February 1948 Truman asked Congress for civil rights legislation. When Southern senators threatened a filibuster, he used executive power. On July 26, 1948, he signed Executive Order 9981, which required "equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed forces without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin" archives.gov.

At the Democratic convention in Philadelphia that July, Hubert Humphrey, the mayor of Minneapolis, spoke for the civil rights program in the party platform www2.mnhs.org. The Republicans had adopted their platform a month earlier presidency.ucsb.edu.

"To those who say that this civil rights program is an infringement on States' Rights, I say this, that the time has arrived in America for the Democratic Party to get out of the shadows of States' Rights and to walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights." www2.mnhs.org

Hubert H. Humphrey, Democratic mayor of Minneapolis, Democratic National Convention, Philadelphia, July 14, 1948

"Lynching or any other form of mob violence anywhere is a disgrace to any civilized state, and we favor the prompt enactment of legislation to end this infamy." presidency.ucsb.edu

Republican Party Platform of 1948, adopted June 21, 1948

The final Democratic platform commended Truman "for his courageous stand on the issue of civil rights" presidency.ucsb.edu. The States' Rights Democratic Party, known as the Dixiecrats, nominated Governor Strom Thurmond of South Carolina senate.gov. Its platform, dated August 14, 1948, condemned "the action of the Democratic Convention in sponsoring a civil rights program" and said presidency.ucsb.edu:

"We stand for the segregation of the races and the racial integrity of each race." presidency.ucsb.edu

Platform of the States' Rights Democratic Party, August 14, 1948

Truman won with 303 electoral votes to 189 for Thomas Dewey. Thurmond won 39: Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and one elector in Tennessee archives.gov.

Brown and the Southern Manifesto

On May 17, 1954, Chief Justice Earl Warren delivered the Court's unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education tile.loc.govarchives.gov:

"We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of "separate but equal" has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." tile.loc.gov

Chief Justice Earl Warren, opinion of the Court, Brown v. Board of Education, May 17, 1954

On March 12, 1956, Representative Howard Smith of Virginia, chairman of the House Rules Committee, introduced the "Declaration of Constitutional Principles," known as the Southern Manifesto. It was signed by 82 representatives and 19 senators, all from states of the former Confederacy, and urged Southerners to use all "lawful means" to resist school desegregation history.house.gov. Thurmond, by then a senator, signed it, and Russell co-authored it senate.govsenate.gov.

In September 1957 Governor Orval Faubus of Arkansas met President Dwight Eisenhower at Newport, Rhode Island, over the integration of Little Rock's Central High School. Ten days later Eisenhower sent federal troops to Little Rock and addressed the nation presidency.ucsb.edu.

"Mob rule cannot be allowed to override the decisions of our courts," Eisenhower said on September 24, 1957 presidency.ucsb.edu. That year Thurmond spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957, then a Senate record. The act passed the next day senate.gov.

1963 to 1965: the votes

On January 14, 1963, George Wallace was inaugurated governor of Alabama in Montgomery. The Alabama Department of Archives and History records his words: "and I say...segregation now...segregation tomorrow...segregation forever" archives.alabama.gov.

On June 11, 1963, President John F. Kennedy told the country on television: "We are confronted primarily with a moral issue. It is as old as the scriptures and is as clear as the American Constitution" presidency.ucsb.edu. On August 28, 1963, the March on Washington for jobs and civil rights took place in the capital catalog.archives.gov.

Kennedy was killed in November 1963, and his proposal became the Civil Rights Act of 1964 archives.gov. The House passed it on February 10, 1964, by 290 to 130 voteview.com. In the Senate the managers were the majority whip, Hubert Humphrey, and the Republican whip, Thomas Kuchel. Minority Leader Everett Dirksen of Illinois enlisted the Republican votes that made cloture possible senate.gov. On June 10, the last morning of the debate, both sides spoke.

For the bill:

"The question is whether we will have two types of citizenship in this Nation, or first-class citizenship for all." govinfo.gov

Hubert H. Humphrey, Democratic senator from Minnesota, Senate floor, June 10, 1964

"Stronger than all the armies is an idea whose time has come. ... The time has come for equality of opportunity in sharing in government, in education, and in employment. It will not be stayed or denied. It is here!" senate.gov

Everett Dirksen, Republican minority leader from Illinois, Senate floor, June 10, 1964

Against the bill:

"No, Mr. President, equal rights in this land of ours means that each citizen has an equal opportunity to acquire property through honest means, that once that property has been acquired he has a right to exercise dominion over it." govinfo.gov

Richard B. Russell, Democratic senator from Georgia, Senate floor, June 10, 1964

"I find no constitutional basis for the exercise of Federal regulatory authority in either of these areas; and I believe the attempted usurpation of such power to be a grave threat to the very essence of our basic system of government." govinfo.gov

Barry Goldwater, Republican senator from Arizona, Senate floor, June 18, 1964

Russell also told the Senate, "I know, and all other Members of the Senate know, that the bill has been drafted in such a way that its greatest impact will be on the States of the old Confederacy" govinfo.gov. Goldwater's two objections were Title II, public accommodations, and Title VII, employment. In the same speech he said, "I am unalterably opposed to discrimination or segregation on the basis of race, color, or creed," and that he had voted for the civil rights acts of 1957 and 1960 govinfo.gov.

The Senate passed the bill on June 19, 1964, by 73 to 27 voteview.com. On July 2 the House accepted the Senate version, 289 to 126, and Johnson signed it a few hours later history.house.gov.

"We believe that all men are created equal. Yet many are denied equal treatment," Johnson said at the signing presidency.ucsb.edu.

The next year brought the vote itself. On March 15, 1965, after the violence against marchers in Selma, Alabama, Johnson spoke to a joint session of Congress presidency.ucsb.eduhistory.house.gov: "There is no constitutional issue here. The command of the Constitution is plain. ... There is no issue of States rights or national rights. There is only the struggle for human rights" presidency.ucsb.edu. The Senate passed the Voting Rights Act on May 26, 1965, by 77 to 19, the House on July 9 by 333 to 85, and the House approved the final version 328 to 74 on August 3 voteview.comhistory.house.gov. Johnson signed it on August 6, 1965. It outlawed literacy tests as a requirement for voting archives.gov.

1964: Goldwater, Reagan and the conservative movement

Goldwater won the Republican nomination and accepted it in San Francisco on July 16, 1964: "I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue" presidency.ucsb.edu. On October 27, Ronald Reagan gave a televised address for him, "A Time for Choosing" presidency.ucsb.edu. Reagan used a phrase Roosevelt had used in 1936.

"There is a mysterious cycle in human events. To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny." presidency.ucsb.edu

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Democratic president, acceptance of renomination, Philadelphia, June 27, 1936

"You and I are told increasingly that we have to choose between a left or right, but I would like to suggest that there is no such thing as a left or right. ... You and I have a rendezvous with destiny." presidency.ucsb.edu

Ronald Reagan, Republican, televised address for Barry Goldwater, October 27, 1964

Johnson carried 44 states and the District of Columbia. Goldwater carried six states, five of them in the South archives.gov.

Riots and "law and order"

On July 28, 1967, Johnson created the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as the Kerner Commission, to answer three questions: What happened? Why did it happen? What can be done to prevent it from happening again ojp.gov? It reported that of 164 disorders in the first nine months of 1967, 8 were major, 33 serious and 123 minor, and that in 75 disorders studied by a Senate subcommittee, 83 deaths were reported, 82 percent of them in Newark and Detroit ojp.gov. Its basic conclusion: "Our Nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white," the report said, "separate and unequal" ojp.gov.

In 1968 both nominees spoke about order.

"We do not want a police state but we need a state of law and order, and neither mob violence nor police brutality have any place in America." presidency.ucsb.edu

Hubert H. Humphrey, Democratic nominee, acceptance speech, Chicago, August 29, 1968

"And to those who say that law and order is the code word for racism, there and here is a reply: Our goal is justice for every American. If we are to have respect for law in America, we must have laws that deserve respect." presidency.ucsb.edu

Richard M. Nixon, Republican nominee, acceptance speech, Miami Beach, August 8, 1968

Nixon also said that night that "the first civil right of every American is to be free from domestic violence" presidency.ucsb.edu. He won 301 electoral votes, Humphrey 191. George Wallace, running for the American Independent Party, received 9,906,473 popular votes and 46 electoral votes: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and one elector in North Carolina archives.gov.

Religion in this era

Catholics and the presidency. On September 12, 1960, Senator John F. Kennedy, a Catholic, spoke to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, a group of Protestant ministers presidency.ucsb.edu. Six years earlier, President Eisenhower had signed the law adding "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance presidency.ucsb.edu.

"I am not the Catholic candidate for President. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for President who happens also to be a Catholic." presidency.ucsb.edu

John F. Kennedy, Democratic nominee, Greater Houston Ministerial Association, September 12, 1960

"In this way we are reaffirming the transcendence of religious faith in America's heritage and future; in this way we shall constantly strengthen those spiritual weapons which forever will be our country's most powerful resource, in peace or in war." presidency.ucsb.edu

Dwight D. Eisenhower, Republican president, statement on signing the bill adding "under God" to the Pledge, June 14, 1954

Black churches. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference was founded in 1957, after the Montgomery bus boycott, when Martin Luther King Jr. invited Southern Black ministers to a meeting at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. Under King it drew on the power and independence of Black churches kinginstitute.stanford.edu.

Clergy and the 1964 act. On June 10, 1964, Senator Russell objected on the floor that "cardinals, bishops, elders, stated clerks, common preachers, priests, and rabbis" had come to Washington to press for the bill and had sought to make its passage "a great moral issue" govinfo.gov.

Islam and the Nation of Islam. Malcolm X joined the Nation of Islam in prison and became a minister under Elijah Muhammad after his release in 1952; by the late 1950s he was its leading spokesman. He broke with the Nation of Islam in the spring of 1964, made a pilgrimage to Mecca, and met King for the only time in the Capitol during the Senate debate on the Civil Rights Act. He was assassinated on February 21, 1965 kinginstitute.stanford.edu.

School prayer. On June 25, 1962, in Engel v. Vitale, the Supreme Court struck down a prayer composed by New York's Board of Regents: "Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our Country." Justice Black wrote that "it is no part of the business of government to compose official prayers for any group of the American people to recite as a part of a religious program carried on by government." Justice Stewart dissented: "I cannot see how an 'official religion' is established by letting those who want to say a prayer say it." Justices Frankfurter and White took no part tile.loc.gov. On June 17, 1963, in Abington School District v. Schempp, the Court held that no state law or school board may require Bible reading or recitation of the Lord's Prayer at the start of the school day tile.loc.gov.

Immigration. In 1965 Congress passed the Immigration and Nationality Act, which eliminated national quotas. In the years that followed, immigrants from China, India, Japan and the Philippines reshaped the country's demographics history.house.gov.

Evidence

Roll calls on the two acts, by party and region. "South" means the 11 states of the former Confederacy (Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia). The counts include only members recorded yea or nay, and the totals match the official tallies voteview.com.

Vote	Total	Southern Democrats	Other Democrats	Southern Republicans	Other Republicans
Civil Rights Act, House passage, Feb. 10, 1964	290 to 130	7 to 86	145 to 10	0 to 10	138 to 24
Civil Rights Act, Senate cloture, June 10, 1964	71 to 29	1 to 20	43 to 3	0 to 1	27 to 5
Civil Rights Act, Senate passage, June 19, 1964	73 to 27	1 to 20	45 to 1	0 to 1	27 to 5
Civil Rights Act, House final, July 2, 1964	289 to 126	8 to 83	145 to 8	0 to 11	136 to 24
Voting Rights Act, Senate passage, May 26, 1965	77 to 19	3 to 17	44 to 0	0 to 2	30 to 0
Voting Rights Act, House passage, July 9, 1965	333 to 85	22 to 61	199 to 1	1 to 15	111 to 8
Voting Rights Act, House final, Aug. 3, 1965	328 to 74	28 to 54	190 to 0	4 to 11	106 to 9
Voting Rights Act, Senate final, Aug. 4, 1965	79 to 18	4 to 16	45 to 1	0 to 1	30 to 0

By party alone, House Democrats voted 152 to 96 for the 1964 act on February 10 and House Republicans 138 to 34 voteview.com. By region alone, members from the former Confederacy voted 7 to 96; everyone else voted 283 to 34 voteview.com.

Presidential results that bracket the era, from the National Archives archives.gov:

• 1932: Roosevelt 472, Hoover 59.
• 1936: Roosevelt 523, Landon 8.
• 1948: Truman 303, Dewey 189, Thurmond 39.
• 1964: Johnson 486, Goldwater 52.
• 1968: Nixon 301, Humphrey 191, Wallace 46.

What the evidence does not show

Roll calls record how members voted, not why. The speeches quoted here are the reasons members gave on the floor.

The regional totals do not show that every member from outside the South supported civil rights, or that every Southern member opposed it. The tables list the exceptions in both directions.

Party labels in this era did not line up with ideology the way they do now. In 1964 the Democratic Party included both Hubert Humphrey and Richard Russell, and the Republican Party included both Everett Dirksen and Barry Goldwater.

The House Historian's essay on the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act names the countries immigrants came from. It does not give their religions, so this chapter does not state them.

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Last checked against its sources on October 30, 2026. Report a correction.