The legacy of the past is an unavoidable presence as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference considers who will be its next president.
In their latest communique regarding the fate of seven arrested members of the Baha'i religious minority in Iran, Amnesty International has expressed grave concern they may face the death penalty if they are found guilty of the charges of "espionage for Israel," "insulting religious sanctities," and "propaganda against the system."
On Wednesday, President Obama will make the most important speech of his presidency. We hear this phrase so much that it has become a cliché. But, in this case, the cliché is accurate.
For half a century, Ted Kennedy was the most prolific senator on the political scene, making major strides in civil rights, civil liberties, education, human rights abroad, arms control, good government and of course health care.
One year before the day of his death, an ailing Sen. Ted Kennedy electrified a crowd of thousands at the Democratic National Convention.
We have known for over a year this day would come, and yet now that it's here it still doesn't quite seem possible.
A new federal report says employees at four New York state juvenile residential centers have been responsible for abuse resulting in concussions, broken bones and even one death.
On a number of occasions and in perfectly pitched and calibrated statements, President Obama has expressed his unequivocal support for the civil rights movement in Iran without appearing to interfere in Iranian domestic affairs.
The Supreme Court compromised Monday in a major voting rights case, finding that a powerful enforcement tool in the landmark Voting Rights Act was being applied too broadly.
Last week Gov. John Lynch signed a bill making New Hampshire the sixth state to legalize same-sex marriage.
The legacy of the past is an unavoidable presence as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference considers who will be its next president.
In their latest communique regarding the fate of seven arrested members of the Baha'i religious minority in Iran, Amnesty International has expressed grave concern they may face the death penalty if they are found guilty of the charges of "espionage for Israel," "insulting religious sanctities," and "propaganda against the system."
On Wednesday, President Obama will make the most important speech of his presidency. We hear this phrase so much that it has become a cliché. But, in this case, the cliché is accurate.
For half a century, Ted Kennedy was the most prolific senator on the political scene, making major strides in civil rights, civil liberties, education, human rights abroad, arms control, good government and of course health care.
One year before the day of his death, an ailing Sen. Ted Kennedy electrified a crowd of thousands at the Democratic National Convention.
We have known for over a year this day would come, and yet now that it's here it still doesn't quite seem possible.
A new federal report says employees at four New York state juvenile residential centers have been responsible for abuse resulting in concussions, broken bones and even one death.
On a number of occasions and in perfectly pitched and calibrated statements, President Obama has expressed his unequivocal support for the civil rights movement in Iran without appearing to interfere in Iranian domestic affairs.
The Supreme Court compromised Monday in a major voting rights case, finding that a powerful enforcement tool in the landmark Voting Rights Act was being applied too broadly.
Last week Gov. John Lynch signed a bill making New Hampshire the sixth state to legalize same-sex marriage.
CNN Presents: Black in America: Eyewitness to Murder: The King Assassination airs Saturday, April 4 and Sunday, April 5 at 8 p.m. ET on CNN
Minnesotans are a peculiar breed, the stereotype goes. They are disproportionately well-mannered. When dinner is offered, Minnesotans refuse at least three times before accepting.
Barack Obama's inauguration marks a profound manifestation of the Rev. Martin Luther King's dream, civil rights leaders say, but the movement would be foolish to drop its guard now.
The world will be watching as Barack Obama is sworn in as president of the United States of America. In anticipation of the inauguration, reporter John Zarrella, photojournalists Dominic Swann and Greg Kilday and I traveled to some of the landmark sites of the civil rights movement to reflect on events that helped shape this historic moment.
More than two-thirds of African-Americans believe Martin Luther King Jr.'s vision for race relations has been fulfilled, a CNN poll found -- a figure up sharply from a survey in early 2008.
For almost 60 years, Grace Britton Sweet has had the right to vote. She can vividly recall the day she registered.
Martin Luther King Jr. Day is January 19, 2009
Three Staten Island men are charged with violating voting rights, accused of assaulting African-Americans after Barack Obama's win in the November presidential election, authorities said Wednesday.
Three Staten Island men face charges of voting rights violations for targeting African-Americans for assault after Barack Obama's win in the November 4 presidential race, authorities said Wednesday.
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was a civil rights icon, but for one man, he's something else: the father he barely remembers.
Record the CNN Special Investigations Unit Classroom Edition: MLK Papers -- Words That Changed a Nation when it airs commercial-free on Monday, December 15, 2008, from 4:00 -- 5:00 a.m. ET on CNN. (A short feature begins at 4:00 a.m. and precedes the program.)
Solomon Brown of San Jose, California, is one of the millions of voters who helped elect Barack Obama to be the future president. He's also one of the voters in California, Arizona and Florida who cast ballots in support of same-sex marriage bans that got considerable support in each state.
It's a done deal: Proposition 8, making same-sex marriage illegal in California, has been approved by voters.
Advocates are working to change that with a nationwide effort to make sure those with mental disabilities know their rights and exercise them on Election Day
The Justice Department will deploy more than 800 federal observers and monitors to voting sites in 23 states to make sure voters' rights are not violated on Election Day.
Campaign paraphernalia is everywhere nowadays. People are sporting T-shirts, hats and pins touting their candidate of choice. But wearing your political allegiances can cause a problem at the polls.
A trip through sweltering Alabama to experience some of the civil rights movement's most important sites brought history books to life for my family and me.
Students will examine Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech. Also, they will compose written responses to Dr. King in which they compare his historic vision of racial equality in the United States to the reality of present-day life.
The Senate approved and sent to the White House a bill overhauling controversial rules on secret government eavesdropping Wednesday
The Supreme Court ruled Monday that states can require voters to produce photo identification without violating their constitutional rights, validating Republican-inspired voter ID laws
Students will learn about the champions of voting rights in the United States.
The Democratic National Committee is violating the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment by allowing only four states to hold caucuses or primaries before the first Tuesday in February, a Florida attorney argued Monday before a federal appeals court.
Britney Spears saw her sons again Monday, while her father sought to quickly end a civil rights challenge to his control of her affairs.
The man who claims to be Britney Spears's new lawyer says that the pop star is being "deprived of her Constitutional rights" and tells PEOPLE he is seeking a "return to normalcy" when it comes to Spears's living and legal situations.
The Rev. James Orange, a civil rights activist whose 1965 jailing sparked a fatal protest that ultimately led to the famed Selma-to-Montgomery march and the Voting Rights Act, died Saturday at Atlanta's Crawford Long Hospital, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference said in a statement. He was 65.
The foundation of a democratic republic is suffrage: the right to vote. Universal suffrage extends this civil right to all adults without distinction to race, sex, belief, intelligence or economic or social status. In the United States, almost all adult citizens over the age of 18 may vote in the presidential election. To this day, U.S. citizens who reside in Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands and other U.S. territories do not vote in presidential elections, but may vote in local elections.
Many Americans spent Monday honoring the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. by recalling the civil rights icon's legacy nearly 40 years after his assassination in Memphis, Tennessee.
Use the following information as a springboard for your students to discuss and research the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both called for an end to a bitter fight in a racially charged debate that has roiled the Democratic presidential contest over the last few days.
Mary-Jo Criswell wants to vote in the November elections but is not sure if she will be able to, because of one barrier: She does not have government-issued photo identification.
Hundreds of students turned out at Colorado State University to speak their minds on whether the student newspaper's editor should lose his job over four words.
The Justice Department's top civil rights enforcer resigned Thursday following more than a year of criticism that his office filled its ranks with conservative loyalists instead of experienced attorneys.
Issues such as same-sex marriage and gays serving in the military have played an important role in American politics for at least the past 10 years and may do so again in next year's presidential and congressional elections.
Congressional investigators are looking into new allegations a top official at the Justice Department illegally hired career lawyers based on their political affiliations.
Six Islamic religious leaders have filed suit against US Airways for having them removed from a domestic flight last November.
Six Islamic religious leaders have filed suit against US Airways for having them removed from a domestic flight last November.
The top two Democratic presidential contenders fought Sunday for the support of African-American voters in a place infamous for a bloody clash between voting rights protesters and police.
As polls began to close in the East, Justice Department officials said voter complaints to federal officials had been "low" on Tuesday.
The Justice Department Monday announced it has dispatched an army of election observers and monitors across the country to polling places where it sees a potential for discrimination or other voting rights violations.
President Bush will address the NAACP's annual convention this week, the White House said Tuesday, making an appeal for unity in what will be the president's first appearance before the nation's oldest civil rights group since coming to office.
In a pair of cases that could reignite disputes over race and public education, the Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide what role affirmative action should play in assigning students to competitive spots in elementary and secondary schools.
A U.S. government report warned on Wednesday that threats to religious freedom in Iraq and Afghanistan are mounting, and included Washington allies Saudi Arabia and Pakistan among countries "of particular concern" for religious intolerance.
Four U.S. presidents -- including President George W. Bush -- were among the luminaries at Coretta Scott King's funeral Tuesday. Among some speakers' accolades and tributes to the civil rights icon were criticisms of the current administration's actions -- the war in Iraq and domestic eavesdropping.
As the nation pays its last respects to Coretta Scott King, the widow of slain civil rights leader Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., CNN.com asked readers what they think will be the civil rights struggles of the 21st century. Here are some of those responses:
The following profiles feature prominent African Americans in the fields of politics, law, sports, civil rights and entertainment.
The Senate Judiciary Committee won't vote on Judge Samuel Alito until next week, but it seems pretty clear he will be the next Supreme Court justice and will move the court to the right compared with the woman he's replacing, Sandra Day O'Connor. Well, why not?
Use this Extra! as a springboard for your students to discuss and research the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Supreme Court Monday, without comment, rejected the appeal of Florida felons seeking to regain their right to vote.
Thousands of mourners packed a Detroit church Wednesday for an emotional tribute to civil rights icon Rosa Parks, who changed the country 50 years ago when she refused to give up her bus seat to a white man.
Rosa Parks was remembered Tuesday as the mother of the civil rights movement, a powerful but quiet voice for equality and as a humble woman who did not seek the limelight.
Rosa Parks, whose act of civil disobedience in 1955 inspired the modern civil rights movement, died Monday in Detroit, Michigan. She was 92.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter said Monday that Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers told him in a private meeting that she believed the 1965 case of Griswold vs. Connecticut -- a landmark ruling establishing the right to privacy -- was "rightly decided."
John Roberts now awaits two Senate votes to decide whether he will be the next chief justice, after telling lawmakers Thursday, "I am not an ideologue."
In 1998, President Bill Clinton was almost forced from office because he lied about whether he had "sexual relations" with Monica Lewinsky in a deposition. The deposition was conducted by lawyers for Paula Jones -- who had sued the president under federal civil rights law and Arkansas tort law.
Forty-one years after three civil rights workers were killed in rural Mississippi, jury selection began Monday in the murder trial of a Baptist preacher accused of instigating the crime.
Jury selection begins Monday in a 1964 civil rights case that still haunts this rural town of 7,300 residents.
If you are -- as I am -- a devotee of sports talk radio, then you have been bombarded this week with criticism of Congress' decision to subpoena a number of current and former baseball players to testify about steroid use. Only discussion of the NCAA basketball championships has vied for prominence with the steroid subpoena story.
In 1991, the acting U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Joe Wilson, sheltered 800 Americans at the embassy in Baghdad during Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait. Twelve years later, Wilson was thrust back onto the international stage when he accused President Bush of misleading the American people into another war with Iraq.
The trial of a reputed Klansman charged with one of the most notorious killings of the civil rights era will begin in late March, a Mississippi judge ruled Wednesday.
A reputed member of the Ku Klux Klan declared his innocence Friday in the 1964 killings of three civil rights workers whose bodies were buried in an earthen dam outside the Mississippi town of Philadelphia.
Thanks to a last-minute court ruling, Jonathan Morgan was able to share the religious origin of the candy cane with his elementary-school classmates at this year's winter-break party at Thomas Elementary School in Plano, Texas.
On December 6, the Supreme Court decided San Diego v. John Roe. The case posed the question of how far the First Amendment's free speech protection reaches to protect a police officer in a uniform. The lawsuit was brought by a police officer who was fired for making pornographic videos of himself in apparently official garb, and distributing them for sale on the web (along with other items).
Many of the nation's leading civil rights groups expressed "serious concern" Monday with President Bush's nomination of White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales to be attorney general, calling for "close scrutiny" by the Senate.
Recently, the Supreme Court made a saddening announcement: Chief Justice William Rehnquist is battling thyroid cancer. The news came as a surprise in the midst of an intense presidential campaign.
The Justice Department is expected to announce Thursday where it plans to send about 1,000 federal election monitors charged with protecting the voting rights of citizens in the November 2 balloting.
The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday approved the Pledge Protection Act.
Three Indonesian journalists face imprisonment for writing and publishing an article that allegedly defamed a leading businessman.
On August 26, 1920, the United States took a giant democratic leap when Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby certified the ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, giving millions of American women the right to vote for the first time in the nation's history.
Last week, the Democratic National Convention (DNC) ended. But the First Amendment issues that were raised there did not. Indeed, they are likely to continue on indefinitely -- recurring at the upcoming Republican National Convention (RNC), and similar public events raising intense security concerns.
The Rev. Al Sharpton brought down the house with a passionate speech to Democratic National Convention delegates about what's wrong with the Bush administration and how Sen. John Kerry will help fulfill America's promise. This is a transcript of his remarks:
The Supreme Court ruled 8-0 on Monday that Michael Newdow did not have the legal standing to challenge the Pledge of Allegiance, allowing for the full pledge to continue to be recited in the nation's public schools.
As Florida county election boards review a list of thousands of potentially ineligible voters -- including some who may be felons -- CNN is suing the state, claiming the public and media should also be able to review the list.
President Bush and Sen. John Kerry marked the 50th anniversary of a landmark Supreme Court decision on school integration with separate speeches Monday that hailed progress in the fight for racial equality but said the battle was not won.
Hundreds of gay and lesbian couples rallied for marriage rights in Manhattan Thursday while about 40 couples lined up in the rain outside New York City Hall seeking to persuade Mayor Michael Bloomberg to issue them marriage licenses.
Is wearing a masked hood at a public rally the same as shouting "Fire!" inside a crowded theater -- or is it closer in significance to burning an American flag?
Recently, various incidents involving holiday decorations have shown that the public's -- and even government officials' -- understanding of the legal rules in this area is far from clear. That is disappointing, for the relevant Supreme Court cases were decided more than a decade ago.
This book review will be less favorable than the one above, as we began talking back to the ACLU's Restoring Civil Liberties: A Blueprint for Action for the Clinton Administration at the first word...
ON REGULAR schedules -- outsiders don't know exactly how often -- the CEOs from the major Japanese keiretsu groups meet in Tokyo. These alliances of companies in related businesses gather under the...
Gerrymandering is in the news these days, and you will doubtless find many an opportunity to work into dinner-party conversation the fact that the term was creatively named for Elbridge Gerry, who ...
We have bad news from Billcast: The Civil Rights Act of 1990 looks like a winner. Billcast, the legislative forecasting system admiringly described in these columns a while back (February 26), says...
If you were trying to explain the current contretemps at Virginia Military Institute to a fellow from Mars, you might plausibly begin with the late Howard Smith and his famous petard. Smith was the...
Friends, it is not easy being a lonely seeker after the truth. For one thing, it can be hard on the lower back. Or so we morosely concluded the other evening after several hours of squinting upward...
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