Pauli Murray: The US firebrand’s unique opportunity to influence a continent

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 566-579
Author(s):  
Braham Dabscheck
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Sex Discrimination ◽  
Review Article ◽  
Jel Codes ◽  
Race Discrimination ◽  
The Us ◽  
Legal Texts ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Twentieth Century America

This review article discusses Rosalind Rosenberg’s study of Pauli Murray’s pivotal role in enhancing the civil rights of African Americans and American women. Pauli Murray should be properly regarded as one of the leading legal thinkers of Twentieth-Century America. She played a role in the development of the jurisprudential thinking, which brought about an end to race discrimination as enshrined in the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine in the Supreme Court’s 1896 decision in Plessy v. Ferguson and ending sex discrimination beginning with the Supreme Court’s 1971 decision in Reed v. Reed. The objective of this review article is to provide an account of her approach to attacking both legally based race and sex discrimination. Drawing on Rosenberg and referencing key legal texts, it begins with a brief account of Murray’s life and times. This is followed by an examination of her thinking on both race and sex discrimination. The review concludes by commending Rosenberg for her analysis of the intersections between the private and public personas of Pauli Murray in a century which witnessed fundamental changes in America. JEL Codes: B10, B22

Race, Labor Markets, and Social Disorder in Twentieth-Century America

2005 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-239
Author(s):  
William J. Collins
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Labor Markets ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Special Section ◽  
Educational Systems ◽  
Central Cities ◽  
Migration Patterns ◽  
Economic Experience ◽  
Twentieth Century America

In 1900, approximately 10 percent of African Americans resided in central cities; by 1970, nearly 60 percent did, far higher than the corresponding proportion of whites. This geographic redistribution was central to the twentieth-century African American economic experience, with connections radiating in innumerable directions: to labor markets, housing markets, educational systems, the civil rights movement, and public policy responses to discrimination and poverty. Although migration patterns are not their focus, each essay in this special section is closely connected to the black population's historic redistribution.

“Fix the Workplace, Not the Worker”: Labour Feminism and the Shifting Grounds of Equality in the US Workplace, 1960-91

2020 ◽  
Vol 119 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-114
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Faue ◽  
Josiah Rector ◽  
Amanda Lauren Walter
Keyword(s):  
Women Workers ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Equal Opportunity ◽  
Health And Safety ◽  
Sex Discrimination ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
Childbearing Age ◽  
United Auto Workers ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Usa

The US Supreme Court decision in UAW v. Johnson Controls, a landmark case that eliminated employer policies that excluded women from jobs with significant reproductive risks, has been the focus of considerable debate. While challenging policies that decided what risks were acceptable for women of childbearing age, critics charged that the ruling weakened labour law protections for women in the USA and lowered standards for all workers. Yet, the case emerged at a time when workplace protections under the Occupational Health and Safety Administration were already failing due to deregulation and unions were running into growing employer hostility. This article argues that labour feminists in the United Auto Workers (UAW) hoped to simultaneously force employers to end sex discrimination and toxic exposures in the workplace. They only shifted to the narrower legal strategy that prevailed in Johnson Controls in the late 1970s and 1980s for pragmatic reasons. Using equal opportunity provisions of the Civil Rights Act was one way for union plaintiffs to ensure that employers were not using foetal protection policies as an end-run around a safer workplace for all workers. Yet, while women workers and unions originally sought to “fix the workplace, not the worker,” conservative opposition accepted women having fewer labour protections while endorsing a less protected and riskier workplace.

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