MGJR Volume 2 2014 | Page 26

The Civil Rights Movement Wasn’t Good Just for Black People

The fight for jobs and equal pay, including the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, was as important to whites, in many ways, as it was to black people, according to Gavin Wright, an economic historian at Stanford University.

In his book, Sharing the Prize - The Economics of the Civil Rights Revolution in the American South, Wright contends the fight for fair pay and housing was especially beneficial to southern whites who gained economically along with black Americans, although many whites fought hardest against the civil rights movement and subsequent legislation that were also in their best interest.

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