Coenen, Dan T

Description

Encyclopedia article about the case Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (1964) which resulted in the Supreme Court upholding the public accommodations provisions of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, outlawing racial discrimination by many private service providers, including hotels, motels, and restaurants selling food that had moved across state lines. None of Congress's enumerated powers unequivocally supported enactment of the "public accommodations" feature of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and challengers protested the legislation as impinging on states prerogatives to regulate local matters without federal interference. The Supreme Court upheld the antidiscrimination provisions of the 1964 Civil Rights Act were a proper exercise of Congress's power to regulate interstate commerce, in effect reasoning that race discrimination by even very localized businesses had negative effects on the interstate movement of people and products that allowed Congress to remove these impediments to commerce whether or not its true motives centered on racism.The Civil Rights Digital Library received support from a National Leadership Grant for Libraries awarded to the University of Georgia by the Institute of Museum and Library Services for the aggregation and enhancement of partner metadata.

Record Contributed By

New Georgia Encyclopedia

Record Harvested From

Digital Library of Georgia