Chapter 5 Federal Gov Questions

How many Asian Americans currently serve in Congress?

12

In which year did the Supreme Court rule that forced busing violated student's constitutional right to equal protection under the law?

2007

According to United States government statistics, roughly ______ percent of Black children live in poverty, compared to ______ percent of white children.

35; 12

Which type of discrimination is based on the law?

de jure discrimination

Serving the United States in the fight against Nazism in World War II led African American soldiers to ______.

demand their civil rights

Affirmative action policies have been used by ______ to expand opportunities for women and minority group members.

employers educational institutions

Which of the following are included in the concept of equal rights, or civil rights?

equal access to the opportunities society provides the right of every person to equal protection under the law equal access to public facilities

Although many Americans believe that the concept of ______ includes such things as access to jobs and health care, others argue that it means only that people are all treated the same under the law.

equality

Rioting broke out in 1957 during

the desegregation of Little Rock Central High School.

Concerning age discrimination in employment, the courts have given employers the right to force individuals to retire based on ______.

the nature of the job the performance of a particular employee

Which of the following are rights gays and lesbians had to fight for in the U.S.? (Choose every correct answer.)

the right to have the same benefits as traditional couples the right to keep their jobs regardless of their sexual orientation

What was the intention of the Plessy v. Ferguson ruling?

to maintain segregation while claiming equality

In determining that it was unconstitutional to reserve 10 percent of federally funded construction projects for minority-owned firms (Adarand v. Peña), the Supreme Court used what part of the test it applies to affirmative action cases?

"narrowly tailored"

Which of the following accurately describes Native Americans today?

Casino gambling has raised Native Americans' average income level, but it is still far below the national average. They are less than half as likely as other Americans to have completed college.

Which groups have historically lacked equality in the United States?

Catholics Asian Americans women

Which influential figure began civil rights work by organizing strikes by farmworkers to attain basic labor rights for migrant workers?

Cesar Chavez

Which proposed amendment to the Constitution was passed by the Congress in the early 1970s but failed to receive the necessary three-fourths majority?

Equal Rights Amendment

Which amendment passed at the end of the war granted African American men the right to vote?

Fifteenth

Which of the following minority groups make up the largest Hispanic population in the United States?

Mexicans

Which of the following statements about African American children in the United States is true?

More than half grow up in a single-parent family.

What is at the heart of many civil rights struggles for equality in the United States?

People hold deep-seated prejudices based on such things as race, color, and religion.

Which landmark Supreme Court case declared affirmative action constitutional but invalidated the use of racial quotas?

Regents of the University of California v. Bakke

What president appointed the first woman to the Supreme Court?

Ronald Reagan

Which of the following is an ongoing struggle between state governments and Native American tribal governments?

States want to control casino gambling on Native American reservations.

In 1972, Native Americans organized a caravan titled the ______ that journeyed from California to Washington, DC, to protest federal policy.

Trail of Broken Treaties

True or false: Following the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, many restaurants, hotels, and other establishments still refused to serve black customers.

True

The landmark case of Lau v. Nichols (1974) resulted in many states offering ______ education in their public schools.

bilingual

Native Americans were not considered to be ______ until 1924.

citizens

In order for an affirmative action program to be upheld as constitutional, the Supreme Court requires that government prove what kind of interest?

compelling

In order to ensure equal employment opportunity for all, the federal government in the 1960s began to require agencies and businesses to

establish policies aimed at giving minority-group members equal opportunities to obtain jobs.

What accounts for the fact that Hispanics are healthier and have a longer life expectancy than would be predicted based on their education and income levels?

family structure

When white settlers first arrived in what is now the United States, there were approximately 5 to 10 million Native American inhabitants. By 1900, there were ______.

fewer than 1 million

In general, the Supreme Court has held that gender discrimination in law

is almost always unconstitutional.

What portion of congressional seats are held by women?

less than a quarter

Which of the following tactics were used by Martin Luther King Jr. in his leadership of the civil rights movement?

marches in nonviolent protest boycotts

Which legal test gives government considerable leeway in treating people differently, such as imposing a higher tax rate on upper-income Americans?

reasonable-basis test

At one time, banks engaged in a practice known as ______, refusing to grant mortgage loans to people who lived in certain neighborhoods, especially those neighborhoods with large Black populations.

redlining

In Plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court declared that "" but equal facilities do not violate the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause.

seperate

Which statement best describes the political engagement of most Asian Americans in the 1960s?

Asian Americans were not politically active to any great extent.

Of the 500 largest U.S. corporations, about ______ percent are headed by women.

7

Despite the Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, by the 1970s ______ percent of black children were still attending schools that were mostly or entirely black.

95

The Supreme Court decision in what case led many affirmative action opponents to believe that the Court may have been on its way to abolishing affirmative action completely?

Adarand v. Peña

Which of the following are among redlining's legacies?

Hispanics and African Americans still have difficulty obtaining mortgages (compared to whites). Segregated neighborhoods still exist.

What did the Voting Rights Act of 1965 entail?

It allowed federal intervention in voter registration in states with a history of discriminating against Black voters. It banned discriminatory voter registration practices.

Since the 1950s, how has the federal government responded to demands for equal rights for African Americans?

It passed a series of laws that secured fundamental rights for African Americans.

Which of the following accurately describes women and poverty?

Many single-parent working women without college degrees or special skills find that their wages cannot cover child-care expenses. Most single-parent families are headed by women and one-third of those live below the poverty line. Single-parent women who work in nonprofessional fields are particularly vulnerable to poverty.

Which of the following statements about affirmative action are true?

Most Americans oppose programs that give preferential treatment to groups that have been disadvantaged historically. Most Americans support programs to give equal treatment to groups that have been disadvantaged historically.

Which constitutional amendment granted women the right to vote?

Nineteenth Amendment

Which of the following statements are accurate representations of the Hispanic population in the United States? (Choose every correct answer.)

The majority are immigrants from Mexico and the Caribbean islands. Their numbers have more than doubled in the past twenty years.

What Sioux village has been the site of both a U.S. cavalry massacre of Native Americans and a modern protest?

Wounded Knee

The largest recent Hispanic demonstrations in the U.S. have been in reaction to

a bill passed by the House that would have led to the arrest and deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants.

Which of the following actions first made Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. a national symbol for the civil rights movement and earned him national media attention?

a year-long bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama

In Rostker v. Goldberg (1980) the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of classifications even though such classifications need to be scrutinized more closely than classifications by age or income.

gender

According to today's statistics, Asian Americans are underrepresented in which of the following areas?

holding high-level political office holding the top position in corporations

Following the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, a number of southern congressmen wrote a letter titled the ______, urging state governments to "resist forced integration by any lawful means."

Southern Manifesto

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 classified which of the following as legally protected groups?

women minorities

According to the Supreme Court, laws that discriminate between people based on their race or ethnicity are laws that make use of ______.

suspect classifications

The preclearance provision of the Voting Rights Act states that designated states and counties must ______.

obtain federal permission before making changes that might adversely affect a minority group

Southern states used a number of devices to prevent African Americans from voting, including which of the following?

poll taxes whites-only primaries literacy tests

Which sociologist authored the book An American Dilemma?

Gunnar Myrdal

How did Thomas Jefferson define the meaning of "all men are created equal"?

He did not believe there was a precise meaning.

Which of the following Hispanic politicians were top contenders for the Republican presidential nomination?

Marco Rubio Ted Cruz

Which 2015 Supreme Court decision removed the ban on same-sex marriage, citing it violated the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection and due process clauses?

Obergefell v. Hodges

In which 2013 case did the Supreme Court invalidate Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act that included the formula for determining which states and counties were subject to federal oversight?

Shelby County v. Holder

The type of discrimination in which traditionally disadvantaged groups have fewer opportunities because of prejudice despite legal protections is

de facto discrimination.