[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 40, Number 27 (Monday, July 5, 2004)]
[Pages 1185-1186]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on the 40th Anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

July 1, 2004

    Thank you all for coming, and welcome to the White House. I am so 
pleased you could join us to celebrate a great anniversary of justice 
and equality in America.
    I appreciate members of my Cabinet being here and a lot of members 
of my administration. I want to thank many of our distinguished guests 
who have joined us today. I'm so pleased to see Dr. Dorothy Height. 
Thank you so much for coming.
    We've got two Lieutenant Governors, Michael Steele and Jennette 
Bradley, with us. Thank you both for being here today. Marc Morial--
where are you, Marc? He must be somewhere. There he is. Thanks for 
coming. I didn't recognize you outside the ``Big Easy.'' [Laughter]
    Lou Sullivan is with us. I'm honored you're here, Lou. Thanks for 
coming, sir. My friend Bob Woodson, president of the National Center for 
Neighborhood Enterprise, is here. Thanks for coming, Woody. Glad you're 
here. Bill Coleman, former Secretary of Transportation, I'm honored 
you're here. Thurgood Marshall, Jr., is with us today. Thank you so much 
for being here. Appreciate--I'm honored you're here. It's pretty neat to 
have a great father, isn't it? [Laughter]
    I'm going to save one announcement for a little later, a special 
announcement. But I do want to recognize Jack Valenti, who was the 
Special Assistant to President Lyndon Johnson. Jack, we're honored 
you're here. Thank you for coming.
    Forty years ago, in many parts of America, basic rights were 
observed or denied based entirely on race. Offensive laws regulated 
every detail of society: where you could get your hair cut; which 
hospital ward you could be treated in; which park or library you could 
visit. A person looking for a job or even a place to stay the night 
could be turned away merely because the color of the skin. And that 
person had very little recourse under Federal law. Forty years ago this 
week, that system of indignity and injustice was ended by the Civil 
Rights Act signed into law in this very room.
    As of July the 2d, 1964, no longer could weary travelers be denied a 
room in a hotel or a table at a restaurant. No longer could any American 
be forced to drink from a separate water fountain or sit at the back of 
a bus just because of their race. All discrimination did not end that 
day, but from that day forward, America has been a better and fairer 
country.
    Today we have here on display, outside this room, the first and last 
pages of the Civil Rights Act and one of the pens that President Lyndon 
B. Johnson used for the signature. That law was a long time in coming, 
and before it arrived, the conscience of America had to be awakened. 
That conscience was stirred by men and women who held sit-ins at lunch 
counters, who rode the buses on Freedom Rides, who endured and overcame 
the slurs and the firehoses and the burning crosses. The conscience of 
America was outraged by the ambush of Medgar Evers, by kidnapings and 
terror bombings, and by the murder of four young girls in a church on a 
Sunday. Our Nation's conscience was moved by hundreds of thousands who 
marched right here in the Nation's Capital to demand the full promise of 
the Declaration and America's founding law.
    President John F. Kennedy heard the voices of the Reverend Dr. 
Martin Luther King, Jr., and others, and took up the challenge. Five 
months before his death, the

[[Page 1186]]

President said our Nation was confronted with a moral issue as old as 
the Scriptures and as clear as the American Constitution, and he called 
on Congress to pass civil rights legislation.
    After President Kennedy was assassinated, some wondered if the new 
President, a son of the South, would carry forward the work of civil 
rights. Very soon they would know the answer. During the Senate debate 
on the Civil Rights Act, one of the longest debates in Senate history, 
President Lyndon Johnson used all his powers of persuasion, and they 
were considerable. [Laughter] No one escaped the LBJ treatment--
[laughter]--not Senators, not their staffs, not even their families. It 
is said that when President Johnson called reluctant Senators at home 
and a child answered, he would say, ``Now you tell your daddy that the 
President called.'' [Laughter] ``And he'd be very proud to have your 
daddy on his side.'' [Laughter]
    It was more than the force of Johnson's personality that helped win 
the day; it was the force of President Johnson's conviction on behalf of 
a just cause. As a young man, he'd seen the ugly effects of 
discrimination. As President, he was determined to fight it by law, 
regardless of the political risk. One Southern Senator warned him, 
``It's going to cost you the election.'' He replied, ``If that's the 
price I've got to pay, I will pay it gladly.''
    Lyndon Johnson is known to history as the President who championed 
and signed the Civil Rights Act. And we recognize and remember the 
contributions of this strong Texan and great American. And we're honored 
to have his daughter, Luci Baines Johnson, with us today. We're honored 
you're here. Thanks for coming. I appreciate you coming.
    We also remember the legislators of both parties who worked 
tirelessly to bring the bill to passage, in particular, Senators Mike 
Mansfield of Montana, Senator Edward Dirksen of Illinois, and Senator 
Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota. When it mattered most, these principled 
men rose to the responsibility of their time, and our Nation honors them 
today.
    After the Civil Rights Act became law, the change was felt 
immediately all across America. In 1964, Dale Long was a 12-year-old boy 
living in Birmingham, Alabama. One day, before the law was passed, Dale 
and his brother convinced their father to take them to a movie where 
blacks had to enter through an alley and could only sit in the upstairs 
balcony. ``I could see the look of humiliation on my dad's face,'' he 
remembers. A few months after the Civil Rights Act, the Long brothers 
returned to that theater. As they remember it, they were with a friend. 
``We went to see a James Bond movie,'' Dale says, and this time they 
entered through the front door and sat where they pleased.
    The indignity of Dale Long's first experience at that movie theater 
seems like something that happened many lifetimes ago. Yet, such 
experiences are within the living memory of millions of our citizens. 
These past four decades in American life give witness to the power of 
good laws to prevent injustice and encourage the finest qualities of our 
national character.
    The Civil Rights Act of 1964 gives all Americans another reason to 
be proud of our country. The work of equality is not done because the 
evil of bigotry is not finally defeated. Yet, the laws of this Nation 
and the good heart of this Nation are on the side of equality. And as 
Dr. King reminded us, ``We must not rest until the day when justice 
rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.''
    I'm honored you all are here today. We'll have a reception on the 
other side of this beautiful house. Thank you for coming. May God 
continue to bless America.

Note: The President spoke at 4:01 p.m. in the East Room at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to civil rights leader Dr. Dorothy I. 
Height; Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele of Maryland; Lt. Gov. Jennette B. 
Bradley of Ohio; Marc H. Morial, president and chief executive officer, 
National Urban League; and Louis W. Sullivan, chair, President's Board 
of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities.