From the War on Poverty to the Quota System

Abstract

Part II explores events in the post-movement days, from the end of the 1960s to the turn of the century. This chapter first focuses on the War on Poverty, a comprehensive welfare policy of the Johnson administration targeted at the poor, then President Nixon’s introduction of a quota system for minorities who historically have faced discrimination. Although it appeared very bold, Affirmative Action was a cost-effective policy. Several incidents occurred behind this shift, such as the Americanization of the Vietnam War, a series of “urban riots,” the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert F. Kennedy, local clashes over school busing, and the so-called “forced integration” of de facto racially segregated inner-city schools.