Wes Mantooth

I agree Charlatan, I would also argue that most of the civil rights advancements we've made in this country were done so against the will of the majority. The Supreme Court was intragel in striking down Jim Crow laws and had to do so as late as the 1970's. It was Lydon Johnson and Congress who were ultimately responsible for ending it which even in 1964 still came under heavy opposition. How long were we to wait?

Lets keep in mind that their was no real constitutional protection against segregation either after all separate but equal still afforded rights to minorities. Congress had to plunge deep into the constitution to justify desegregation and had very little room to stand on how to enforce it. That sounds oddly familiar doesn't it?

I doubt many today would argue the govt acted unfairly against the will of the people by stepping in and ending such a terrible practice. There simply was no way all 50 states were going to get on the same page and remedy this problem. Allowing every state to hold referendums outlawing the practice would have taken generations if they even got around to holding them at all. If not for the Civil Rights Act we'd probably still be dealing with this issue today, robbing our own citizens of their rights and leaving us light years behind most of the world on equal rights.

A Representative Democracy can be pretty nice to have sometimes.

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