This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act, which Congress passed one week after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968. King dedicated the last years of his life to the Chicago Freedom Movement, fighting housing discrimination and government policies that created segregation and trapped black Chicagoans in high-poverty neighborhoods. This movement and, tragically, King’s murder, helped spur passage of the FHA, which remains one of our nation’s most vital civil rights laws.
The Thurgood Marshall Institute of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund has created a retrospective of housing discrimination on the 50th Anniversary of the Fair Housing Act of 1968. As we look back at the way the FHA has changed—and failed to change—the ability of all Americans to procure housing, we have a chance to grapple with the institutionalizing of racial housing segregation across the country. Learn more here.
