What Were the Republican and Democratic Votes That Passed the Civil Rights Bill of 1964?
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed discrimination in public places, provided for the integration of schools and other public facilities, and made employment discrimination illegal. Sent to Congress by the administration of President John F. Kennedy in June 1963, the passage of the bill into law a little more than a year later was a triumph of bipartisan cooperation, as well rights legislation.
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House of Representatives
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The bill was stalled in the House of Representatives' Rules Committee when Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963. It was finally sent to the floor of the House on Jan. 30, 1964. After nine days of debate, on Feb. 10 the bill was voted on by 420 members -- 290 in favor, 130 opposed. Republicans voted in favor 138-34, and Democrats voted 152-96 in support. Democrats from northern states voted in favor 141- 4 and southern-state Democrats opposed the bill 92-11.
Direct to Senate
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The bill was next sent to the Senate. Since it was passed in the House first it went directly to the Senate calendar, bypassing the normal committee review. This rule is rarely used, but supporters of the bill wanted to avoid the probable delay of the bill in the Senate Judiciary Committee. The vote in favor of placing it directly before the full Senate was 54-37. This left southern conservatives with only the filibuster tool to try to stop the bill.
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Southern Bloc Filibuster
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The motion to consider the bill was debated for sixteen days before it passed, 67-17. For the next three months opponents, known as the "southern bloc," filibustered the bill. The southern bloc consisted of eighteen southern Democrats and one Republican, led by Sen. Richard Russell, a Democrat from Georgia. This minority could hold up the bill because Senate rules guarantee unlimited debate unless it was ended by cloture, a procedure that ends debate and allows a vote, if two-thirds of the Senate agree.
Cloture
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Democrats made up exactly two-thirds of the Senate, with 67 of the 100 members. But 21 of those were from southern states. This meant cloture required 22 of the Senate's 33 Republicans to support a vote on the Democrat-sponsored bill. The minority leader, Everett Dirksen, R-Ill., played a pivotal role for the civil rights bill. On June 10, 1964, his substantial efforts in support of the bill culminated in an impassioned appeal to the Senate to support cloture and hold the vote. On this extraordinary occasion, the Senate voted for cloture, 71-29 -- 44 Democrats and 27 Republicans voted in favor. Opposed were 23 Democrats and 6 Republicans.
The Civil Rights Act
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On June 19, 1964, the civil rights bill was passed in the Senate, 73-27. Six Republicans and 21 Democrats voted against it. The debate had lasted 83 days and just over 730 hours. Because some changes had been made to the bill, it then returned to the House of Representatives for reconsideration, where it passed, 289 to 126, on July 2. Only six representatives had changed their votes since February. A few hours later President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
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