Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day

The segregation suffered by African-Americans left wounds that still have not been healed by time. Although the Civil Rights Act was signed in 1964, the fight for racial equality is not over yet. Almost fifty years later there are still traces of discrimination.
During the American Civil Rights Movement there were some crucial turning points. The Supreme Court decision in 1954 which buried the "separate but equal" precedent was a trigger in the American Civil Rights Movement. Another monumental event was the "I Have a Dream Speech" made by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Washington D.C., on August 28, 1963. And, of course, the signing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 granted African-Americans the right to vote which was a milestone in American history.
But, the fight was not over with the signing of the Civil Rights Act. The election of President Barack Obama in 2008, for instance, can be added to the list of major turning points in the effort to end segregation.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the "I Have a Dream Speech" said that the Emancipation Proclamation "came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves" but he realized that one hundred years later African-Americans were not free yet, they were "still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation." The same can be stated about the Civil Rights Act or about the election of President Obama. Those were milestones, but that does not mean that the fight for an equal society is over.