WASHINGTON, July 1 (UPI) -- President George W. Bush marked the 40th anniversary of the landmark Civil Rights Act with a White House ceremony in which he praised those who stirred the American conscience to end a system of injustice and indignity.
"As of July the second, 1964, no longer could weary travelers be denied a room in a hotel or a table at the restaurant," he said. "No longer could any American be forced to drink from a separate water fountain or sit at the back of a bus just because of their race.
"All discrimination did not end that day, but from that day forward, America has been a better and fairer country."
The ceremony, followed by a reception, was in the East Room of the White House -- the same room where President Lyndon Baines Johnson, a Southerner who spurned Southern racial tensions and pushed through the Civil Rights Act, signed the hotly contested legislation into law. On display in the room Thursday was the original title and signature page of the act and one of the pens Johnson used to sign it into law.
Upon enactment, racial restrictions on the use of public facilities -- including shopping, lodging, dining, entertainment and public transportation -- were federally outlawed. The law also strengthened voting rights, outlawed workplace discrimination and created the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
"The Civil Rights Act of 1964 gives all Americans another reason to be proud of our country," Bush said.
"The work of equality is not done because the evil of bigotry is not finally defeated," he added. "Yet the laws of this nation and the good heart of this nation are on the side of equality."
Special guests at the ceremony included Thurgood Marshall Jr., son of the United States' first African-America Supreme Court judge; Lucy Baines Johnson Turpin, daughter of President Johnson; National Urban League President and Chief Executive Officer Marc Morial; and Louis Sullivan, chairman of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities Commission. Another 130 guests were in attendance, including representatives of the civil-rights community, which has been critical of Bush over the issue of civil rights.
Julian Bond, chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, has slammed Bush for not doing enough on civil rights. Others have attacked the administration for opposing in court the University of Michigan's affirmative-action program on minority admissions and for nominating candidates to the federal bench civil-rights activists have opposed.
"Under President Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft, the Justice Department's civil-rights division has been effectively closed," the campaign of Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said in a release. "Ashcroft has brought only 16 lawsuits in three years, compared to 24 in the last three years of Clinton, and has abandoned lawsuits and settlements begun by prior administrations."
Bush garnered 9 percent of the black vote in the 2000 election, the lowest tally since Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater lost to Johnson by a landslide in 1964. Bush, like his predecessors, is actively courting the traditionally overwhelmingly Democratic black electorate -- and denies any civil-rights rollback.
"I urge you to look at the record and ignore the rhetoric," Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said earlier Thursday.
The administration touts the president's No Child Left Behind Act, minority-homeownership programs, faith-based community initiatives and economic-stimulus programs as signs of his commitment to provide equal opportunity and rights for all U.S. residents, but criticism has not subsided.
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