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Deluder Satan Act
It being one chief project of that old deluder, Satan, to keep men from the knowledge of the Scriptures, as in former times by keeping them in an unknown tongue, so in these latter times by persuading from the use of tongues, that so that at least the true sense and meaning of the original might be clouded and corrupted with false glosses of saint-seeming deceivers; and to the end that learning may not be buried in the grave of our forefathers and in the church and commonwealth. -
Massachusetts Bay School Law
The Law of 1642 required that parents and master see to it that their children knew the principles of religion and the capital laws of the commonwealth. -
New England Primer
The New England Primer was the first reading primer designed for the American Colonies. It became the most successful educational textbook published in 18th century America and it became the foundation of most schooling before the 1790s. -
Constitution and Bill of Rights Ratified
In September 1789, the first Congress of the United States approved 12 amendments to the U.S. Constitution and sent them to the states for ratification. The amendments were designed to protect the basic rights of U.S. citizens, guaranteeing the freedom of speech, press, assembly, and exercise of religion; the right to fair legal procedure and to bear arms; and that powers not delegated to the federal government would be reserved for the states and the people. -
The First Morrill Act
The Morrill Act of 1862 was also known as the Land Grant College Act. It was a major boost to higher education in America. The grant was originally set up to establish institutions is each state that would educate people in agriculture, home economics, mechanical arts, and other professions that were practical at the time. The land-grant act was introduced by a congressman from Vermont named Justin Smith Morrill. He envisioned the financing of agricultural and mechanical education. -
Emancipation Proclamation
President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, as the nation approached its third year of bloody civil war. The proclamation declared "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free." -
13th Amendment
The 13th Amendment to the Constitution declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." Formally abolishing slavery in the United States, the 13th Amendment was passed by the Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified by the states on December 6, 1865. -
14th Amendment
The 14th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified on July 9, 1868, and granted citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States,” which included former slaves recently freed. -
Plessy vs. Ferguson
This 1896 U.S. Supreme Court case upheld the constitutionality of segregation under the “separate but equal” doctrine. It stemmed from an 1892 incident in which African-American train passenger Homer Plessy refused to sit in a Jim Crow car, breaking a Louisiana law. Rejecting Plessy’s argument that his constitutional rights were violated, the Court ruled that a state law that “implies merely a legal distinction” between whites and blacks did not conflict with the 13th and14th Amendments. -
Smith-Hughes Act
The Smith-Hughes National Vocational Education Act of 1917 was an act of the United States Congress that promoted vocational agriculture to train people "who have entered upon or who are preparing to enter upon the work of the farm," and provided federal funds for this purpose. -
GI Bill
The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 (P.L. 78-346, 58 Stat. 284m), known informally as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s). -
National School Lunch Act
The Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act (79 P.L. 396, 60 Stat. 230) is a United States federal law that created the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) to provide low-cost or free school lunch meals to qualified students through subsidies to schools. -
Brown vs. Board of Education
The story of Brown v. Board of Education, which ended legal segregation in public schools, is one of hope and courage. When the people agreed to be plaintiffs in the case, they never knew they would change history. The people who make up this story were ordinary people. They were teachers, secretaries, welders, ministers and students who simply wanted to be treated equally. -
National Defense Education Act NDEA
National Defense Education Act (NDEA), U.S. federal legislation passed by Congress and signed into law by Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower on September 2, 1958, that provided funding to improve American schools and to promote postsecondary education. The goal of the legislation was to enable the country’s educational system to meet the demands posed by national security needs. Of particular concern was bolstering the United States’ ability to compete with the Soviet Union in the areas of science. -
Civil Rights Act
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Pub.L. 88–352, 78 Stat. 241, enacted July 2, 1964) is a landmark piece of civil rights legislation in the United States that outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. -
Bilingual Education Act
The Bilingual Education Act, Title VII of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1968 (or BEA) was the first piece of United States federal legislation that recognized the needs of Limited English Speaking Ability (LESA) students. -
Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972
Title IX is a comprehensive federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity. The principal objective of Title IX is to avoid the use of federal money to support sex discrimination in education programs and to provide individual citizens effective protection against those practices. Title IX applies, with a few specific exceptions, to all aspects of federally funded education programs or activities. -
Rehabilitation Act
The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (often just called the “Rehab Act”) prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in programs run by federal agencies; programs that receive federal financial assistance; in federal employment; and in the employment practices of federal contractors. -
Plyler vs. Doe
Plyler v. Doe, (1982), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States struck down a state statute denying funding for education to unauthorized immigrant children and simultaneously struck down a municipal school district's attempt to charge unauthorized immigrants an annual $1,000 tuition fee for each undocumented immigrant student to compensate for the lost state funding. The Court found that where states limit the rights afforded to people (specifically children) based immigrant. -
Indian Education Act
The 1972 Indian Education Act was the landmark legislation establishing a comprehensive approach to meeting the unique needs of American Indian and Alaska Native students.Aug 25, 2005 -
The Elementary and Secondary Education Act ESEA
The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) was signed by President Obama on December 10, 2015, and represents good news for our nation’s schools. This bipartisan measure reauthorizes the 50-year-old Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the nation’s national education law and longstanding commitment to equal opportunity for all students.