Glossary

  • Legislature

    law-making body

  • Letter from Birmingham Jail

    Martin Luther King, Jr., composed a letter from his prison cell in Birmingham in response to local religious leaders’ criticisms of the campaign.

  • Libel

    a published false statement that is damaging to a person’s reputation

  • Literacy tests

    exams to determine if a person was able to meet the comprehension requirements needed to vote, commonly used by Southern states to keep Black citizens from voting.

  • Litigation

    the process of taking legal action

  • Little Rock Nine

    The first group of African-American students who attended Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.

  • Lobbied

    to seek to influence politicians or public officials on a particular issue.

  • Lobby

    to seek to influence politicians or public officials on a particular issue

  • Lottery

    A means of raising money by selling tickets and giving prizes to the holders of numbers drawn at random.

  • Louis D. Brandeis

    the first Jewish-American lawyer appointed as Associate Justice to the Supreme Court in 1916.