cted in the two decades are similar because they are enacted for the people. In 1963 legal reform was made in the Baker v. Carr case making the district lines for voting more representative of the population. Reforms in the 60's were widespread and liberal. Prayer in school was made illegal, the Equal Pay Act in 1963stated that women legally had the right to the same pay as men on the job, and congress enacted the Civil Rights Act ( '64). The people were demanding change in society. Illustrations of their demands can be shown not only through the acts passed, but also through the grassroots movements for reform. Free speech protests, the emergence of the National Organization for Women ( '66), and the activist Cesar Chavez for United Farm Workers are all representations of smaller minority populations gaining a voice. Though these ideas and policies made it into the mainstream and are now widely accepted, they were not popular at the time. Minorities such as women and African Americans had to fight to be recognized politically and socially and through this struggle they gained recognition and legal backing.
             In the eighties reform was quite another idea all together. Where reforms in the 30's and 60's seem to be created by and for the people the election of President Ronald Reagan in 1980 brought a different tone. Reagan, a republican attacked the conditions that the nation was left in following Carter asking "are you better off now than you were four years ago?" Regan was referring to the rising inflation and unemployment rates that had been showing its wear on the American population. While Reagan called for a "new day" for the people, he was allowing the common man to fall by the waste side. Reagan was a large advocate for hands off government or keeping government out of the daily lives of the people. The Regan took a stance against women's rights, speaking out against abortion an...