In its tumultuous 48-year history, affirmative action has been both praised and pilloried as an answer to racial inequality. The term "affirmative action" was first introduced by President Kennedy in 1961 as a method of redressing discrimination that had persisted in spite of civil rights laws and constitutional guarantees. It was developed and enforced for the first time by President Johnson. "This is the next and more profound stage of the battle for civil rights," Johnson asserted. "We seek… not just equality as a right and a theory, but equality as a fact and as a result."
Affirmative action refers to policies that take factors including "race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation or national origin"[1] into consideration in order to benefit an underrepresented group, usually as a means to counter the effects of a history of discrimination. The focus of such policies ranges from employment and education to public contracting and health programs.
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/affirmative1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/affirmative1.html#ixzz1UZjkwJ2b
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