Kansas Human Rights Commission

In 1953, the State of Kansas passed the Kansas Act Against Discrimination, the twelfth state to pass such an act. This act created the Anti-Discrimination Commission which focused solely on employment practices and had no enforcement capabilities. In 1961 when the act was amended in order to become an enforceable law prohibiting discriminatory employment practices because of race, religion, color, national origin, or ancestry, the name changed to the Kansas Commission on Civil Rights. After further amendments over the next thirty years, the commission again changed name in 1991 to the Kansas Human Rights Commission. The KHRC continues to operate with a mandate to prevent and eliminate unlawful discrimination in employment situations, to eliminate profiling in conjunction with traffic stops, to eliminate and prevent discrimination, segregation or separation, and assure equal opportunities in all places of public accommodation and in housing. [Kansas Human Rights Commission. "Annual Report Fiscal Year 2007," http://www.khrc.net/pdf/AR2007.pdf (accessed 27 October 2008).]