In response to low voter registration among African Americans, President Dwight D. Eisenhower proposes the Civil Rights Act of 1957 — the first since Reconstruction. The law creates the Civil Rights Commission to investigate acts of interference with citizens’ right to vote and to monitor other civil rights abuses. Civil rights leaders complain that the law is weakened because it provides for violators to be tried locally, meaning that those attempting to disenfranchise blacks would gain a sympathetic jury.