Bush embarrassed by Civil Rights Act anniversary:

"Julian Bond, chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, has slammed Bush for not doing enough on civil rights. Others have attacked the administration for opposing in court the University of Michigan's affirmative-action program on minority admissions and for nominating candidates to the federal bench civil-rights activists have opposed.

'Under President Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft, the Justice Department's civil-rights division has been effectively closed,' the campaign of Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said in a release. 'Ashcroft has brought only 16 lawsuits in three years, compared to 24 in the last three years of Clinton, and has abandoned lawsuits and settlements begun by prior administrations.'

Bush garnered 9 percent of the black vote in the 2000 election, the lowest tally since Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater lost to Johnson by a landslide in 1964. Bush, like his predecessors, is actively courting the traditionally overwhelmingly Democratic black electorate -- and denies any civil-rights rollback.

'I urge you to look at the record and ignore the rhetoric,' Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said earlier Thursday.

The administration touts the president's No Child Left Behind Act, minority-homeownership programs, faith-based community initiatives and economic-stimulus programs as signs of his commitment to provide equal opportunity and rights for all U.S. residents, but criticism has not subsided."