Reading ComprehensionDifficulty: Easy

PT120 S2 P1 Q1 Explanation

The Downstate Campaign

A free, expert breakdown of this official LSAT Reading Comprehension question.

TopicsAuthor's AttitudeSociety

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Passage

In 1963, a three-week-long demonstration for jobs at the construction site of the Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, became one of the most significant and widely publicized campaigns of the civil rights movement in the United States. An interdenominational group made up mostly of locally based African American ministers, who in trade union hiring practices, both of which they believed excluded African Americans from construction jobs.

Inspired by the emergence of African American religious leaders as key figures elsewhere in the civil rights movement, and reasoning that the ministers would be able to mobilize large numbers of people from their congregations and network effectively with other religious leaders throughout the city, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), a their political careers and their reputations within their communities for effecting change through established political channels.

The Downstate campaign ended with an agreement between the ministers and both government and union officials. This agreement did not include new legislation or a commitment to a specific numerical increase in jobs for African Americans, as the protestors had demanded. But even though some civil rights activists therefore considered the agreement a model for future ministers who sought to initiate protest actions on behalf of their communities.

What this question is testing

Author's Attitude

Your task

Pin down exactly what the question asks about the passage — a detail, the author's view, the structure, or the main point — before looking at the choices.

Common trap

Answers that restate a true detail from the passage but don't answer the specific question being asked.

Winning move

Anticipate the answer in your own words from the passage, then find the choice that matches that prediction.

Reading along? Open the full official question in LawHub — we show a fragment here and keep the reasoning in our own words.

The question
1.

It can be reasonably inferred from the passage that the author’s attitude is most favorable toward which one

Answer choices

  1. Not Emphasized1% picked this

    the ways in which the Downstate campaign altered the opinions of

    The beginning of the final paragraph says that the Downstate campaign ended with an agreement with union officials that did not include new legislation or a commitment to a specific numerical increase in jobs, as demanded. So the author probably wouldn't be most impressed by this, since it's unclear how much the opinions of union leaders were even altered.

  2. Not Emphasized5% picked this

    the impact that the Downstate campaign had on the implementation of

    The beginning of the final paragraph says that the Downstate campaign ended with an agreement with union officials that did not include new legislation. Government officials pledged to enforce existing antidiscrimination legislation, which is definitely less exciting that implementing new legislation.

  3. Out of Scope: demonstrators3% picked this

    CORE’s relationship to the demonstrators in the

    The passage never actually talks about the demonstrators. The ministers are discussed as the leaders of the demonstration. They presumably participated in the demonstration also, but it would be weird to interpret "the demonstrators" to mean the leaders of the demonstration. It makes more sense to interpret it as the regular rank-and-file people who showed up to protest.

  4. Correct82% picked this

    the effects that the Downstate campaign had on

    Why this is right

    We can match this up with the middle of the final paragraph: the Downstate campaign effectively aroused public concern for the previously neglected problem of discrimination in the construction industry.

    Skill tested: Author's Attitude · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

  5. Not Emphasized10% picked this

    the way in which the leaders of the Downstate campaign negotiated the agreement that

    The beginning of the final paragraph says that the Downstate campaign ended with an agreement with union officials that did not include new legislation or a commitment to a specific numerical increase in jobs, as demanded. So the author probably wouldn't be most impressed by this, since the protesters didn't really get any of the big things they were asking for.

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