Law and Equal Opportunity is a sociological case study of the forces that facilitate, shape, and obstruct the legal implementation of social ideals. Specifically, Leon Mayhew's analysis focuses on the impact of antidiscrimination law in the state of Massachusetts, and the workings of the corresponding administrative agency, the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination. The book provides an account of the establishment of the Commission, its policies and practices, and the obstacles it confronted over a seventeen-year period (in particular from 1959 to 1963) and presents a detailed examination of actual complaints and how they were dealt with.