The Civil Rights Movement

1. The Civil Rights Movement 1954- 1968

2. In the 1950s and 1960s African Americans made major strides. • They began by challenging segregation in the South. • In Montgomery bus boycott,Martin Luther King Jr. achieved national and worldwide recognition.

3. The Origins of the Movement • The African American civil rights movement began after Rosa Parksrefused to give her seat on a bus to a white man. • An organized boycott of the bus system was just the beginning as African Americans demanded equal rights.

4. In 1896 the Supreme Court had declared segregation legal in Plessy v. Ferguson. • This ruling had established aseparate-but-equal doctrinemaking laws segregating Africans Americans legal as long as equal facilities were provided. • Jim Crowe lawssegregating African Americans and whites were common in the South after the Plessy v. Ferguson decision.

5. In places without segregation laws such as the North, there was de facto segregationby custom and tradition. • The civil rights movement had been building for a long time. • Since 1909, theNational Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)had supported court cases intended to overturn segregation. • It provided financial support and lawyers to African Americans.

6. In 1935 the Supreme Court ruled inNorris v. Alabamathat Alabama’s exclusion of African Americans from juries violated their right to equal protection under the law. • In 1946 the Court ruled in Morgan v. Virginiathat segregation on interstate buses was unconstitutional.

7. African Americans gained political power as they migrated to Northern cities where they could vote. • African Americans voted for politicians who listened to their concerns on civil rights issues, resulting in a strong Democratic Party.

8. The Push for Desegregation • During WWII African American leaders began to use their new political power to demand more rights. • In factories that held government contracts and increased opportunities for African Americans in the military.

9. In Chicago in 1942, James Farmer and George Houser founded the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). • CORE began using sit-insa form of protest first used by union workers in 1930s. • The sit-ins resulted in integration of many restaurants, theaters, and other public facilities in Chicago, Detroit, Denver and Syracuse.

10. The Civil Rights Movement Begins • When African Americans returned from WWII they had hoped for equality. • When this did not occur the civil rights movement began as African Americans planned protests and marches to end prejudice.

11. Brown v. Board of Education • After WWII the NAACP continued to challenge segregation in the courts. • From 1939 to 1961 the NAACP’s chief counsel and director of its Legal Defense and Education Fund was the brilliant African American attorney Thurgood Marshall.

12. After WWII Marshall focused on his efforts on ending segregation in public schools. • In 1954 Supreme Court decided to combine several different cases and issue a general ruling on segregation in schools. • In 1954 the Supreme Court decided to combine several different cases and issue a general ruling on segregation in schools.

13. One of the cases involved a young African American girl named Linda Brownwho was denied admission to her neighborhood school in Topeka, Kansas because of her race. • She was told to attend an all-black school across town. • With the help of her parents and the NAACP they sued the Topeka school board.

14. On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in the case of Brown v. Board of Educationof Topeka, Kansas that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional and violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. • Chief Justice Earl Warrensummed up the Court’s decision when he wrote: “In the field of public education the doctrine of separate but equal has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.”

15. The Southern Manifesto • The Brown decision marked a dramatic reversal of the ideas expressed in the Plessy v. Ferguson case. • Brown v. Board of Education applied only to public schools but the ruling threatened the entire system of segregation. • Although it convinced many African Americans that the time had come to challenge other forms of segregations, it also angered many white Southerners, who became even more determined to defend segregation, regardless of what the Supreme Court ruled.

16. Although some school districts in border states integrated their in compliance with the Court’s ruling, anger and opposition was a far more common reaction. • In Washington, D.C. Senator Harry F. Byrdof Virginia called on Southerners to adopt “massive resistance” against ruling. • Across the South hundreds of thousands of white Americans joined citizens’ councils to pressure their local governments and school boards into defying the Supreme Court.

17. In 1956 a group of 101 Southern members of Congress signed the Southern Manifestowhich denounced the Supreme Court’s ruling as a clear abuse of judicial power and pledged to use all lawful means to reverse the decision.

18. The Montgomery Bus Boycott • On the day Rosa Parks appeared in court, the Women’s Political Councilled African Americans in a boycott against the Montgomery bus system. • The Montgomery Improvement Association was created to run the boycott and negotiate with city leaders to end segregation.

19. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.was elected to head The Montgomery Improvement Association he called for a nonviolent passive resistance approach to end segregation and racism. • The boycott of the bus system continued for over a year as African Americans walked or participated in carpools. • In December 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court declared Alabama’s laws requiring segregation on buses to be unconstitutional.

20. African American Churches • Martin Luther King Jr. was not the only prominent minister in the bus boycott. • Many other leaders were African American ministers. • The boycott could not have succeeded without the support of the African American churches in the city.

21. After the Montgomery bus boycott demonstrated that nonviolent protest could be successful, African American ministers led by King established the Southern Christian Leadership Conferencein 1957. • The SCLC set out to eliminate segregation from American society and to encourage African Americans to register to vote. • Dr. King served as the SCLC’s first president. • Under his leadership the organization challenged segregation at the voting booths, and in public transportation, housing, and public accommodations.

22. African American churches served as forums for many of the protest and planning meetings. • The churches also mobilized many of the volunteers for specific civil-rights campaigns. • African American ministers led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. established the SCLC which was set up to eliminate segregation from American society and encouraged African Americans to vote.

23. Eisenhower and Civil Rights • President Eisenhowerbecame the first president since Reconstruction to send federal troops into the South to protect African Americans and their constitutional rights.

24. In Little Rock, Arkansas Governor OrvalFaubusordered the National Guard to prevent African American students from entering the Little Rock High School. • President Eisenhower demanded that the troops be removed. • The governor withdrew the troops but left the school to the angry mob.

25. Two African Americans were beaten and many windows of the school were broken. • Eisenhower ordered the United States Army to surround the school and the students were escorted into the building. • The troops remained the entire school year.

26. New Civil Rights Legislation • The same year that the Little Rock crisis began, Congress passed the first civil rights law since Reconstruction. • TheCivil Rights Act of 1957was intended to protect the right of African Americans to vote. • President Eisenhower believed firmly in the right to vote and he viewed it as his responsibility to protect voting rights.

27. In 1964 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at the age of 35 was the youngest person ever to receive the Nobel Peace Prizefor his works toward civil rights.

28. The Sit-In Movement • In 1960 four African Americans staged a sit-in at a Woolworth’s whites- only lunch counter. • This led to a mass movement for civil rights. • Soon sit-ins were occurring across the nation. • Within two months sit-ins had spread to 54 cities in 9 states.

29. The effects the sit-in movement had was it got the nation’s attention and gave people a way to get involved in the civil rights movement. • Students like Jesse Jacksonfrom North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College felt that sit-ins gave them power to change things.

30. SNCC • As sit-ins became more popular, it was necessary to choose a leader to coordinate the effort. • Ella Bakerexecutive director of the SCLC urged students to create their own organization. • The students formed the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).

31. Among SNCC’s early leaders were Marion Barry who later served as mayor of Washington, D.C. and John Lewis who later became a member of Congress. • African American college students from all over the Southmade up the majority of SNCC’s members although many whites also joined.

32. Robert Moses, an SNCC volunteer from New York, pointed out that most of the civil rights movement was focused on urban areas, and rural Americans needed help as well. • When they went South, SNCC volunteers had their lives threatened and others were beaten. • In 1964 three SNCC workers were murdered as they tried to register African Americans to vote.

33. SNCC organizer Fannie Lou Hamerwas arrested in Mississippi after encouraging African Americans to vote. • While in Jail she was beaten by police. • Later she helped to organize the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. • She challenged the legality of the segregated Democratic Party at the 1964 Democratic Convention.

34. In 1961 CORE leader Jessie Farmer asked teams of African Americans and whites to travel into the South to draw attention to the South’s refusal to integrate bus terminals. • The teams became known as the Freedom Riders. • In May 1961 the first Freedom Riders boarded several southbound interstate buses.

35. When buses carrying them arrived in Anniston, Birmingham, and Montgomery, Alabama, angry white mobs attacked them. • The mobs slit the bus tires and threw rocks at the windows. • In Anniston, someone threw a firebomb into one bus, although fortunately no one was killed. • In Birmingham the riders emerged from a bus to face a gang of young men armed with bats, chains and lead pipes.

39. The head of the police in Birmingham, Public Safety Commissioner Theophilus Eugene “BULL” Conner explained that there had been no police at the bus station because it was Mother’s Day, and he had given many of the police officers off. • FBI evidence later showed that Connor had contacted the Local KKK and told them he wanted the Freedom Riders beaten until ‘it looked like a bulldog got a hold of them.”

40. The violence in Alabama made national news shocking many Americans. • The attack on the Freedom Riders came less than four months after President Kennedy took office. • President Kennedy was compelled to do something about the violence in Alabama.

41. John F. Kennedy and Civil Rights • During JFK’s presidential campaign in 1960 he supported the civil rights movement, which resulted in African American votes that helped him narrowly win the race. • Once in office, President Kennedy became cautious on civil rights realizing that in order to get other programs passed through Congress he would have to avoid new civil rights legislation.

42. President Kennedy and his brother Robert actively supported the civil rights movement. • Robert helped African Americans register to vote by having lawsuits filed throughout the South. • President Kennedycreated the Committee on Equal Opportunity to stop the federal bureaucracy from discrimination against African Americans when hiring and promoting people.

43. In 1962 James Meredithan African American Air Force veteran tried to register at the segregated University of Mississippi. • Meredith was met with the governor blocking his path. • President Kennedy ordered 500 federal marshals to escort Meredith to the campus.

44. A full scale riot broke out with 160 marshals being wounded. • The army sent in thousands of troops. • For the remainder of the year, Meredith attended classes under federal guard until he graduated the following August.

45. The Civil Rights of 1964 • AlabamaGovernor George Wallaceblocked the way for two African Americans to register for college at the University of Alabama, President Kennedy appeared on national television to announce his civil rights bill. • He stayed until federal marshals ordered him to move.

47. George Wallace blocks the entrance to Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama in 1963 as a National Guardsman asks him to step aside. Wallace symbolically blocked the entrance of the first registered African American students after mandatory school desegregation was enacted by the federal government.

48. The following day a white segregationist murdered Medger Evers a civil rights activist (Byron De La Beckwith) in Mississippi.

49. Martin Luther King Jr.wanted to pressure Congress to pass Kennedy’s civil rights bill through. • On August 28, 1963 King led 200,000 demonstrators of all races to the nations’ capital and staged a peaceful rally.

50. Opponents of the Civil rights bill did whatever they could to slow the procedure to pass it. • The bill could easily pass in the House of Representatives but it faced difficulty in the Senate. • Senators could speak for as long as they wanted while debating a bill. • Afilibusteroccurs when a small group of senators take turns speaking and refuse to stop the debate to allow the bill to be voted on.