How does Darwin’s “Survival of the Fittest” theory relate to the concepts of equality?

1. How does Darwin’s “Survival of the Fittest” theory relate to the concepts of equality?

2. Timeline for the Struggle for Civil Rights in America In poet Dudley Randall’s "Booker T. and W.E.B.," Booker T. Washington argues that African Americans should work quietly on the plantation for Mr. Charlie and Miss Ann and save money to buy a house, among other things, as part of a fictional conversation with W.E.B. DuBois, who constantly disagrees, citing education as the goal to which Afircan Americans should aspire. Randall ends the poem with a nod to the latter, W.E.B.: "I don't agree," said W.E.B. "For what can property avail If dignity and justice fail? Unless you help to make the laws, They'll steal your house with trumped-up clause. A rope's as tight, a fire as hot, No matter how much cash you've got. Speak soft, and try your little plan, But as for me, I'll be a man." "It seems to me," said Booker T.-- "I don't agree," Said W.E.B.

3. 1865 13th Amendment outlaws slavery Ku Klux Klan founded to maintain white supremacy through intimidation & violence Freedman’s Bureau formed during Reconstruction to assist freed slaves in the South 1866 Civil Rights Act 1866grants citizenship to native-born Americans except Indians 1868 14th Amendment grants equal protection of the laws to African-Americans 1870 15th Amendment establishes right of African American males to vote Anti-Negro cartoon of 1900, portraying the Negro as a demon who should not be permitted to vote. The outcome: North Carolina disenfranchised the Negro.

4. Civil Rights Act1875 grants equal access to public accommodations. In 1883 – All white Supreme Court declared this law unconstitutional! "How does it feel to be a problem?"—is the question with which Du Bois begins The Souls of Black Folk

5. Plessy v. Ferguson 1898 Perhaps the single most telling moment of the 1890s for black citizens was the Supreme Court's decision that segregated public facilities did not violate the Constitution. Why a "telling moment?” Because it said to African Americans "you're on your own." The federal government would not enforce integration, just as it would not pass an anti-lynching law or, later, maintain integrated federal workplaces. -WW II exposed racism Events of WWII set the stage for the civil rights movement After this experience – fighting ag fascism – they came home prepared to fight for their own freedom During the war, civil rights organizations actively campaigned for AA voting rights and an end to Jim Crow laws FDR issued presidential directive prohibiting racial discrimination by federal agencies and all companies engaged in war work THE GROUNDWORK WAS LAID FOR ORGANIZED CAMPAIGNS TO END SEGREGATION!

6. 1946 Morgan v. Virginia,1946Supreme Court finds laws requiring segregated seating on interstate buses are unconstitutional 1948 President Harry Truman ends segregation in the US military University of Arkansas admits African American students to state university w/o court order Thurgood Marshall 1950 In Sweatt v. Painter,1950 Supreme Court finds that state law schools must admit black students even if separate black schools exist 1954 In Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka,1954 the Supreme Court overturns the principle of “separate but equal” SC unanimously struck down segregation in schools as unconstitutional – violation of 14th amendment Equal Protection Clause MLK

7. RESISTANCE TO SCHOOL DESEGREGATION Within a year more than 500 school districts had desegregated their schools. Where AAs were a majority, whites resisted deseg In some places Klan reappeared White Citizens Councils boycotted businesses that supported deseg Second Brown ruling – to speed up the process – Brown II – implement with “all deliberate speed” Initially, Eisenhower refused to enforce compliance Events in Little Rock, AK forced him to comply

8. Little Rock Central 1957 -Little Rock Nine Governor orders National Guard to stop black students Use of Federal troops by Eisenhower to integrate

9. Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott 1954 AAs filed a lawsuit – for 381 days they refused to ride the buses Boycott remained nonviolent -even after someone bombed King’s home! SC outlawed bus segregation in 1956 -SCLC -SNCC Jesus: love your enemies Thoreau: refuse to obey unjust laws A. Philip Randolph: how to organize massive demonstrations Mohandas Ghandi: resist oppression w/nonviolence

10. Michael Beschloss Presidential Courage Politics and the Election of 1960

11. Freedom Riders 1961 James Farmer, CORE director, announced that a group of SNCC volunteers in Nashville were setto continue where the others had left off - create a crisis The violence got just the result the freedom riders had hoped for: newspapers at home & abroad denounced the beatings. The Attorney General & ICC banned segregation in all interstate travel facilities: including waiting rooms, restrooms, & lunch counters

12. Is this Civil War? University of Mississippi 1962-Oxford, Miss. James Meredith: September 1962, Air Force vet, James Meredith won a federal court case to enroll in the all-white University of Mississippi When Meredith came on campus he was met by MI governor, Ross Barnett, who refused to let him register

13. Is This Civil War? • “JFK addresses the people on TV as the riots carry on. Looking into the camera, he declared that the “orders of the court” were being “carried out” at Ole Miss. He crisply noted that “few laws are universally loved,” but Americans could not “disobey” them. • It was his first major civil rights speech as President.” Michael Bescholoss Presidential Courage

14. It is looking like Civil War II --Trouble continued in Birmingham, AL The city is known for its strict enforcement of total segregation in public life & for its reputation for racial violence. -May 2, 1963 more than 1000 AA children march in Birmingham. 959 were arrested - May 3, 1963 a second “children’s crusade” came face-to-face w/police TV CAMERAS CAPTURED IT! HEARD CHILDREN SCREAMING

15. It is looking like Civil War II Front Page News Kennedy warned the Russians would exploit the “terrible” new photograph May 12, 1963 - Birmingham is nearing complete chaos!

16. Letter From a Birmingham Jail 1963 • While King sat in a Birmingham jail, a group of 8 white ministers implored him to cancel the demonstrations. Denied writing paper by the prison guards, King composed his reply in the margins of a copy of the New York Times and on pieces of scrap paper. • Later, King will win the 1964 Nobel Peace prize

17. It is looking like Civil War II

18. Courts order University of Alabama to admit 2 black students Gov Wallace wanted to block it and make dramatic political press...presidential aspirations The last thing JFK wants is another Oxford case. In 100 degree heat U.S. Marshal Katzenbach asked Wallace to step aside. Wallace delivered a 7 minute diatribeagainst Kennedy’s “military dictatorship”

19. Boldest Speech Ever “ We are confronted primarily with a moral issue...as old as the Scriptures and ...as clear as the American Constitution” “ If an American, because his skin is dark, cannot eat lunch in a restaurant...if he cannot vote...if he cannot send his children to the best public school...then who among us would be content to have the color of his skin changed and stand in his place?”

20. Highlighting the need – just hours after Kennedy’s speech – Medgar Evers is shot • He was field sec for NAACP and a WWII vet • Police arrest a white supremacist: Byron de la Beckwith – but he was released after trials resulting in 2 hung juries • His release brought a militancy to the mov’tAAs wanted “freedom now” 3 dozen cities erupt! MLK proposes a march to show support for the civil rights bill

21. August 1963 March on Washington Emancipation in 1863 August 28, 1963 – 250,000 people, including 75,000 whites converge on the nation’s capital -listened to speeches about the passage of the Civil Rights Bill MLK’s “I have a Dream” speech is given here. Appeal for racial harmony

22. 2 weeks later, 4 young girls from Birmingham were killed when a bomb was thrown into the church through the window. 17th Street Baptist Church bombing Sept 1963 • JFK has to carry the Southern States in election of 1964. They want a corrupt bargain like Hayes in 1876 to remove reconstruction/civil rights bill. • November 1963, assassin shot & killed JFK - LBJ pledges to carry on his work • July 2, 1964 – LBJ signs Civil Rights Act of 1964 • Prohibited discrimination b/c race, religion, national origin, gender • Gave all citizens the right to enter libraries, parks, washrooms, restaurants, theaters, all other public accommodations

23. 1964 • 24th Amendment outlaws poll taxes for national elections • Organization for African American Unity (OAU) formed to promote closer ties between African Americans and Africa • Freedom Summer 1964- massive effort to register black voters; Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party send delegates to DNC (Democratic National Caucus) • 3 Mississippi civil rights workers are found murdered Andrew Goodman James Cheney Michael Schwerner

24. 1965 • Malcolm X assassinated • Blacks begin a march from Selma to Montgomery, AL, but are stopped by police blockade that turns violent. It is seen on TV - interrupts the showing of the Academy Award winning movie The Nuremberg Trials. • Voting Right Act 1965 nullifies local laws and practices that prevent minorities from voting (literacy tests, etc) • 1967 • In Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court rules that prohibiting interracial marriages is unconstitutional

25. 1988 Overriding President Reagan’s veto, Congress passes the Civil Rights Restoration Act, which expands the reach of non-discrimination laws within private institutions receiving federal aid 1991 After 2 years of debates, vetoes, and threatened vetoes, President Bush reverses himself and signs the Civil Rights Act of 1991, strengthening existing civil rights laws and providing for damages in cases of intentional employment discrimination

26. 2003 Supreme Court upholds Affirmative Action in Higher Education in the most important affirmative action decision since the 1978 Bakke case U of Michigan can consider race as one of many factors when selecting their students vecause it furthers a “compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a more diverse student body

27. BALLAD OF BIRMINGHAM "Mother dear, may I go downtown instead of out to play, and march the streets of Birmingham in a Freedom March today?" "No, baby, no, you may not go, for the dogs are fierce and wild, and clubs and hoses, guns and jails ain't good for a little child." "But, mother, I won't be alone. Other children will go with me, and march the streets of Birmingham to make our country free." "No, baby, no, you may not go, for I fear those guns will fire. But you may go to church instead and sing in the children's choir." She has combed and brushed her nightdark hair, and bathed rose petal sweet, and drawn white gloves on her small brown hands, and white shoes on her feet. The mother smiled to know her child was in the sacred place, but that smile was the last smile to come upon her face. For when she heard the explosion, her eyes grew wet and wild. She raced through the streets of Birmingham calling for her child. She clawed through bits of glass and brick, then lifted out a shoe. "O, here's the shoe my baby wore, but, baby, where are you?"