CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT
3 Phases of the CRM
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Legal Phase
Direct Action Phase
Black Power Phase
Civil Rights Movement: Legal Phase
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Philosophy: if you change the law people’s attitudes will change
with it
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Goal: make “separate, but equal” so expensive that gov’t would get rid of it
Key People: Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall
Key Court Cases: Gaines v. Missouri (1938), Sweat v. Painter
(1950), McLaurin v. Oklahoma (1950)
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Helped Brown v. Board of Education (1954) overturn Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
Problem with Brown v. Board: Supreme Court forced
desegregation of Southern Schools at “all deliberate speed”
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No exact timeline allowed Southern Schools to drag their feet
Major Events of the CRM
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1. Brown v. Board of Education, 1954
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2. Montgomery Bus Boycott, 1955
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MIA – Montgomery Improvement Association
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Civil rights leaders who kept boycott alive while NAACP took Parks case to court
3. Little Rock Nine, 1957-58
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Gov. Orval Faubus used Arkansas Nat’l Guard to prevent black students admission
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Eisenhower sends 1,000 troops for protection
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Closed school for the 1958-59 school year
4. Freedom Riders, 1961
 CORE members (racially mixed group) rode a bus from D.C.
through the south to New Orleans
5. Freedom Summer, 1964
 White college students from the North taught literacy and
constitutional rights – help register voters
Major Events of the CRM
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6. Children’s Crusade: Birmingham, 1963
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7. March on Washington
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250,000 protested at Washington Mall to show support for
Kennedy’s civil rights bill
“I have a dream”
8.16th Street Bombing
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Project C
Birmingham – 4 girls killed in church bombing
9. Civil Rights Act of 1964
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Passed by Johnson and ending the legal discrimination on the
basis of race, color, religion, nat’l origin and sex in voting,
employment and public accommodations