Final Exam Schedule
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Period 1 – Thursday 5/29
Period 7,2,5 – Friday 5/30
Period 4,3,6 – Monday 6/2
Period 8 – Tuesday 6/3
• Each exam period = 1:35
American Civil Rights Movement
1950s & 1960s
American Studies
The Civil Rights Movement
True or False?
True or False?
Answers
1.
2.
3.
4.
True
True
True
False – there were more than 30 sit ins in 7
states within a month
5. False – children as young as 6 were arrested
6. False – over 250,000 people traveled to
Washington, D.C.
7. False – over 30 homes were firebombed, 80
demonstrators beaten and 3 killed
Situation in the U. S. 1877 – 1950s
• 13th Amendment
• 14th Amendment
• 15th Amendment
• Abolished slavery and
guaranteed rights—
including voting—to
African Americans
Situation in the U. S. 1877 –
1950s
• Jim Crow Laws
• Poll Tax
• Literacy Test
• Grandfather Clause
• Southern states restricted
African-Americans
despite Constitutional
protections
Situation in the U. S. 1877 –
1950s
• Plessy v. Ferguson
• Supreme Court declared
segregation was legal as
long as facilities were
“separate but equal”
Situation in the U. S. 1877 –
1950s
• Lynching
• Mob executions
• Used by whites in the
South to terrorize
African-Americans and
enforce the Jim Crow
system
Strange Fruit
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Southern trees bear strange fruit
Blood on the leaves
Blood at the root
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees
Pastoral scene of the gallant south
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth
The scent of magnolia sweet and fresh
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh
Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck
for the rain to gather
for the wind to suck
for the sun to rot
for the tree to drop
Here is a strange and bitter crop
Composed by Abel Meeropol (aka Lewis Allan)
Originally sung by: Billie Holiday
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/strangefruit/film.html
Origin of the Civil Rights Movement
• World War II • 1. African-Americans left
sharecropping jobs for industrial
jobs in Northern cities
• 2. 700,000 African-Americans
served in WW II – “We return from
fighting. We return fighting.”
• 3. During WWII, AfricanAmericans protested against Jim
Crow Laws—were successful
Who was Linda Brown?
• Brown v. Board of Education (Topeka,
Kansas) 1954
– Facts
• Linda Brown = 8 year old African American student
• Nearest elementary school = 4 blocks from the
Brown home (all white)
• Linda Brown’s school (all black) = 21 blocks from
the Brown home
• NAACP sues Bd of Education challenging the
separate but equal
Origin of the Civil Rights
Movement
• Thurgood Marshall
• NAACP Lawyer who
argues Linda Brown’s
case
• Later became the first
African-American
Supreme Court Justice
Warriors Don’t Cry
1. Why did the teacher insist that the students leave
quickly and walk home in groups?
2. If you were Melba’s mother or father, what might
you consider doing to protect your daughter? What
might you do to fight discrimination to give her more
opportunities in the future?
3. How did this ruling, Brown v. Board of Education,
promote or hinder the American ideal of opportunity?
Of rights?
Most Significant Victory
• Brown v. Board of
Education
• “Separate educational
facilities are inherently
unequal.”
• School Districts across
the nation began to
desegregate
Important Court Victories
• Desegregated interstate buses
• Desegregated law schools
• Desegregated graduate schools
Segregated City Bus – 1950’s
Montgomery, Alabama
• Rosa Parks • Refused to give up her seat to a
white man.
• Was arrested.
• Became a symbol of the Civil
Rights Movement
The Arrest
On December 1, 1955 Rosa Parks
refused to give up her seat to a
White man on a bus.
Parks was arrested and charged
with the violation of a segregation
law in The Montgomery City
Code.
50 African American leaders in
the community met to discuss
what to do about Rosa’s arrest.
“People always say that I
didn't give up my seat because
I was tired, but that isn't true.
I was not tired physically, or
no more tired than I usually
was at the end of a working
day. I was not old, although
some people have an image of
me as being old then. I was
forty-two. No, the only tired I
was, was tired of giving in.” Rosa Parks Autobiography
Montgomery Bus Boycott
On December 5, 1955,
African Americans in
Montgomery began to
boycott the busses.
40,000 Black commuters
walked to work, some as far
as twenty miles.
The boycott lasted 382 days.
The boycott ended after the
Supreme Court ruled the law
unconstitutional.
Martin Luther King Jr.
• In 1953, at the age of 26, King
became pastor at the Dexter
Avenue Baptist Church
in Montgomery Alabama.
• His start as a Civil Rights
leader came during the
Montgomery
Bus Boycott.
Montgomery, Alabama
• King organized a boycott of buses in
Montgomery
• Lasted 382 days
• King’s home was bombed
• Supreme Court finally outlawed segregation
on buses
Montgomery, Alabama
• Martin Luther King Jr.
• Studied tactics of
Thoreau, Gandhi, and
others
• Preached about soul
force—non-violent
resistance
• “We will not hate you,
but we cannot . . . obey
your unjust laws”
Non-Violent Tactics
• Boycott
• Refusing to buy a good or service
• Sit-in
• Sitting in segregated areas and
refusing to move
• March
• Marching with a large group to
draw attention to a cause
King Becomes a National Figure
• Southern Christian
Leadership
Conference (SCLC)
• Civil Rights group
organized by King
• Included over 100
African-American
ministers
Little Rock, Arkansas—1957
• Nine African-American students were to
integrate Central High School
• Governor ordered Arkansas National Guard
to turn the students away
• Federal judge ordered the governor to allow
the students entry
• Governor refused—African-American
students were turned away
Little Rock, Arkansas—1957
• Eisenhower responds
• Put 1,000 paratroopers in
Little Rock
• Stationed in the High
School—escorted
students to class,
maintained order
Little Rock High School 1957
The Movement Grows
• Student Non-violent
Coordinating Committee
(SNCC)
• Group of AfricanAmerican college students
in North Carolina
In the summers and over school-holidays volunteers came south
to join the fight for freedom and justice.
Most — but certainly not all — were college students or recent
grads.
Most — but certainly not all — were from the North.
Most — but certainly not all — were white.
Most returned to their campuses and jobs, but some stayed on as
full time freedom fighters.
Greensboro, North Carolina
• SNCC used sit-ins to protest segregated
lunch counters
• Media coverage showed racism to the entire
country
Separate Everything
Colored Fountain
Lunch Counter Sit-in 1960
Notice the
arm band?
• By 1960, 48 cities had desegregated lunch
counters
Freedom Riders
• Wanted to test enforcement of Supreme
Courts decision to desegregate interstate
buses.
• Blacks and Whites rode through the South
Getting Ready to Meet the Bus!!
Name the gender?
Freedom Riders
• Peck (a civil rights activist) rode on Bus One. At
the Alabama state line, a half dozen white racists
got on the bus, carrying chains, brass knuckles,
and pistols. They yanked the young AfricanAmerican riders from their seats and shoved
them into the aisle. Peck and a 60-year-old
white freedom rider tried to intervene. The
thugs knocked Peck unconscious and kicked the
old man repeatedly in the head until his brain
hemorrhaged.
Freedom Riders
• When Bus One got to Birmingham,
Alabama, a mob was waiting at the bus
terminal, many holding iron bars and pipes.
As they entered the white waiting room,
they were dragged into the alley and beaten
with the pipes. Peck was again knocked
unconscious, this time he needed 53 stitches
in his head and face.
Freedom Riders
• In Anniston, Alabama, 200 whites attacked Bus
Two and slashed its tires. Six miles out of
town, the bus was crippled. The mob
barricaded the door, smashed a window, and
tossed a fire bomb into the bus. The freedom
riders were barely able to force the door open
and escape before the bus exploded.
Freedom Riders
• Another group of freedom riders rode from
Tennessee into Alabama. When they reached
Birmingham, the Police Chief had them pulled
off the bus, beaten and driven back to Tennessee.
The freedom riders returned to Birmingham.
When they proceeded to Montgomery, a white
mob had formed and no police were present.
The freedom riders were again beaten. John F.
Kennedy finally sent 400 U. S. Marshals to
protect the riders as they continued to
Mississippi
Ole Miss
• James Meredith won a court case that would
make him the first African-American
student at the University of Mississippi.
Ole Miss
• Federal Marshals escorted Meredith to
register
• Riots ensued – 2 dead, 200 arrested, 5000
soldiers needed to stop the rioters
• 1966 Meredith was shot during a freedom
march in Mississippi – he survived
Ole Miss
• Mascot – Rebels
• Symbol – Confederate
Flag
No Segregation!!
Hotel owner pouring
muratic acid in his pool
Police ‘escorting’ swimmers from
a white only beach
Birmingham, Alabama – 1963
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Demonstrations to protest segregation
King was arrested – released
Children’s March- 959 were arrested
2nd Children’s March – police used fire
hoses, attack dogs against the marchers
• Finally, negative media attention, boycotts,
and protests led to desegregation
Protesters in a Birmingham Jail
1963
Jackson, Mississippi – 1963
• Civil Rights activist Medgar Evers was
killed in his driveway
• The killer, Byron de la Beckwith was
released after two trials (hung jury)
Washington, D. C. – 1963
• March organized to persuade Congress to
pass Civil Rights Bill
• 250,000 met to hear speeches, music
• “I Have a Dream” speech – Martin Luther
King, Jr.
• After Kennedy was shot, Civil Rights Act of
1964 passed
March on Washington 1963
Mississippi – 1964
• Freedom Summer – 1000 college students
went to Mississippi to register AfricanAmericans voters
• Met violent resistance—4 dead many
wounded, churches and businesses burned
Mississippi Burning
Selma, Alabama – 1965
• Voter registration drive – 2,000 African-Americans arrested,
police beatings
• Police killed a demonstrator
• King announced a protest March from Selma to Montgomery
• State police beat marchers, used tear gas
• Federal government stepped in protected marchers
• 25,000 marchers reached Selma
• The March crosses Lowndes County, a stronghold of the Ku
Klux Klan.
– Population: 81% Black, 19% white.
Voter registration: Blacks 0, whites 2240 (118%)
Selma, Alabama – 1965
• Voting Rights Act of 1965 passed—
eliminated the literacy test
• Allowed federal government to enroll
voters who were denied suffrage
• Twenty-Fourth Amendment—
eliminated the poll tax
Waiting to Vote 1966
Black Power
• Slogan coined by Stokely Carmichael (SNCC)
• African-Americans should separate from whites,
define their own goals, and lead their own
organizations
• Signaled a shift away from non-violent
resistance
Black Power
Mexico City, 1968
Black Panthers
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Black Power
Black Militancy—suggested armed revolt
“Power flows out of the barrel of a gun”
Communist
Got into shootouts with police
Black Panthers
• Sold copies of Mao Zedong’s Little Red
Book to raise money so they could purchase
shotguns
Black Panthers
• Started free daycare and free breakfast
program in urban ghettos
• Made them popular in Northern cities
Black Panthers
Black Panthers
Black Panthers
• J. Edgar Hoover (head of the F. B. I.)
declares that the Black Panthers were the
"greatest threat to the internal security of the
country."
Black Panthers
• Begin to unravel
• Leaders are sent to jail, flee the country,
killed by police
Martin Luther King, Jr.
• Assassinated in
April, 1968
Last Testament?
• "Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some
difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now.
Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind.
Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has
its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want
to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the
mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised
land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know
tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.
And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything.
I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of
the coming of the Lord."
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— The final words from Martin Luther King's last speech, given in Memphis
Tennessee the night before he was assasinated on April 4, 1968
Violence Erupts
• 125 cities experience rioting
Watts, 1965
Detroit, 1967
Washington, D. C., 1968
Kerner Commission
• Appointed by President Johnson
• Decides that the main cause of urban
violence is white racism
Civil Rights Act of 1968
• Banned segregation in housing
De Facto Segregation
• Difficult to overcome
• Involves changing attitudes, not laws
Affirmative Action
• Making special efforts to hire or enroll
groups that have suffered from
discrimination in the past.
• Very controversial—is it reverse
discrimination?