How does Darwin’s “Survival of the Fittest” theory
relate to the concepts of equality?
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.
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 1866 grants 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.
Civil Rights Act 1875 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
Winslow Homer: The Gulf Stream 1899
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!
1946
Morgan v. Virginia, 1946 Supreme 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
MLK
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
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
Little Rock Central 1957 -Little Rock Nine
Governor orders National Guard to stop black students
Use of Federal troops by Eisenhower to integrate
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
Michael Beschloss Presidential Courage
Politics and the Election of 1960
Freedom Riders 1961
James Farmer, CORE director, announced that
a group of SNCC volunteers in Nashville were
set to 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
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
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
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
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!
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
It is looking like Civil War II
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”
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?”
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’t AAs wanted “freedom now”
3 dozen cities erupt!
MLK proposes a march to show support
for the civil rights bill
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
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
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
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
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
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
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?"