The American Dilemma
Black man drinks from ‘colored’ fountain:
even the quality of the fountain is inferior.
Section 17.1
Today’s Agenda
• Presentations (Day 36)
• Begin 17.1
• HW: Start putting your notebook in order!
Scream of
anguish
Some returning WWII said that they felt
angry: they saw the U.S. as hypocritical,
after they returned home to America. Why?
Left: German sign says Jews are forbidden; right: ‘colored’ dining room
(for restaurant?) is in back of the out-house!!
Let’s Review
• What is the significance of the Plessy v.
Ferguson case?
• What are Jim Crow Laws?
– “separate but equal”
• What is lynching?
– Strange Fruit
• What is segregation? Integration?
• Recall Truman’s executive order and the
revolt of the Dixiecrats
What made the African American “invisible”
in 1950s society, according to did novelist
Ralph Ellison?
• Segregation (in the South)
– Separation of blacks and whites through
state and local laws
• Public schools, buses, waiting rooms,
restaurants
– Affirmed by Plessy v Ferguson (1896)
• “separate but equal” constitutional
• De Facto Segregation (in the North)
– Separation (in fact but not by law)
– Levittown, neighborhoods, school
districts Above: different black man drinks from ‘colored only’; below: ad promises G.I. and
Capture from Peter Jennings clip on racial segregation
Describe the NAACPs strategy for
ending segregation:
• Planned on challenging “sep. but equal”
ruling on graduate and specialized schools
• Expense of making schools ‘equal’ would
Photo of Thurgood Marshall
force states to integrate
in ’50s
• 1950 they decided to directly
challenge segregation
• Thurgood Marshall
(leader of NAACP)
• Picked Kansas school district to
challenge segregation
• Hoped to lose there
• Why?
Describe the case of Brown v the Board
of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954).
• Topeka schools were of comparable quality
• Linda Brown
– Age 7
– Walked over RR switching yard to catch a
bus to school (miles away)
– All white school just blocks from her house
Above: kids cross tracks to take
• Decision (Warren Court):
bus; below: S.C.C.J. Earl Warren
– Said that segregation is harmful to children
even if the facilities are equal
– “may affect their hearts and minds in a way
very unlikely ever to be undone.”
– Segregation in Education is unconstitutional
– Said integration should take place “at the
earliest possible date.”
Capture from clip on Brown vs. Board (colonial flag background)
Southern Reaction
Left: three murdered freedom riders
How did the South react to the decision?
• Strong resistance to decision in South
• Passed over 450 laws to prevent
integration
• Virginia cut off state $ to integrated
schools
• Southern Manifesto
Above: George C. Wallace, Alabama
governor; Below: Lyndon B. Johnson, Texas
– Praised states who resisted
Senator
integration
– Signed by 100 southern
congressmen (House and Senate)
• LBJ =one of three who refused
– End of their careers widely forecast
– Guess who the other two were?
Who were the Little Rock Nine?
• 1st African American students to attend
all white southern school
• Superintendent planned to integrate 9
African Americans
• Gov. Orval Faubus resisted integration
– National Guard was removed by Faubus
• Allowed mob intimidation to drive the
Nine away
• Eisenhower sent 101st Airborne to
protect schools
• School district closed following year
• Finally reopened 1959 and obeyed
Brown decision
Above: white mob taunts black
student; below: Little Rock Nine in
class
Capture from clip on school de-segregation