The Civil Rights Movement
1954-1968
Origins of the Movement
• Segregation had been declared equal
when the Plessy v. Ferguson case of 1896
established the “separate but equal”
doctrine.
• These segregation laws were known as
“Jim Crow” laws.
• They segregated buses, bathrooms,
trains, schools, restaurants, swimming
pools, parks, and other public facilities.
NAACP
• The National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People
(*NAACP) was established in 1909 and
supported court cases attempting to
overturn segregation.
• They supported efforts to end segregation.
Brown v. Board of Education 1954
• In 1954, the Supreme Court heard the
case of a young African American girl
named Linda Brown- she was denied
admission to a neighborhood school in
Topeka, Kansas because of race.
• With the help of the NAACP, her parents
sued the school board.
• The court ruled that segregation in public
schools was unconstitutional.
Linda Brown (Left) and family
http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/brownfamily.jpg
The Montgomery Bus Boycott
• In 1955, Rosa Parks boarded a bus in
Montgomery, Alabama and refused to sit
in the rear where African Americans were
supposed to sit.
• She was arrested.
• Others, outraged by her arrest, called on
African Americans to boycott Montgomery,
Alabama’s buses the day Parks was in
court.
Rosa Parks
http://www.pacificviews.org/weblog/archives/Pictures/rosa_parks_fingerprint.jpg
The Montgomery Bus Boycott
• They formed the Montgomery
Improvement Association led by Martin
Luther King, Jr., a 26 year old pastor.
• King inspired his followers and
encouraged ending segregation and
racism through nonviolent and passive
resistance.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
http://www.s150.msu.edu/1960-1969/mlk.jpg
African American Churches
• African American churches and ministers
were some of the major leaders of the Civil
Rights movement.
• King established the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference (SCLC) in 1957.
Eisenhower
• Eisenhower opposed segregation and
sympathized with the goals of the Civil
Rights Movement.
• He also ordered more military facilities to
be desegregated.
• He did however oppose protests and court
rulings- he felt that values had to change
not just laws.
http://www.cia.gov/csi/monograph/firstln/955pres18.gif
Eisenhower
• He became the first troop that had to send
federal troops into the South to protect the
constitutional rights of African Americans.
• In 1957, the school board in Little Rock,
Arkansas, won a court order to admit nine
African American students to Central High- a
white school.
• The governor of Arkansas was really moderate
but to win re-election he campaigned for white
supremacy.
Eisenhower
• Governor Faubus ordered the Arkansas National
Guard to prevent the nine students from entered
the school.
• Television coverage made Little Rock the center
of national attention.
• He was opposing the authority of the federal
government.
• President Eisenhower ordered U.S. Army troops
to Little Rock- they escorted the Little Rock Nine
into the school.
• The troops remained through the school year to
protect them.
The Little Rock Nine
http://amcop.blogspot.com/uploaded_images/little%20rock%
20nine-751046.JPG
http://pbskids.org/wayback/civilrights/school/little_rock_nine.jpg
Sit-In Movements
• In 1959, four African Americans enrolled at
North Carolina A&T in Greensboro performed a
sit-in at a whites-only lunch counter in a
Woolworth’s department store.
• They were refused service, and they stayed until
the counter closed and continued to do so.
• The following day- 29 African American students
were there.
• 300 were present by the end of the week.
Greensboro Sit-In
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/civilrights/images/cr0015th.jpg
Sit-In Movements
• The Sit-In movement spread to many
more cities.
• This was a form of peaceful protect.
• Some African Americans were
discouraged by the slow pace of
desegregation.
• Most remained peaceful, however.
Young People
• Many protesters were young people.
• The Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee was formed and played a key
role in desegregating public facilities
between 1960-65.
Freedom Riders
• Most bus travel remained segregated in the
south, despite rulings outlawing segregation on
interstate buses.
• The federal government regulates interstate
commerce so they can regulate the buses
traveling over state lines, but states control
those that just stay in the state because of the
U.S. Constitution.
• In 1961, teams of whites and blacks traveled to
the South to draw attention to the segregated
buses- they were called Freedom Riders.
http://www.voicesofcivilrights.org/photoGallery/images/AARP_
photo_gallery_03.jpg
http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia
/sharemed/targets/images/pho/t028/T028
163A.jpg
Freedom Riders
• In 1961, the first Freedom Riders boarded
several interstate buses.
• Angry white mobs attacked them in
Alabama- they slit tires, and threw rocks,
and someone threw a firebomb into a busno one was killed.
• Other riders faced angry gangs armed with
bats, chains, and pipes and were beaten.
• This violence shocked the nation.
President John F. Kennedy
• Kennedy took office in 1961, after winning
the election of 1960.
• He promised to actively support the civil
rights movement.
• He appointed many African Americans to
government jobs and created the
Committee on Equal Employment
Opportunity (CEEO).
http://www.cia.gov/csi/monograph/firstln/955pres24.gif
Kennedy
• Southerners had a strong hold on
Congress, and Kennedy did not want to
challenge them directly so he allowed the
Justice Department run by Robert
Kennedy, his brother, to actively support
the civil rights movement.
• They particularly focused on protecting the
right to vote.
Birmingham, Alabama
• Birmingham was a center of violence
during this time.
• Martin Luther King, Jr. launched
demonstrations in the city in 1963.
• He was arrested, but felt this was the best
way to get Kennedy’s attention.
• He wrote his famous “Letter From a
Birmingham Jail” while in the prison.
Birmingham, Alabama
• After he was released, the protests
increased, and the Public Safety
Commissioner of Birmingham, Bull
Connor, ordered police to use clubs, police
dogs, and high-pressure fire hoses on the
demonstrators.
• This was captured on television and
horrified the nation.
http://www.outofrange.net/blog
archive/archives/mooreBirming
ham.jpg
http://www.gettysburg.edu/academics/engli
sh/eng235/dog.jpg
Civil Rights Act of 1964
• In 1964, President Johnson signed the
Civil Rights Bill of 1964.
• One of the major opponents, Governor
George Wallace of Alabama, said, “I draw
a line in the dust… and I say, Segregation
now! Segregation tomorrow! Segregation
forever!”
March on Washington
• In the summer of 1963, Dr. King delivered
a powerful speech near the Lincoln
Memorial in Washington, D.C.
• Over 200,000 demonstrators came to
march on Washington.
• King gave his “I have a dream” speech at
this time.
King’s “I have a dream” speech
• “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise
up and live out the true meaning of its creed:
‘We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all
men are created equal.’… I have a dream that
my four little children will one day live in a nation
where they will not be judged by the color of
their skin but by the content of their character….
I have a dream that one day the state of
Alabama… will be transformed into a situation
where little black boys and black girls will be
able to join hands with little white boys and white
girls and walk together as sisters and brothers.”
http://www.africawithin.com/bios/ml_king.jpg
http://www.exodusnews.com/P
hotos/MartinLutherKing.jpg
Heart of Atlanta Motel v. U.S.
• In 1964, the Supreme Court ruled that
privately owned facilities like the above
named hotel could not discriminate based
on race
Selma March
• In 1965, the SCLC and Dr. King selected Selma,
Alabama as a focal point to push voting rights
protection.
• They performed a march for freedom from
Selma to the state capitol in Montgomery, about
50 miles.
• A sheriff ordered them to disperse and while the
marches kneeled in prayer, 200 state troopers
and citizens rushed on them and beat them.
• Cameras captured this- it stunned the nation.
• They called in “Bloody Sunday.”
http://www.africanamericans.com/images2/S
elmaMarchMartinCoretta.jpg
http://home.earthlink.net/~sistersofselma/selma3i.jpg
Voting Rights Act of 1965
• The passage of the voting rights act
marked a turning point.
• The movement had achieved its two major
goals- segregation had been outlawed
with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and new
federal laws were in place to prevent
discrimination and protect voting rights
with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Racism
• This is prejudice or discrimination toward
someone because of his or her race.
• It still exists.
Civil Rights Movement
• Although two major legislative goals had
been met by the movement, changing
people’s attitudes would take much more
time.
• Achieving economic equality would also
take more time.
Black Power
• Not all Civil Rights protestors chose
nonviolent forms of protest.
• Many African Americans around 1965
began to turn away from nonviolent protest
and King and support more aggressive
forms of protest.
• Black power meant that physical selfdefense and even violence were
acceptable in defense of one’s freedom.
Black Power
• Black power also stressed pride in the
African American culture.
• It emphasized racial distinctiveness rather
than cultural assimilation and not
becoming mainstream.
Malcolm X
• In the early 1960s, Malcolm X became a symbol
of black power.
• He joined the Nation of Islam- Black Muslims.
• They were led by Elijah Muhammad- they did
not hold the same beliefs as mainstream
Muslims.
• They believed African Americans should
separate themselves from whites and form their
own self-governing communities.
http://shs.westport.k12.ct.us/jwb/Collab/CivRtsWeb/Images/malcolmx.jpg
Malcolm X
• Malcolm X was a powerful speaker and
gained much attention for the black power
movement.
• In 1964, Malcolm X broke from the Nation
of Islam and criticized the organization and
leader.
• As a result, he was killed in 1965, while
giving a speech in New York.
Black Panthers
• In 1966, several men from Oakland, CA
organized the Black Panther Party for SelfDefense.
• They believed that a revolution was
necessary and encouraged African
Americans to arm themselves and
confront white society and force them to
grant them equal rights.
• They recruited the urban poor mostly.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
• By the late 1960s, the civil rights movement had
divided into competing sects.
• Dr. King went to Memphis, TN to support a strike
in April of 1968.
• He was assassinated by a sniper.
• He had said earlier, “I’ve been to the
mountaintop… 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.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.
• His assassination touched off national
mourning.
• Three major leaders of the Civil Rights
Movement had been assassinatedKennedy, Malcolm X, and King.
• They did, however, greatly influence
American society in their day and in the
future as well.
Election of 1968
• In 1968, Johnson did not run again as the Vietnam
War turned sour
• The Republicans chose Nixon to run again (he lost to
Kennedy in 1960)
• The Democrats were trying to choose between him
and Eugene McCarthy (not Joseph McCarthy) but
Bobby Kennedy was shot in June 1968
• He had been attorney general under his brother’s
presidency and had also been a major proponent of
civil rights
• Nixon won the election
Legacy of the Civil Rights
Movement
• Ended legal segregation and
discrimination in public and private
facilities
• Racism and discrimination still existed
• More pride in African American
communities
• More African American political
participation
• Much unfinished business