Notes:
The Civil Rights Movement
The Beginning of the Civil Rights
Movement (1950s):
1. The Supreme Court, in a decision handed down
by new Chief Justice Earl Warren, ruled that
school segregation was unconstitutional in
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954).
The decision overturned Plessy v. Ferguson
(1896) and the “separate but equal” doctrine.
It opened the way for challenges to segregation
in other institutions.
Winning attorney Thurgood Marshall was the
future first black Supreme Court justice.
2. Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat to a
white man in Montgomery Alabama in 1955,
leading to her arrest and the Montgomery Bus
Boycott.
The black community refused to ride the buses
and successfully ended bus segregation.
The boycott gave the Civil Rights Movement its
most important leader, Dr. Martin Luther King.
His idea of nonviolent and active protest became
the method of the Civil Rights movement.
3. The 1955 murder of 14 year old Emmett Till for
whistling at a white woman brought national
attention to the crimes of the south.
His killers were not brought to justice.
4. The 1957 efforts to integrate schools in Little
Rock Arkansas caused chaos when the
governor blocked integration of Central High
School.
President Eisenhower was forced to call out the
military to restore order and force integration.
Events of the Civil Rights
Movement in the 1960s:
1. In February of 1960, four students began a sit in
at a Greensboro NC lunch counter that didn’t
serve blacks.
The movement spread, and thousands faced
arrest and attack by challenging segregation.
2. Sit in leaders formed the Student Non-violent
Coordination Committee (SNCC)
3. In 1961, two buses loaded with “Freedom
Riders” traveled to the South.
They were attacked, their buses burned, and the
riders beaten.
President Kennedy was outraged and the
Supreme Court outlawed segregation on
interstate travel.
4. Birmingham AL was seen as the most
segregated city in the U.S. King led protests
there that resulted in his own arrest.
He wrote his “Letter from Birmingham Jail”
Other protestors in Birmingham were beaten by
police who were led by Bull Connor.
Fire hoses and attack dogs were used on the
protestors, causing outrage among the U.S.
population watching on TV.
5. In 1963, the March on Washington brought
200,000 blacks to the nation’s capital.
Singing the Civil Rights anthem “We Shall
Overcome”, they gathered around the
Washington Monument.
King gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech,
one of the highlights of the Civil Rights
Movement.
6. LBJ, as part of his “Great Society” programs,
signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that JFK had
endorsed.
It prohibited discrimination in employment and
public accommodations based on race.
7. Still seeking voting rights, King led a march from
Selma AL to Montgomery in 1965.
The marchers were attacked and beaten by
police on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, but
completed their march on the third attempt.
8. The 24th Amendment to the Constitution
outlawed poll taxes and the Voting Rights Act of
1965 forbid literacy tests for voters. Thousands
of black regained the vote.
Alternate Civil Rights
Approaches:
1. The Nation of Islam (Black Muslims) encouraged
racial separatism and the use of violent
retaliation for white violence.
2. Malcolm X was a leader of this movement. He
eventually broke with the Nation of Islam, which
was later responsible for his assassination.
3. The “Black Power” movement encouraged black
pride and black control over their own businesses
and communities. The Black Panthers are an
example of this movement.
4. Several race riots in cities outside of the South
proved that race was a national and not a
regional problem.
Some of the riots were the result of the 1968
assassination of Martin Luther King in Memphis
TN.
5. White backlash appeared as some believed
that programs like affirmative action took the
Civil Rights Movement too far.
6. Other groups responded to the Civil Rights
Movement with movements of their own.
Women, college students, counterculture
Hippies, Mexican Americans, and Native
Americans fought for their rights during the
turbulent 60s and 70s.