The Civil Rights Era

CHA3U

Brown v. Board of Education

• Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) est. legality of “separate but equal schools”

• NAACP lawyer Thurgood Marshall began to focus on desegregating nation’s schools in 1950s

• Case of Linda Brown in Topeka, Kansas

• Segregation kept her from attending a school close to home forcing her to travel considerable distance and cross dangerous railroad tracks

Brown v. Board of Education• Supreme Court combined several

school segregation cases from around country into single case: Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas

• Court understood significance of case

• Court heard arguments over a two-year period

• Considered research about segregation’s effects on African American children

• 1954 - Chief Justice Earl Warren issued decision

• Decision unanimous - separate schools for African Americans and whites violated Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection of the law

• Racial segregation illegal in public schools

Little Rock• School desegregation moved

slowly in South

• Some states integrated quickly - other states faced opposition

• Virginia passed laws that closed schools that planned to integrate

• September, 1957 - Little Rock, Arkansas

• 9 African-American students admitted to all-white Central High School

• Governor Orval Faubus spoke out against plan

• Ordered the Arkansas National Guard to surround the school

Little Rock

• Claimed move was to protect school from attacks by armed protesters

• Faubus exaggerated danger and spread panic

• For three weeks members of the National Guard the Little Rock Nine from entering the school

Little Rock

• September 23 – white mob riots when students attempt to enter school

• President Eisenhower ordered 1000 federal troops to Little Rock

• September 25, 1957 - under protection of soldiers w/ fixed bayonets, Little Rock Nine entered Central High

Little Rock Nine

• Endured difficult year• Minniejean Brown expelled for

responding to a racial slur • “One Down…Eight to Go.”• Faubus shutdown school

system in 1958• Est. private school system for

whites• Poor whites as well as African-

Americans had no school to attend

• 1959 – school district re- opened under court order

• Desegregated

Rosa Parks

• NAACP sought to end segregation on southern transportation systems

• System forced blacks to ride on back of the bus

• Montgomery, Alabama – December 1, 1955 – Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on bus to white passenger

• Arrested and convicted of violating segregation laws

Montgomery Bus Boycott

• In protest, 50 000 African-Americans boycott the Montgomery bus system

• Hurt bus system and white businesses

• Baptist minister Martin Luther King Jr. led protest

• Suffered intimated and physical violence

• King had studied Gandhi’s non-violent tactics and urged blacks not to respond w/ violence

Montgomery Bus Boycott

• Non-violent protest worked

• November, 1956 Supreme Court declared Montgomery and Alabama segregation laws on buses unconstitutional

• Montgomery bus system desegregated

• Victory a blow to racial discrimination

• Civil Rights movement had a new leader – King

Civil Rights Act of 1957

• Ike had tried to keep federal government out of controversial laws that affected state and local governments

• “I don’t believe you can change the hearts of men with laws and decisions.”

• First new civil rights law since Reconstruction

• Made it a federal crime to prevent qualified persons from voting

Strategies of Non-ViolenceSit-in Movement

• 4 college students in Greensboro, North Carolina, stayed in their seats at Woolworth’s lunch counter after being refused service because of their race

• Over next few days, protesters filled 63 of the 66 seats at the lunch counter

• Students were dedicated and well-behaved and ended each sit-in with a prayer

• Over time, protesters in about 50 southern cities began to use sit-in tactic

Strategies of Non-ViolenceThe Freedom Rides

• 1960 - Supreme Court ordered that bus station facilities for interstate travelers must be open to all passengers

• Ruling was not enforced.

• Group of Freedom Riders on a bus trip through South to draw attention to situation

• Mobs angry at Freedom Riders attempts to use white-only facilities firebombed a bus in Alabama and attacked riders w/ bats and pipes in Birmingham

Strategies of Non-Violence

• After savage beatings in Birmingham, Alabama bus companies refused to sell Freedom Riders tickets

• Local police unwilling to protect riders

• AG Robert Kennedy sent federal marshals to protect riders.

• Interstate Commerce Commission finally forced integration of bus and train stations

James Meredith• September 1962 - Mississippi

Governor Ross Barnett refused to allow James Meredith to register at University of Mississippi

• Barnett personally kept Meredith from registering

• September 30th riot on campus when word leaks that Meredith is there

• JFK orders the army to restore order

• 2 dead, 375 injured• Meredith registered next day,

attended classes w/ armed guards

• Graduated in 1963

Birmingham Campaign

• Birmingham, Alabama • City know for its’ strict

enforcement of segregation laws

• King raised money to fight Birmingham’s segregation laws

• Volunteers began sit-ins and marches

• Shutdown city

• Arrested

Birmingham Campaign

• King criticized for using children for protests – 900 children arrested

• Police Chief “Bull” Connor used police and fire fighters to break up group of 2500 student protesters

• Violence of Connor’s methods was broadcast all over television news

• International outcry

Birmingham Campaign

• JFK sends in federal negotiators to reach settlement

• Jim Crow signs taken down in city – public places became more open to blacks

• King’s reputation surged• Bull Connor fired• By attracting media attention to

treatment of African-Americans, campaign brought national attention to segregation

• Major factor in the national push towards the Civil Rights Act of 1964,

March on Washington

• August 1963 – 100th anniversary Emancipation Proclamation

• Marched on Washington, D.C. to pressure Congress to pass JFK’s Civil Rights Bill

• King delivered inspiring/famous speeches

• “I have a dream” speech – a vision of what America could and should be

The Civil Rights Act of 1964

• After JFK’s assassination, LBJ determined to pass civil rights bill

• Passed July 2, 1964• Banned discrimination in

employment on basis of race, colour, religion, gender, or national origin

• Outlawed public segregation

• To allow for equal voting rights, act removed some registration restrictions

Voting Rights

• Voting rights for African Americans were achieved at great human cost

• JFK worried about violent reactions to nonviolent methods

• AG Robert Kennedy promised federal government would protect civil rights workers if focused on voter registration

• 24th Amendment (1964) outlawed practice of taxing citizens to vote – poll tax – applied only to congressional and presidential elections

• Hundreds of people volunteered to summers registering African Americans to vote

Freedom Summer

• Hundreds of college students volunteered to spend summer registering African Americans to vote

• Volunteers were white, northern, and upper middle class

• Volunteers registered voters or taught at summer schools

Mississippi

• Andrew Goodman, college student from NY and Freedom Summer volunteer arrived in Mississippi on June 20, 1964

• Next day - Goodman, James Chaney and Michael Schwerner went missing

• Bodies found six weeks later

• Found underneath earthen damn

• President Johnson ordered FBI to investigate

Mississippi• Three had been arrested and held

at jail then purposefully released into a waiting ambush from Klansmen

• Beaten, tortured and murdered

• Murders of white volunteers shocked Americans in ways that African-American killings had not

• Mississippi refused to investigate or indict anyone for murders

• FBI arrested 7 men on charges related to murder – served little or no jail time

• In 2005 – 41st anniversary of killings – Edgar Ray Killen found guilty

Freedom Summer

• Murders derailed Freedom Summer

• Volunteers carried on, but African-Americans were afraid of violence

• By the end of summer, only 1600 African-Americans had been added to voting rolls

Selma, Alabama

• 1965 – only 383 registered out of Selma’s 15 000 eligible black voters

• King organized protest march from Selma to Montgomery

• Alabama Governor George Wallace banned protest

• March 7 – 600 people being 54 mile trek

• Attacked by police – “Bloody Sunday”

Voter Rights Act of 1965

• President Johnson outraged

• Addressed joint session of Congress and demanded passage of voting rights bill

• Passed five months later• Entire voter registration

process was under federal control

• 1968 – Mississippi – 7% eligible voters to 59%

Death of King

• King became aware that economic issues must be part of civil rights movement

• April 1968 – travels to Memphis, Tennessee to help striking sanitation workers

• James Earl Ray killed King as he stood on balcony of his motel

• Symbol of non-violence meets violent end

• Within hours, rioting erupted in more than 120 cities

• 46 people dead, 2600 injured, and more than 21000 arrested

Legacy of King

• Human rights icon• Secured progress on

civil rights • Birthday is a national

holiday• Civil Rights

movement flounder, was directionless without his leadership

King’s Legacy

When asked what he wanted said at his funeral, he responded,

“I'd like somebody to mention that day that Martin Luther King Jr. tried to give his life serving others. I'd like for somebody to say that day that Martin Luther King Jr. tried to love somebody. I want you to say that day that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that day that I did try to feed the hungry. I want you to be able to say that day that I did try in my life to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say on that day that I did try in my life to visit those who were in prison. And I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity”