Civil Rights

Civil Rights Act of 1875

Outlawed public facility segregation; overturned in 1883

Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)

Established "separate but equal" doctrine

Jim Crow laws

Enforced racial segregation post-Plessy

Brown v. Board of Education (1954)

Declared school segregation unconstitutional

Little Rock, Arkansas; Central High School

Eisenhower sent troops to protect the "Little Rock Nine" (1957)

“All deliberate speed”

Phrase from Brown II ordering gradual desegregation

Montgomery Bus Boycott

1955-1956 protest sparked by Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks

Refused bus seat, triggering the boycott

Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA)

Organized boycott; led by MLK

Martin Luther King (MLK)

Leader of SCLC; nonviolent resistance

“Soul force”; civil disobedience

MLK’s term for nonviolent protest

Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

MLK’s group for civil rights campaigns

SNCC

Student-led group for sit-ins and Freedom Rides

Freedom Riders

1960s activists challenging interstate segregation

James Meredith

First Black student at University of Mississippi (1962)

Medgar Evers

NAACP leader assassinated in 1963

March on Washington (1963)

MLK’s "I Have a Dream" speech venue

Civil Rights Act of 1964

Banned race, religion, gender, or origin discrimination

Freedom Summer

1964 Mississippi voter registration project

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Ended literacy tests; federal voter oversight

De Jure Segregation

Segregation enforced by law (e.g., Jim Crow laws)

De Facto Segregation

Segregation by custom (e.g., "white flight")

“White flight”

White families fleeing integrated urban areas

Watts (Los Angeles)

1965 riots highlighting urban inequality

War on Poverty

LBJ’s program to reduce economic/racial disparities

Malcolm X

Advocate for Black empowerment; "ballots or bullets"

Black Islam

Nation of Islam, joined by Malcolm X in prison

Black Power

Slogan for Black self-determination (Stokely Carmichael)

Black Panther Party

Founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale to combat police brutality

Memphis, TN; garbage workers strike

MLK’s final campaign before assassination (1968)

Kerner Commission

Blamed riots on systemic racism/poverty (1968)

Civil Rights Act of 1968

Prohibited housing discrimination

Affirmative action

Policies addressing past discrimination; "reverse discrimination" claims

Legacy of the Civil Rights Movement

Increased Black graduates, voters, and racial pride