History Civil Rights Test Study Guide

13th Amendment

Ended slavery in the United States.

14th Amendment

Gave citizenship and equal protection under the law to all people born in the U.S.

15th Amendment

Gave Black men the right to vote.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Law that made it illegal to stop people (especially Black Americans) from voting.

Desegregation of the United States Armed Forces

Ended racial segregation in the military.

Freedom Riders

Civil rights activists who rode buses in the South to protest segregation.

Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)

Said segregation was legal as long as things were 'separate but equal.'

Sweatt v. Painter (1950)

Said separate schools for Black and white students were not truly equal.

Brown v. Board of Education (1954)

Said school segregation is unconstitutional (illegal) and overturned "separate but equal"

Thurgood Marshall

Civil rights lawyer who fought against segregation, first Black Supreme Court Justice

March on Washington (1963)

Huge protest for civil rights and jobs where MLK gave his "I Have a Dream" speech

Montgomery Bus Boycott (1955-1956)

Protest where Black Americans refused to ride buses, started after Rosa Parks

Little Rock Nine (1957)

Group of nine African American students who enrolled in Little Rock Central High School.

Governor Orval Faubus

The governor of Arkansas who sent the national guard, defying federal law

President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Sent 101st Airborne to escort the students

Martin Luther King

Firmly committed to nonviolent civil disobedience and Christian love.

Malcolm X

Advocate for the rights of Blacks, indicated white America in the harshest terms for its crimes against Black.

Malcom X advocated for achieving freedom…

By any means necessary (violence)

Black Panthers Party

Founded in 1966 to patrol black neighborhoods to protect residents from police brutality.

Affirmative Action

Aims to reduce discrimination and increase diversity.

Rosa Parks

African American civil rights activist known as the 'Mother of the Civil Rights Movement.' Her arrest sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott

Jim Crow Laws

Legalized segregation in public facilities based on the idea of 'separate but equal.' Upheld by Plessy v. Ferguson

What ended the Jim Crow Laws?

Civil Rights Act & Voting Rights Act

Great Society

Focused on eliminating poverty and racial injustice. Created Medicare and Medicaid, etc.

New Frontier

President John F. Kennedy's domestic and foreign policy agenda. Focused on economic growth, edu, and civil rights