Did the lives of Black Americans improve from 1954-68?

Yes

• Brown vs Board of Education + segregation

• Rosa Parks’ bus boycott

• SCLC

• MLK

• SNCC

• CORE

• The Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act

• JFK and Johnson

No

• internal divisions

• racism (KKK, racist law enforcers, southern governors)

• distraction of the Vietnam war

• Republicans returning to Congress after the 1966 elections

• Black Panthers

Brown vs Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas + segregation

17th May 1954

• a unanimous 9-0 decision - achievement for Earl Warren who was able to persuade other justices - necessary to ensure significant change (mainly in resistant states)

• the SC overturned Plessy vs Ferguson (1896)

• brought to the SC in 1953 by the NAACP

• Thurgood Marshall (NAACP’s chief lawyer) argued ‘separate but equal’ public schools were a breach of the 14th Amendment

• due to the considerable criticism of southern white politicians, SC issued a declaration, the ‘Brown II’ case (1955), demanding the speedy integration of all public schools within the USA

• set off a chain of more desegregation laws:

  • Browder vs Gayle (1956) in public transport within cities - good news for MLK’s campaign to end segregation in Montgomery

  • Boynton vs Virginia (1960) ruled that segregated bus depots were illegal

  • Bailey vs Patterson (1962) SC declared desegregation on interstate public transport (not that effective - freedom rides)

Limitations:

• SC had no power of enforcement - these were just court decisions

  • by the end of 1956, not one southern public school had been racially integrated despite the Brown case (55) and Brown II case (56)

• huge southern resistance:

  • white citizen councils were creased to offer grass-roots resistance to integration

  • 100 southern senators and congressmen signed the Southern Manifesto to oppose the SC decisions

  • southern state governors (e.g. mississippian Ross Barnett) openly challenged the SC’s right to ‘interfere’ in southern politics

• needed direct action by the president to force integration against local white opposition

Little Rock 9 - at Central High School, Little Rock, Arkansas, 1957

• attempt to allow 9 BA students to attend an all-white school

• the State govenor and local white people opposed

• a riot nearly occured on their first day, sparked media attention and was shown on national television, caused national outrage, Eisenhower sent 1000 members of the 101st Airborne Division to protect the students and allow them to attend classes. the troops stayed all year

James Meredith

• attempted to enrol at the all-white Uni of Mississippi in 1962

• Ross Barnett (governer of Mississippi) opposed

• JFK had to displaced hundreds of US marshals and hundreds of federal troops to allow Meredith to enrol and attend

Rosa Parks’ bus boycott

Events

• Rosa Parks was arrested in December 1955 for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama

• Montgomery’s black community boycotted the buses for a year until the NAACP won a SC ruling against segregated buses in Browder vs Gayle

Impact

• inspired similar successful boycotts in 20 other Southern cities (e.g. Florida 1956)

• inspired individuals (e.g. Melba Pattillo of the Little Rock 9)

• increased Northern white support for Southern Black activism

• Montgomery businesses lost $1m when BAs couldn’t access their downtown shops as easily so it encouraged some Southern white businesses to oppose segregation

• showed the strength of non-violence

• boosted morale and inspired more resistance as the boycott had continued despite opposition and the harassment of black activists

• the buses were desegregated in Montgomery (but nothing else)

• gave MLK national attention as he was the leader of the Montgomery Improvement Association + he set up the SCLC in 1957 (but it achieved little at first)

SCLC

Southern Christian Leadership Conference - formed and led by MLK (1957) in Montgomery, Alabama

Albany, Georgia - 1961-2

• the SCLC’s ‘biggest defeat’

• failed to attract National media coverage and achieved very little overall

• police were nonviolent and efficient in dismantling the protest

Birmingham, Alabama - April-May 1963

• turning point of the civil rights movement

• non-violent marches led by the SCLC and MLK

• violent police response (Police Chief Bull Conner) - uses of dogs + fire hoses (attacking the non-violent protestors), arrested many, overflowing jails, made headline news nationally/attracted national media

• led to the Truce Agreement, 10 May 1963

  • declared there must be integration of races within employment

  • demanded desegregation e.g. in washrooms and fitting rooms

march on Washington DC, 28 August 1963

• hoping to achieve a success like A Phillip Randolph’s 1941 Washington march

• organised by the SCLC

• MLK ‘i have a dream’ speech to 250,000 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial - speech became one of the most famous speeches in US history

• called for the end of segregation + described his ‘dream’ of national integration

• prompted JFK to go on national TV and announce his Civil Rights Bill to outlaw racial discrimination (died before it was passed)

• led MLK to receive a Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 for his work for the civil rights movement + Ronald Reagan made MLK’s birthday, 15th January, a national holiday (1983)

SNCC

Student Non-Violent Co-ordinating Committee (Feb 1960)

sit ins:

• Feb 1 1960

• a group of 4 BA students sat at a white only lunch counter in Woolworth’s department store in Greensboro, North Carolina

• staff refused to serve them but they stayed until the store closed

• this began a chain of sit ins across the south in feb-april 1960

• the SNCC’s protests got widespread media publicity and led to the desegregation of lunch counters across the south - impact of non-violence

In 1964 they engaged in a major voter registration campaign in Lowndes Count, Mississippi

• led to the creation of the Mississippi Free Democratic Party which offered a rival to the white-led Democratic Party of Mississippi

CORE

Congress of Racial Equality - James Farmer, Chicago, 1942

• organised sit-ins during WWII

• promoted integrated student group bus rides (Freedom Rides) in 1961 across the south to test the SC’s rulings against segregated buses - Boyton vs Virgina (1960) and Morgan vs Virginia (1947)

impact of Freedom Rides

• 436 individuals participated in 60 separate Freedom Rides

• showed the bravery and eagerness of younger black activists

• the violence persuaded Attorney General Robert Kennedy to try and enforce SC rulings against segregated interstate transport

• white attacks (especially at Anniston, Alabama) exposed the lawlessness and brutality of white southerners (beatings, arrests, a bus firebombing) as Farmer had hoped (Anniston and Birmingham, Alabama)

The Civil Rights Act

1964

How was it passed?

• Kennedy had won over the Republican minority leader to the bill

• Johnson worked to get it passed

• changing white opinion which Congress responded to - 68% of the US favoured the bill by January 1964

• some Congress members considered passing the bill as tribute to JFK (died Nov 1963)

• Black activism exposed Southern white racism e.g. Birmingham

Importance:

• helped revolutionise the south

• established an Equal Employment Commission

• allowed the federal government to end de jure segregation in the south

• prohibited discrimination in public places (now illegal)

• furthered school desegregation

Remaining problems:

• did nothing about poverty and discrinimation in the city ghettos outside the South - Harlem (NYC), South Side (Chicago), Watts (LA)

• 1964 Act did nothing about black southern voting

The Voting Rights Act

1965

Why was it passed?

• still discrimination in voting rights - half of Selma’s (Alabama) population was black but only 23 BAs had been able to vote

• MLK’s 1965 Selma campaign exposed Southern racism and brutality - TV viewers saw state troopers attack marchers (led by activist John Lewis) with clubs and tear gas on ‘Bloody Sunday’ - over 58 injured

Why was it important?

• combated racist devices like literacy tests

• revolutionised southern politics - impact of having the black southern vote

• gave black people a say - equality, right

• more BAs were elected into Southern office by 6x between 1965-9 - facilitated the passage of legislation in Congress

Presidents

little rock 9 - Eisenhower sent 1000 members of the 101st Airborne Division to protect the students and allow them to attend classes. the troops stayed all year

James Meredith - JFK had to displaced hundreds of US marshals and hundreds of federal troops to allow Meredith to enrol and attend

Lyndon B Johnson (southern democrat)

Why did he want to help BA’s?

• feared racial inequality could lead to violence

• thought racial equality would help revitalise the south, wealth wise (South = poorest part of US)

• considered US society rich and liberal enough to eradicate poverty and racism - idea of a ‘Great Society’

His role in the 1964 Civil Rights Act:

• worked hard to break the Southern filibuster

• won over some Southerners - promised federal expenditure in their area

• made appeals to JFK

however, it was mainly passed due to the work and strength of MLK

internal divisions

the expulsion of WAs from the SNCC and CORE

• SNCC - its leadership began to be heavily influenced by 2 northern radical activists, James Forman and Stokely Carmicheal, in the summer of 1965

  • Carmicheal’s experience in Lowndes County, Mississippi (he was exposed to the significant black poverty where the local Democratic Party was run by WAs that didn’t care about BAs), in the spring of summer of 1965 convinced him that the SNCC should be a radical, all-black organisation

• CORE - by 1965, CORE black activists became increasingly disappointed by their lack of federal support and began to become more disillusioned with non-violent protest

  • with the end of segregation, CORE began to focus on black unemployment, slums, police brutality and substandard schooling (issues highlighted in the 1965 Watts riot (LA - north)

  • by 1964, 80% of CORE’s National Action Committee were BAs, and the white majority which had dominated CORE from 1942 begun to decline rapidly. this was because many BAs had began questioning CORE’s strict non-violent policy even in the face of attacks and white supremacist imitation

  • the murder of 3 CORE activists in Mississippi in 1965 during the black voter registration campaign started this shift to rejecting non-violence as well as the limited success of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party

  • in 1966, there was a struggle between the national leading of CORE and non-violent activist James Farmer and the more militant and radical Floyd McKissick who took over as CORE leader

  • in 1968 McKissick supported Black power, the expulsion of white members and the abandonment of non-violent protest

MLK vs Malcolm X

• MX - born in Nebraska (North), against non-violence, islamic, served time in prison for drug dealing, concerned with helping BAs now (and wanted black seperatism rather than integration) rather than hoping that WAs would be less racist in the future (like MLK)

• MX attempted to form an alliance with the rising radical leadership of the SNCC and CORE but his offers were rejected

• reasons why MX wanted to fix BA suffering rather than focus on integration:

  • BAs were still suffering with poverty and unemployment - in 1966 7.8% of BAs were unemployed - double that of WAs. 40% of Black families lived in poverty on less than $3,000 a year

  • majority of children nationally still attended segregated schools ten years after Brown vs Board (1955-1965)

  • these problems and the message of MX led to black anger seen in riots in Watts (1965), Newark (1967), Detroit (1968) and Cleveland (1968)

• After MX’s murder (by Nation of Islam gunmen in feb 1965) his legacy became increasingly popular in the black ghettos of the north and west. MX’s support for black nationalism was popular with Carmichael and Floyd McKissick (increased divides with SCLC)

continued resistance to the civil rights movement (racism)

opposition to little rock 9, freedom rides (very violent), james meredith, SC decisions, Birmingham (from the police), the civil rights and voting acts

violence

• birmingham - bull connor’s use of dogs and hoses

• almost a riot - little rock 9s’ first days

• freedom rides - bus bombing, attacks

• January 1957, 4 black churches (Montgomery) and the homes of prominent Black activists were bombed (a bomb in MLK’s house was managed to be defused). 7 white men were arrested for the bombing, all members of the KKK

Black Panther Party

• formed in Oakland in1966 by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton, two college students

• they set out their radical agenda, and adoption of ‘black power’ in their Ten-Point Programme (e.g. calling for all black men to be except from military service and for full employment for black american workers)

• formed an allience with the SNCC (feb 1968) and Stokely Carmichael was appointed PM of the National Central Committee (the party’s key decision-making body (non-elected)) and James Foreman was appointed as minister of foreign affairs - both resigned at the end of 1968 because the no longer agreed with the new direction of the Party

• never exceeded 5000 people

• initially aimed at reform

  • began a free breakfast programme for black children in Oakland and offered medical advice to the black residents in the Oakland ghetto (1967)

  • monitored levels of police brutality and harassment of black communities by law enforcement officers

• from 1968 became more of a radical group - adopting Marxist socialism + advocating the overthrow of American society

• became a particular target for the US law enforcement community, including the FBI

• in 1969, 27 BPs were shot by police + 750 arrested

MLK’s mistakes 1966-68

Failure in Chicago, 1966

• MLK moved his campaign north where BAs faced employment and housing discrimination

• the SCLC was poorly organised in Chicago

• when MLK insisted to the Mayor of Chicago, Richard Daley, that BAs in CHicago suffered from poor housing accomodation, Daley sent in building inspectors who handed out housing violations to the landlords concerned

• also an SCLC protest march at the white suburb of Gage Park highlighting de facto segregation was met with hostile white residents who hurled missiles - Daley accused the SCLC of encouraging rioting

Vietnam War

• King spoke out (1965) against the war but it was in April 1967 that he expressed sympathy for the Vietnamese Communists in a speech in New York City. he also expressed support for other left-wing revolutionary movements in South America, Africa and Asia.

• King compared US military tactics un Vietnam to the Nazis in WWII

• Whitney Young (Urban League) and Roy Wilkins (NAACP) (2 important civil rights leaders) condemned his position

• King lost his influence with LBJ after working closely with his administration on civil rights and became politically isolated from national decision making

Impact of MLK’s death

• national outrage + grief

• widespread rioting by BAs in US

• NG called to protect federal gov buildings in Washington DC

• SCLC lacked leadership now and Reverend Ralph Abernathy (new leader) failed to unify the group. He recreated Resurrection City in Washington but poor weather caused mud and it cost $71,000 to clear up (bad funding and poor leadership)