Civil Rights Movement

The Civil Rights Movement

1940-1960’s; a broad and diverse effort to attain racial equality; a struggle for social justice that took place mainly during the 1950s and 1960s for Black Americans to gain equal rights under the law in the U.S.

De Jure Segregation

Segregation that is imposed by the law; Plessy v. Ferguson 1896 (“separate but equal”), extended to most areas of public life: school, hospitals, transportation, restaurants, cemeteries and beaches

De Facto Segregation

Segregation by unwritten custom or tradition; “Way of LIfe”; North: denied housing in particular neighborhoods, discrimination in employment, often only get low paying job; West and Southwest Asian and Mexican Americans also faced this type of discrimination

Effects of Jim Crow and Segregation

Lower on the economic ladder; higher rates of poverty and illiteracy; lower rates of home ownership lower rates of life expectancy; Voting Rights/Public office

WWII Sets the Stage

1941 President Roosevelt banned discrimination in defense industries; African AMerican soldiers were unwilling to accept discrimination at home after defending freedom abroad; Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) founded, advocated for nonviolence and began to organize protests against segregation; Jackie Robinson joins the Brooklyn Dodgers, violence and discrimination continues and increases