CRM

UTLAWED SLAVERY

14^TH AMENDMENT

MADE AFRICAN AMERICANS CITIZENS

GUARANTEED EQUAL PROTECTION UNDER THE LAW

15^TH AMENDMENT

GUARANTEED AFRICAN AMERICANS THE RIGHT TO VOTE\

PLESSY v. FERGUSON (1896)

U.S. Supreme Court case that made segregation “legal” in the United States

• BROWN v. BOARD OF EDUCATION (1954): Declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional, overturning Plessy v. Ferguson.

The Origins of the Civil Rights Movement

• Rosa Parks decision not to give up her seat on a public bus so that a white man could sit down sparked a new era of the Civil Rights Movement.

• She was arrested because of the 1896 Supreme Court Ruling   of  Plessy v. Ferguson (separate but equal)

• Her arrest lead to  the Montgomery Bus Boycott  which was organized  by Rev. Martin Luther King Junior,.

• For the next 70 years, Jim Crow laws dominated society in the South for African Americans

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954)

• Supreme court unanimously declares segregation unconstitutional under the 14^th amendment

• Supreme Court ruled segregation of public schools was unconstitutional

• NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall (center) argued the case to end segregation

SOUTHERN MANIFESTO 1956

• Signed by 101 Southern Congressmen denouncing the ruling of Brown v Board of Education.

• It called the Supreme Court ruling a “clear abuse of judicial power” and pledged to use “all lawful means” to reverse the decision.

• NAACP

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Oldest & largest civil rights organization in American History Purpose: Challenged Segregation, Lynching & discrimination laws

Inspired by W.E.B. Dubois

Used Rosa Park's case to challenge segregation

SCLC

Southern Christian Leadership Council

SOUTHERN CHRISTAIN

LEADERSHIP

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

CONSERENCE

Organized by African American Ministers Leader Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King

Purpose: To encourage African Americans to vote Purpose: Eliminate segregation in voting booths, public transportation & housing. African Americans to vote, challenged

SNCC

Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee

Founded by college students (black & white)

Purpose: Headed voter registration drives

FREEDOM SUMMER

known as:

3 college students were killed in Mississippi

(2 white/1 black) for trying to register African Americans to

vote; Movie = Mississippi Burning

CORE

SIT-I

Chicago Based

Purpose: Used "Sit-Ins" as a form of protest to desegregate restaurants

Successfully Integrated many Northern cities

FANNIE LOU HAMER

• SNCC organizer

• Sharecropper from Mississippi

• Fired from her job and evicted from her farm for attempting to vote

• Arrested as she returned from a voter registration workshop

• Beaten in jail

• Went on to organize the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party which challenged the legality of the states segregated Democratic Party

Montgomery Bus Boycott

Outraged over Park’s arrest, African Americans organize a boycott of Montgomery’s Public Transportation System in 1956

African Americans carpooled, took taxis, or walked to avoid taking the bus

After a year, the city of Montgomery was ordered to end its segregation policy

3 demands of the boycott

Coutreous treatment on the buses

Hiring of black driver

Frist come first sserved seating but with blacks filling up from the back and whites fron the front

The person who led the Montgomery Bus Boycott was a Baptist minister from Atlanta.

His name was Martin Luther King, Jr.

Eisenhower’s Response to the Civil Rights Movement

• Sympathetic yet fearful of the effects of overturning segregation

• He felt pressured to desegregate

• Believed segregation/racism would “eventually” end

• Worried challenging white southerners might divide the country

• Refused to endorse Brown v. Board of Education decision

“I don’t believe you can change the hearts of men with laws or decisions” – Eisenhower

• Regardless, he knew he had to uphold the authority of the Federal Gov’t. Became the 1st president since Reconstruction to send troops into the South to protect the rights of African Americans.

in 1957, a federal court ordered the integration of Little Rock Central High

The local NAACP picked out nine African Americans to attend the school

• Sept 1957 Federal court ordered that 9 A. American students be admitted to the all white Central High School in Little Rock Arkansas

• Gov. Orval Faubus sends in National Guard to keep the students from attending

• “Ike” persuades the Governor to remove the troops and let the students in

• Angry white mobs form so “Ike” calls in 1,000  101 Airborne & 10,000 Arkansas National Guard to protect the students

• Troops remained at the school the entire year.

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower called in federal troops  to enforce the Supreme Court ruling

Only one of the “Little Rock Nine” graduated, but the incident raised national awareness about the discrimination in the South

James Meredith is denied admission into Ole Miss

President Kennedy sends 500 federal marshals to escort Meredith and make sure he was allowed to attended classes

Alabama governor George Wallace blocks the entrance to keep two black students from enrolling at the University of Alabama

"The President wants us to surrender this state to Martin Luther King and his group of pro-Communists who have instituted these demonstrations."

Types of Protests

• Marches

• Freedom Riders

• Sit ins

Civil Rights Marches

Marches were the most common form of protests used during the Civil Rights Movement

Protestors would march peacefully in attempt to draw national attention for their cause

Sit-ins

They sat at the counter until they were served or arrested

Students who participated in the sit-ins refused to become violent

Sit-ins raised the awareness of the discrimination that was occurring

                Freedom Riders

Blacks and whites traveled into the South to draw attention to the South’s segregation of bus terminals

When Freedom Riders arrived at various cities in the South, white mobs attacked them

• Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated southern United States in 1961 to challenge the non-enforcement of the United States Supreme Court decisions which ruled that segregated public buses were unconstitutional.

Leaders of Civil Rights Movement

Medgar Evers

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Malcolm X

Rosa Parks

Stokley Carmichael

The song

“We  Shall Overcome” became the battle cry  of the Civil Rights Movement

Protestors often sang the song during civil rights marches

Violence in Birmingham

At marches in Alabama, Birmingham police chief Bull Connor used fire hoses and attack dogs to prevent people from marching

The incident raised national awareness about the discrimination in the South

Odyssey of Emmitt Till

Emmitt Till was a 14-year-old from Chicago

whose murder in 1955 made national news

Till was lynched and murdered after he said

“bye baby” to a white woman who was the

cashier at a store while visiting his

cousin in Money, Mississippi

      Civil Rights Act of 1964

Despite strong opposition from Southern senators, President Lyndon B. Johnson got Congress to pass the bill

Law gave Congress power to outlaw segregation in most public places; gave minorities equal access to facilities such as restaurants and theaters

24^th Amendment

The 24^th Amendment, ratified in 1964, helped to guarantee the right to vote for African Americans

It abolished poll taxes, which were fees that had to be paid in order to vote in national elections

SNCC and SCLC increased their voter registration drives in the South

Freedom Summer
was a campaign in the United States launched in June 1964 to attempt to register as many African-American voters as possible in Mississippi, which had historically excluded most blacks from voting.

The Selma March/Bloody Sunday
March 7 1965

• -aka- The March For Freedom; non-violent march

• Led :SNCC’s John Lewis & SCLC’s Hosea Williams

• Selma, Alabama = chosen as ground zero for voting rights campaign bcuz Selma was a predominately African American but only 3% registered to vote.

  • A.Americans  were terrorized, beaten w/clubs & cattle prods to keep them from voting

• As they crossed the  Edmund Pettus Bridge they were told to disperse

• They were beaten in Full view of  the t.v. camera’s –aka Bloody Sunday

• 600 Marchers/70 hospitalized/70 injured.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

The violence in Selma infuriated President Johnson and led to the federal government to step in again

Johnson to propose a new voting rights law and, in early August, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed into law

It authorized the Attorney General to send federal examiners to register qualified voters by bypassing local officials who tried to keep blacks from voting

Malcolm “X”

Malcolm X was a symbol of the black power movement. Joined the Nation of Islam. Preached black nationalism. Advocated the use of violence “for self defense” and to gain African American rights

He was assassinated in 1965 after abandoning the beliefs of Black Panthers

Black Power Movement

• Leader: Stokely Carmichael (former leader of SNCC)

• Appealed to people that wanted a more aggressive form of protest.

• Believed that African Americans “alone” should lead their own struggle

• Racial distinctiveness

  • “Afro” hairstyles

  • African Clothing

  • Black leather Jackets

  • Carrying guns in public

• Black Power:

  • Physical Defense is acceptable

  • A call for black people to define their goals

  • Demanding respect for their rights

Black Panthers

• Organized in Oakland, CA to fight police brutality in the ghettos

• Called for an end to racial oppression ; for control of major institutions  in the African American Community:

  • ➢Schools, law enforcement, housing, and hospitals

Martin Luther King assassinated

Tragedy struck on April 4, 1968, when Martin Luther King was assassinated

King was in Memphis, Tenn., for a march for Sanitation Workers

The assassination of Martin Luther King marked the end of the civil rights movement