Martin Luther King and the Struggle for Black Voting Rights

Black Community's Political Leverage in Montgomery

  • The black community in Montgomery utilized new political leverage to establish:
    • First black public high school in 1946.
    • Second black high school in 1949.
    • A black hospital in 1951.
    • Black public housing developments.
    • First black police officers in early 1954, assigned to black neighborhoods.

White Leaders' Motives

  • White city leaders agreed to these changes to:
    • Buttress segregation, ensuring "colored" facilities approximated "white" ones due to NAACP court victories against "separate but equal".
    • Attract investment from the North by presenting a forward-looking image.

Black Community's Commitment

  • Supported improvements while remaining committed to ending Jim Crow.

Segregation on City Buses

  • Practices included:
    • Front ten seats reserved for whites.
    • Black passengers forbidden to sit in white seats.
    • Black passengers required to pay in front and reenter through the rear.
    • Black customers ordered to stand for white customers.
    • Practices enforced by police despite not being explicitly authorized by city ordinances.

Rosa Parks and the Bus Boycott

  • Rosa Parks, NAACP secretary, arrested on December 1, 1955, for refusing to yield her seat to a white passenger.
  • Fred Gray, Parks' representative, noted she violated no municipal ordinance.
  • Parks charged with violating a 1945 state bus segregation law.
  • Local trial court convicted Parks, and Gray appealed.

Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA)

  • Black residents boycotted buses, inspired by boycotts in Baton Rouge (1953) and New York City (1941).
  • MIA created to run the boycott.
  • Martin Luther King Jr. chosen as president due to:
    • Education (doctorate in theology).
    • Public speaking skills.
    • Not being tied to local black leadership factions.
  • King initially thought the boycott would last a few days but it lasted over a year.

Martin Luther King Jr.'s Philosophy

  • King insisted protesters "meet hate with love".
  • Transformed the boycott into a near-religious pursuit.
  • His nonviolent, mass-movement approach appealed as an alternative to the NAACP's legal strategy.

Influence of the Brown Decision

  • Energized black Americans with hope for integration.
  • Outraged many white southerners.

White Resistance

  • Ku Klux Klan reemerged to stop the civil rights movement with violence.
  • White Citizens Councils advocated "massive resistance" to integration.
  • Montgomery whites created a council in October 1955, growing to 12,000 members by February 1956.

MIA's Initial Demands and City's Response

  • MIA initially asked for:
    • Black drivers on black routes.
    • More flexible seating.
    • No seats reserved for whites only.
  • City government refused and tried to disrupt the boycott.

King's Arrest and MIA's Decision

  • King arrested for speeding on January 26, 1956.
  • MIA decided compromise was useless.
  • Fred Gray filed a suit in federal court demanding an injunction against segregated seating.

NAACP Involvement and State's Response

  • NAACP offered legal and financial help.
  • Alabama demanded NAACP membership and financial records.
  • NAACP refused and was subjected to severe fines, forcing office closures.
  • State draft board revoked Gray's ministerial exemption; federal intervention prevented military service.

Violent Attacks and Legal Actions

  • KKK bombed King's home and the house of the former NAACP president.
  • No arrests were made.
  • A grand jury indicted nearly a hundred MIA leaders under an anti-boycott statute.
  • King's case was the first to be tried; he was convicted on March 22 and appealed.

Resolution of the Boycott

  • MIA continued the boycott until the segregation case was resolved.
  • In early June, a federal circuit court ruled segregated buses violated the Fourteenth Amendment.
  • Alabama appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which rejected the appeal.
  • On December 20, 1956, federal injunctions arrived ordering bus integration, ending the boycott.

King's National Stature

  • The Montgomery bus boycott made King a national figure.
  • Time magazine put him on the cover in February 1957.
  • The boycott created national political momentum for civil rights.

Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

  • King helped create the SCLC in February 1957 to organize black ministers for civil rights action.
  • He gave civil rights speeches and published "Stride towards Freedom" in 1958.

Little Rock Crisis

  • In September 1957, a white mob blocked nine black students from entering Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.
  • President Eisenhower sent in the 101st Airborne Division to enforce the court order.

Civil Rights Act of 1957

  • Congress approved the first Civil Rights Act since Reconstruction.
  • It created a Civil Rights Commission and a Civil Rights Division in the Justice Department.
  • The statute disappointed King and the NAACP, reflecting a mainstream white view of "gradual" reform.

Public Opinion

  • By 1959, 53 percent of respondents in a national Gallup poll believed the Supreme Court ruling on segregation in schools had "caused a lot more trouble than it was worth."

Civil Disobedience and Publicity (1960-1963)

  • King resigned his pulpit in Montgomery to move back to Atlanta and become co-pastor with his father.

Greensboro Sit-Ins

  • On February 1, 1960, four freshmen from North Carolina Technical and Agricultural State College initiated sit-ins at a "whites only" lunch counter in Greensboro.
  • The movement spread quickly to other cities.

Nashville Sit-Ins

  • James Lawson trained students for civil disobedience and sponsored sit-in demonstrations in Nashville.
  • Diane Nash led sit-ins at lunch counters in downtown Nashville.
  • Hundreds were arrested and jailed.
  • Downtown Nashville businesses eventually integrated their lunch counters.

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

  • In April 1960, the SCLC sponsored a national conference of student sit-in activists, who established SNCC.

Atlanta Sit-Ins and King's Arrest

  • SNCC started a sit-in campaign in Atlanta.
  • King joined and was arrested on October 19, 1960.
  • The Atlanta mayor brokered a deal to drop charges against the protestors.

King's Imprisonment and the Presidential Election

  • King was sentenced to four months of hard labor for violating probation related to a traffic ticket.
  • He was moved to a maximum-security state prison.

Kennedy's Intervention

  • John F. Kennedy phoned King's wife, Coretta, expressing concern.
  • Robert F. Kennedy called King's judge to argue for bail.
  • King was released on bail the next day.

Impact on the Election

  • News of Kennedy's intervention swept through black communities.
  • JFK won a 0.02 percent plurality of the total vote, with 70 percent of the black vote.

Kennedy's Cautious Approach to Civil Rights

  • President Kennedy proceeded cautiously on civil rights, fearing alienation of southern whites.
  • He appointed pro-segregation federal judges.

Freedom Rides

  • The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) organized a "Freedom Ride" in 1961 to challenge segregation at interstate bus terminals.
  • On May 14, mobs attacked the riders near Anniston, Alabama.
    • One mob burned the Greyhound bus.
    • Another mob attacked the Trailways bus.
  • Images of the burning bus and the bleeding Freedom Riders appeared on front pages around the world.
  • SNCC sent activists on a bus from Nashville to Birmingham, where they were arrested.