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1. When did the Civil Rights Movement take place?

2. What were the Jim Crow Laws? \

3. How were they used to marginalize Black people?

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Jim Crow Laws

During Reconstruction, Black people took on leadership roles like never before. They held public office and sought legislative changes for equality and the right to vote.

In 1868, the 14th Amendment to the Constitution gave Black people equal protection under the law. In 1870, the 15th Amendment granted Black American men the right to vote. Still, many white Americans, especially those in the South, were unhappy that people they'd once enslaved were now on a more-or-less equal playing field.

To marginalize Black people, keep them separate from white people and erase the progress they'd made during Reconstruction, " Jim Crow " laws were established in the South beginning in the late 19th century. Black people couldn't use the same public facilities as white people, live in many of the same towns or go to the same schools. Interracial marriage was illegal, and most Black people couldn't vote because they were unable to pass voter literacy tests.

Jim Crow laws weren't adopted in northern states; however, Black people still experienced discrimination at their jobs or when they tried to buy a house or get an education. To make matters worse, laws were passed in some states to limit voting rights for Black Americans.

Moreover, southern segregation gained ground in 1896 when the U.S. Supreme Court declared in Plessy v. Ferguson that facilities for Black and white people could be "separate but equal."

World War II and Civil Rights

Prior to World War II, most Black people worked as low-wage farmers, factory workers, domestics or servants. By the early 1940s, war-related work was booming, but most Black Americans weren't given better-paying jobs. They were also discouraged from joining the military.

After thousands of Black people threatened to march on Washington to demand equal employment rights, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802 on June 25, 1941. It opened national defense jobs and other government jobs to all Americans regardless of race, creed, color or national origin.

Black men and women served heroically in World War II, despite suffering segregation and discrimination during their deployment. The Tuskegee Airmen broke the racial barrier to become the first Black military aviators in the U.S. Army Air Corps and earned more than 150 Distinguished Flying Crosses. Yet many Black veterans were met with prejudice and scorn upon returning home. This was a stark contrast to why America had entered the war to begin with-to defend freedom and democracy in the world.

As the Cold War began, President Harry Truman initiated a civil rights agenda, and in 1948 issued Executive Order 9981 to end discrimination in the military. These events helped set the stage for grass-roots initiatives to enact racial equality legislation and incite the civil rights movement.

Rosa Parks

On December 1, 1955, a 42-year-old woman named Rosa Parks found a seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus after work. Segregation laws at the time stated Black passengers must sit in designated seats at the back of the bus, and Parks complied.

When a white man got on the bus and couldn't find a seat in the white section at the front of the bus, the bus driver instructed Parks and three other Black passengers to give up their seats. Parks refused and was arrested.

As word of her arrest ignited outrage and support, Parks unwittingly became the "mother of the modern-day civil rights movement." Black community leaders formed the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) led by Baptist minister Martin Luther King Jr., a role which would place him front and center in the fight for civil rights.

Parks' courage incited the MIA to stage a boycott of the Montgomery bus system. The Montgomery Bus Boycott lasted 381 days. On November 14, 1956, the Supreme Court ruled segregated seating was unconstitutional.

Little Rock Nine

In 1954, the civil rights movement gained momentum when the United States Supreme Court made segregation illegal in public schools in the case of Brown v. Board of Education. In 1957, Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas asked for volunteers from all-Black high schools to attend the formerly segregated school.

On September 4, 1957, nine Black students, known as the Little Rock Nine, arrived at Central High School to begin classes but were instead met by the Arkansas National Guard (on order of Governor Orval Faubus) and a screaming, threatening mob. The Little Rock Nine tried again a couple of weeks later and made it inside, but had to be removed for their safety when violence ensued.

Finally, President Dwight D. Eisenhower intervened and ordered federal troops to escort the Little Rock Nine to and from classes at Central High. Still, the students faced continual harassment and prejudice.

Their efforts, however, brought much-needed attention to the issue of desegregation and fueled protests on both sides of the issue.

Civil Rights Act of 1957

Even though all Americans had gained the right to vote, many southern states made it difficult for Black citizens. They often required prospective voters of color to take literacy tests that were confusing, misleading and nearly impossible to pass.

Wanting to show a commitment to the civil rights movement and minimize racial tensions in the South, the Eisenhower administration pressured Congress to consider new civil rights legislation.

On September 9, 1957, President Eisenhower signed the Civil Rights Act of 1957 into law, the first major civil rights legislation since Reconstruction. It allowed federal prosecution of anyone who tried to prevent someone from voting. It also created a commission to investigate voter fraud.

Sit-In at Woolworth's Lunch Counter

Despite making some gains, Black Americans still experienced blatant prejudice in their daily lives. On February 1, 1960, four college students took a stand against segregation in Greensboro, North Carolina when they refused to leave a Woolworth's lunch counter without being served.

Over the next several days, hundreds of people joined their cause in what became known as the Greensboro sit-ins. After some were arrested and charged with trespassing, protesters launched a boycott of all segregated lunch counters until the owners caved and the original four students were finally served at the Woolworth's lunch counter where they'd first stood their ground.

Their efforts spearheaded peaceful sit-ins and demonstrations in dozens of cities and helped launch the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to encourage all students to get involved in the civil rights movement. It also caught the eye of young college graduate Stokely Carmichael, who joined the SNCC during the Freedom Summer of 1964 to register Black voters in Mississippi. In 1966, Carmichael became the chair of the SNCC, giving his famous speech in which he originated the phrase "Black power."

Freedom Riders

On May 4, 1961, 13 " Freedom Riders"-seven Black and six white activists-mounted a Greyhound bus in Washington, D.C., embarking on a bus tour of the American south to protest segregated bus terminals. They were testing the 1960 decision by the Supreme Court in Boynton v. Virginia that declared the segregation of interstate transportation facilities unconstitutional.

Facing violence from both police officers and white protesters, the Freedom Rides drew international attention. On Mother's Day 1961, the bus reached Anniston, Alabama, where a mob mounted the bus and threw a bomb into it. The Freedom Riders escaped the burning bus but were badly beaten. Photos of the bus engulfed in flames were widely circulated, and the group could not find a bus driver to take them further. U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy (brother to President John F. Kennedy) negotiated with Alabama Governor John Patterson to find a suitable driver, and the Freedom Riders resumed their journey under police escort on May 20. But the officers left the group once they reached Montgomery, where a white mob brutally attacked the bus. Attorney General Kennedy responded to the riders-and a call from Martin Luther King Jr.-by sending federal marshals to Montgomery.

On May 24, 1961, a group of Freedom Riders reached Jackson, Mississippi. Though met with hundreds of supporters, the group was arrested for trespassing in a "whites-only" facility and sentenced to 30 days in jail. Attorneys for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ( NAACP) brought the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court, which reversed the convictions. Hundreds of new Freedom Riders were drawn to the cause, and the rides continued.

In the fall of 1961, under pressure from the Kennedy administration, the Interstate Commerce Commission issued regulations prohibiting segregation in interstate transit terminals

March on Washington

Arguably one of the most famous events of the civil rights movement took place on August 28, 1963: the March on Washington. It was organized and attended by civil rights leaders such as A. Philip Randolph, Bayard Rustin and Martin Luther King Jr.

More than 200,000 people of all races congregated in Washington, D. C. for the peaceful march with the main purpose of forcing civil rights legislation and establishing job equality for everyone. The highlight of the march was King's speech in which he continually stated, "I have a dream..."

King's " I Have a Dream" speech galvanized the national civil rights movement and became a slogan for equality and freedom.

Civil Rights Act of 1964

President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964-legislation initiated by President John F. Kennedy before his assassination -into law on July 2 of that year.

King and other civil rights activists witnessed the signing. The law guaranteed equal employment for all, limited the use of voter literacy tests and allowed federal authorities to ensure public facilities were integrated.

Bloody Sunday

On March 7, 1965, the civil rights movement in Alabama took an especially violent turn as 600 peaceful demonstrators participated in the Selma to Montgomery march to protest the killing of Black civil rights activist Jimmie Lee Jackson by a white police officer and to encourage legislation to enforce the 15th amendment.

As the protesters neared the Edmund Pettus Bridge, they were blocked by Alabama state and local police sent by Alabama Governor George C. Wallace, a vocal opponent of desegregation. Refusing to stand down, protesters moved forward and were viciously beaten and teargassed by police and dozens of protesters were hospitalized.

The entire incident was televised and became known as " Bloody Sunday." Some activists wanted to retaliate with violence, but King pushed for nonviolent protests and eventually gained federal protection for another march.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

When President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law on August 6, 1965, he took the Civil Rights Act of 1964 several steps further. The new law banned all voter literacy tests and provided federal examiners in certain voting jurisdictions.

It also allowed the attorney general to contest state and local poll taxes. As a result, poll taxes were later declared unconstitutional in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections in 1966.

Part of the Act was walked back decades later, in 2013, when a Supreme Court decision ruled that Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act was unconstitutional, holding that the constraints placed on certain states and federal review of states' voting procedures were outdated.

Civil Rights Leaders Assassinated

The civil rights movement had tragic consequences for two of its leaders in the late 1960s. On February 21, 1965, former Nation of Islam leader and Organization of Afro-American Unity founder Malcolm X was assassinated at a rally.

On April 4, 1968, civil rights leader and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated on his hotel room's balcony. Emotionally-charged looting and riots followed, putting even more pressure on the Johnson administration to push through additional civil rights laws.

Fair Housing Act of 1968

The Fair Housing Act became law on April 11, 1968, just days after King's assassination. It prevented housing discrimination based on race, sex, national origin and religion. It was also the last legislation enacted during the civil rights era.

The civil rights movement was an empowering yet precarious time for Black Americans. The efforts of civil rights activists and countless protesters of all races brought about legislation to end segregation, Black voter suppression and discriminatory employment and housing practices.

Sources

A Brief History of Jim Crow. Constitutional Rights Foundation.
Civil Rights Act of 1957. Civil Rights Digital Library.
Document for June 25th: Executive Order 8802: Prohibition of Discrimination in the Defense Industry. National Archives.
Greensboro Lunch Counter Sit-In. African American Odyssey.
Little Rock School Desegregation (1957). The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute Stanford.
Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Global Freedom Struggle. The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute Stanford.
Rosa Marie Parks Biography. Rosa and Raymond Parks.
Selma, Alabama, (Bloody Sunday, March 7, 1965). BlackPast.org.
The Civil Rights Movement (1919-1960s). National Humanities Center.
The Little Rock Nine. National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior: Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site.
Turning Point: World War II. Virginia Historical Society.

Photo Galleries

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Civil Rights Movement: Timeline, Key Events & Leaders | HISTORY

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The civil rights movement was a struggle for justice and equality for African Americans that took place mainly in the 1950s and 1960s. Among its leaders were Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, the Little Rock Nine, Rosa Parks and many others.

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1. Identify the three "reconstruction" amendments.

2. Explain 2-3 myths around slavery.

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During Reconstruction, three amendments to the Constitution were made in an effort to establish equality for black Americans.

The Thirteenth Amendment, adopted in 1865, abolishes slavery or involuntary servitude except in punishment for a crime. The Fourteenth Amendment, adopted in 1868, defines all people born in the United States as citizens, requires due process of law, and requires equal protection to all people. The Fifteenth Amendment, ratified in 1870, prevents the denial of a citizen's vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

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Reconstruction Amendments | Themes | Slavery by Another Name | PBS

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Watch experts explain the Reconstruction Amendments (Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendment), created to establish equality for black Americans.

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1. Who was Rosa Parks, and what did she do to get arrested?

2. Was Parks a Civil Rights activist prior to her arrest?

3. What Parks "civil disobedience" pre-meditated?

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Rosa Parks - Civil Rights Activist | Mini Bio | BIO

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1. Who was Emmett Till?

2. How did his murder effect the Civil Rights Movement?

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A new film, Till, documents the decades-long pursuit of justice for the 14-year-old, whose 1955 killing galvanized a generation of activists.

This picture of 14-year-old Emmett Till with his mother at their home in Chicago was taken shortly before his trip to visit family in Mississippi, where he was murdered.

Photograph via Chicago Tribune, Getty Images

On August 31, 1955, the mutilated body of 14-year-old Emmett Till was found floating in the Tallahatchie River.

Beaten and murdered for allegedly whistling at a white woman, the teen was one of many Black men, women, and children who were lynched without recourse in the century after the Civil War. Till's story woke the nation up to the violent reality of being Black in America.

His legacy endures today-thanks in part to his mother, Mamie Elizabeth Till, who showed the world the brutality of her son's murder and fought tirelessly for justice. Although Emmett's killers were never convicted, his name and face are still evoked in the ongoing struggle for equality. Their story is told in the new film Till.

This is how Emmett Till's murder, and his fearless mother, helped ignite the American civil rights movement.

Who was Emmett Till and what happened to him?

Emmett "Bobo" Louis Till was just 14 years old when he was murdered. Family remember him as a fun loving, gentle person who loved practical jokes and making others laugh.

But Till grew up in a time when most public spaces were segregated and marriage between races was illegal. Black people were taught to speak to white people with their eyes turned to the ground and to address them with honorifics. Violations were often answered with beatings and other uses of force.

Raised in Chicago, Till was visiting relatives in the Mississippi Delta in the summer of 1955. On the evening of August 24, Till went with some cousins to the Bryant Grocery and Meat Market in Money, Mississippi.

(What were Jim Crow laws?)

Carolyn Bryant Donham, the store owner's wife, was tending the store that evening. Despite Bryant Donham's later claims that Till repeatedly grabbed and harassed her in the store, court documents show Till paid two cents for bubble gum and left without incident. When Bryant Donham left the store, Till whistled- his cousins say it wasn't directed at her, but knew this would cause trouble and drove away.

Over the next three days, Bryant Donham's husband Roy terrorized two other Black teenagers mistaken for Till: one in the Bryant store, and another walking in the road, who was thrown in the back of Bryant's van before he was released.

On August 28 at 2:30 a.m., Bryant, his brother J.W. Milam, and at least one other person went to the Wright home looking for the boy who had "done the talking" at the grocery store. They woke Till up and ordered him to get dressed, threatening his relatives and refusing their offer of payment in exchange for letting Till go.

(A new trail marks some of the most significant landmarks of the civil rights movement.)

The next day, Leflore County Sheriff's Department arrested both Bryant and Milam and charged them with kidnapping. They admitted to taking Till but claimed they released him.

Two days later, Till's naked body was found floating in the Tallahatchie River with a 75-pound cotton gin fan tied to his neck with barbed wire. His face was disfigured nearly beyond recognition.

Bryant and Milam were indicted on charges of murder.

What happened to Emmett Till's killers?

In September 1955, J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant were tried for murder before a jury of all white men in a Tallahatchie County court. A Black teen named Willy Reed risked his life to testify that he saw the men drive Till to a farm where Reed heard them beat Till mercilessly in the barn.

The jury acquitted Milam and Bryant after deliberating for only 67 minutes. One juror told a reporter they wouldn't have taken so long if they hadn't "stopped to drink pop." In November, the brothers also escaped kidnapping charges.

The men later confessed in a story they sold to Look magazine that they took Till to the Tallahatchie River, where they shot him in the head and pushed his body into the water.

No one else was ever indicted or prosecuted for involvement in Till's kidnapping or murder.

How did Emmett Till's murder catalyze the civil rights movement?

When Mamie Till learned her son was kidnapped, she gathered her family and called up newspapers the same day. By the next morning, she had gotten the NAACP and local and state politicians involved. This early publicity proved critical.

Her son's casket arrived in Chicago locked with the seal of the state of Mississippi, but Mamie Till fought for the undertaker to open it. Once she saw her son, she made a monumental decision to have an open casket funeral. She famously told the funeral director: "Let the people see what I've seen."

(Who was Medgar Evers?)

Tens of thousands of people came to see Emmett Till's body. Jet magazine photographer David Jackson was among them, taking the photo of Till in his coffin that brought America face-to-face with the murder. Jackson, along with journalists Simeon Booker from Jet and Moses Newson of the Tri-State Defender, made the case national news.

Till's horrific murder inspired what was later dubbed the "Emmett Till Generation" of Southern Black youth who joined meetings, sit-ins, and marches to demand their equal treatment under the law.

It also inspired the leaders of the movement. One hundred days after Till's murder, Rosa Parks sat in the front of a Montgomery bus and refused to get up as it filled with white passengers, violating Alabama's bus segregation laws. Reverend Jesse Jackson said in 1988 that Rosa "thought about going to the back of the bus. But then she thought about Emmett Till and she couldn't do it."

(How Martin Luther King, Jr.'s view on human rights inspires us today.)

Martin Luther King, Jr., one of the most prominent leaders of the civil rights movement, also invoked Till's case in several speeches. He delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech on the anniversary of Till's murder at the 1963 March on Washington.

What is Till's legacy today?

David Jackson's powerful photograph of Emmett Till's disfigured body continues to resonate: It has been linked with videos of Rodney King's beating in 1991, Philando Castile's fatal shooting at a traffic stop in 2016, George Floyd 's murder in 2020, and countless other racial injustices that have occurred in the decades since Till's murder.

The racism that led to Till's killing is still very much alive today, as hate groups have more than doubled in the last two decades.The memorial sign that marks where Till's body was pulled from the river was riddled with bullet holes and had to be replaced with one covered in bullet proof glass.

(The struggle for voting rights continue decades after the March on Washington.)

Today, there's still a push to bring charges against Carolyn Bryant Donham, one of the last living people connected to the case. In 2017, Duke University historian Timothy B. Tyson released a book in which Bryant Donham allegedly admitted lying about her interaction in the store with Till. But in December 2021, the Department of Justice announced it closed its investigation after it was unable to confirm that she had recanted her statement. In August 2022, a Mississippi grand jury also declined to indict Bryant Donham, now in her 80s.

Despite Mamie Till's best efforts, justice for Emmett Till remains elusive.

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How Emmett Till's murder catalyzed the U.S. civil rights movement

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A new film, Till, documents the decades-long pursuit of justice for the 14-year-old, whose 1955 killing galvanized a generation of activists.

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1. List everything you see in the picture.

2. What key details reveal the image is a reflection of Jim Crow South?

3. Infer the artist's attitude about segregation and Jim Crow Laws.

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1. Who was the first African American to receive the National Book Award?

2. Make a prediction about the novel's title. How could it relate to the Civil Rights Movement?

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The NAACP's legal strategy against segregated education culminated in the 1954 Supreme Court's landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision. African Americans gained the formal, if not the practical, right to study alongside their white peers in primary and secondary schools. The decision fueled an intransigent, violent resistance during which Southern states used a variety of tactics to evade the law.

In the summer of 1955, a surge of anti-black violence included the kidnapping and brutal murder of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till, a crime that provoked widespread and assertive protests from black and white Americans. By December 1955, the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott led by Martin Luther King, Jr., began a protracted campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience to protest segregation that attracted national and international attention.

During 1956, a group of Southern senators and congressmen signed the "Southern Manifesto," vowing resistance to racial integration by all "lawful means." Resistance heightened in 1957-1958 during the crisis over integration at Little Rock's Central High School. At the same time, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights led a successful drive for passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and continued to press for even stronger legislation. NAACP Youth Council chapters staged sit-ins at whites-only lunch counters, sparking a movement against segregation in public accommodations throughout the South in 1960. Nonviolent direct action increased during the presidency of John F. Kennedy, beginning with the 1961 Freedom Rides.

Hundreds of demonstrations erupted in cities and towns across the nation. National and international media coverage of the use of fire hoses and attack dogs against child protesters precipitated a crisis in the Kennedy administration, which it could not ignore. The bombings and riots in Birmingham, Alabama, on May 11, 1963, compelled Kennedy to call in federal troops.

On June 19, 1963, the president sent a comprehensive civil rights bill to Congress. The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28 roused public support for the pending bill. After the president's assassination on November 22, the fate of Kennedy's bill was in the hands of his vice president and successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, and the United States Congress.
See timeline for this period
Roy Wilkins NAACP's Longest Serving Leader

Roy Wilkins (1901−1981) was born in St. Louis, the son of a minister. While attending the University of Minnesota he served as secretary of the local NAACP. After graduation he began work as the editor of the Kansas City Call, a black weekly. The headline coverage Wilkins gave the NAACP in the Call attracted the attention of Walter White, who hired him as NAACP assistant secretary in 1931.

From 1934 to 1949, Wilkins served concurrently as editor of The Crisis, the NAACP's quarterly journal. In 1950 he became NAACP administrator and cofounded the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. He succeeded Walter White as executive secretary of the NAACP in 1955. Under his leadership the NAACP achieved school desegregation, major civil rights legislation, and its peak membership. Wilkins retired in 1977 as the longest serving NAACP leader.

Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

"I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids-and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me."

Writer Ralph Waldo Ellison completed only one novel during his lifetime, the critically acclaimed Invisible Man, published in 1952. It is recognized as one of the most influential masterpieces of the twentieth century, earning honors and awards for Ellison. In the novel Ellison addresses what it means to be an African American in a world hostile to the rights of a minority, on the cusp of the emerging civil rights movement.

Supplemental Brief in the Brown Cases

Brown v. Board of Education was a watershed moment for American civil rights law. The Supreme Court of the United States held that Jim Crow laws that segregated public school students on the basis of race were unconstitutional, in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. Brown explicitly overturned the court's prior decision in Plessy v. Ferguson, where it had held that segregated public facilities were constitutional, provided they were separate but substantially equal. This event was the culmination of the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund's campaign against segregation in schools. Despite this landmark decision, desegregation of public schools was often met with delays or outright opposition.

Attorneys for Brown v. Board of Education

The Supreme Court bundled Brown v. Board of Education with four related cases and scheduled a hearing for December 9, 1952. A rehearing was convened on December 7, 1953, and a decision rendered on May 17, 1954. Three lawyers, Thurgood Marshall ( center), chief counsel for the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund and lead attorney on the Briggs case, with George E. C. Hayes ( left) and James M. Nabrit ( right), attorneys for the Bolling case, are shown standing on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court congratulating each other after the court's decision declaring segregation unconstitutional.

Warren's Reading Copy of the Brown Opinion, 1954

Chief Justice Earl Warren's reading copy of Brown is annotated in his hand. Warren announced the opinion in the names of each justice, an unprecedented occurrence. The drama was heightened by the widespread prediction that the Court would be divided on the issue. Warren reminded himself to emphasize the decision's unanimity with a marginal notation, "unanimously," which departed from the printed reading copy to declare, "Therefore, we unanimously hold. . . ." In his memoirs, Warren recalled the moment with genuine warmth. "When the word 'unanimously' was spoken, a wave of emotion swept the room; no words or intentional movement, yet a distinct emotional manifestation that defies description." "Unanimously" was not incorporated into the published version of the opinion, and thus exists only in this manuscript.

"A Great Day for America"

Oliver Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) was a triumphant moment for Civil Rights and underscored Chief Justice Earl Warren's effectiveness in leading the Court. Chief Justice Warren recognized the importance of issuing Brown v. Board as a unanimous decision, ensuring opponents of the decision would not be emboldened by a dissenting opinion. Associate Justice Harold H. Burton sent this note to Chief Justice Warren on the day that the Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board was announced. He said, "Today I believe has been a great day for America and the Court. . . . I cherish the privilege of sharing in this." In a tribute to Warren's judicial statesmanship, Burton added, "To you goes the credit for the character of the opinions which produced the all important unanimity. Congratulations."

Two Reactions to the Brown v. Board U.S. Supreme Court Decision

In this live television discussion, broadcast on May 23, 1954, Illinois Senator Paul Douglas (1892-1976) and Texas Senator Price Daniel (1910-1988) answer questions about the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision handed down six days earlier. In response to Brown v. Board, Daniel, along with 100 other lawmakers, signed the Southern Manifesto two years later, protesting the Supreme Court's "abuse of judicial power." This excerpt is from American Forum of the Air: The Supreme Court's Desegregation Decision, broadcast on NBC.

Six Years after Brown, Atlanta Citizens Discuss Their Schools

Rosa Parks Arrested and Fingerprinted

Tom Mboya of Kenya: "A World Struggle, A Human Struggle"

U.S. Representative Patsy T. Mink

Representative Patsy T. Mink (D-HI) (1927-2002) was the first woman of color to be elected to Congress. Mink, a third generation Japanese American was born and raised on Maui. She received her law degree from the University of Chicago Law School in 1951. Returning to Hawaii, Mink served in the State Senate when Hawaii became the fiftieth state and delivered a speech during the 1960 Democratic National Convention convincing the party to maintain its stance on civil rights. Mink was elected to Congress in 1964 and served a total of six consecutive terms. While in Congress she co-authored the Title IX Amendment of the Higher Education Act extending more of the 1964 act's antidiscrimination protections to women.

"What greater weapon for peace do we have than our victory over bigotry and race hatred which for many centuries past have torn the world apart."

CORE Voter Registration in Louisiana

In July 1963, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) sent a task force to Plaquemine, Louisiana, to initiate a voter registration drive, responding to the request of a local schoolteacher and activist for help. The summer drive was documented in Louisiana Diary, broadcast March 16, 1964, on National Educational Television. In these excerpts, Ronnie Moore, CORE's field secretary for Louisiana, explains that through voter registration, they hope to achieve laws to protect African Americans from violence and ensure justice and fair law enforcement. CORE executive director James Farmer (1920-1999), who speaks to activists in one excerpt, arrived in Plaquemine in August for a mass march to City Hall after demands were ignored by officials. Farmer's arrest at the march prevented him from attending the March on Washington.

Journalist and Advisor Louis Martin

Louis Martin (1912-1997), a renowned journalist and newspaper publisher, served as the principal black advisor to Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Carter, and as deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1961 to 1969. Martin kept this notebook to chronicle his travels and activities during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. In the passage shown here, he reports on the reaction at the White House to the 1963 Birmingham campaign.

"In the last few weeks Negro demonstrations in Birmingham and the South and North have intensified the race-relations dilemma and forced the attention of everyone from the President on down. Civil Rights' items dominate all media and it the is the central theme of private and public discussion."

Civil Rights Leader Louis Martin

Louis Martin grew-up in Savannah, Georgia, the son of a Cuban-born physician. Educated at the University of Michigan, he began his career as a reporter for the Chicago Defender in 1936, and within a year became the editor and publisher of the Michigan Chronicle. In 1944 Martin took a leave of absence to work as assistant publicity director for President Franklin Roosevelt's campaign. From 1947 to 1959 he served as editor-in-chief of the Defender, and in 1949 became founding president of the National Newspaper Publishers Association. Martin returned to politics in 1960 as a member of John F. Kennedy's presidential campaign team. He served as an advisor to Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Carter, and as deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1961 to 1969. Dubbed "the godfather of black politics," Martin helped to establish African Americans as a political power in the Democratic Party and promote them to high government posts. He aided the appointments of Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court, Andrew Brimmer to the Federal Reserve Board, and Robert Weaver as secretary of Housing and Urban Development. In 1970 Martin cofounded the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a black think tank, serving as its first chairman for nine years.

The Cambridge Movement

The Cambridge Nonviolent Action Committee (CNAC) formed in 1962 to target segregation and racial inequality in the Eastern Shore of Maryland city of Cambridge. This excerpt from NBC's The American Revolution of '63, broadcast September 2, 1963, documents violent encounters that led in June 1963 to a declaration of martial law. Intervention by the Kennedy Administration to resolve the crisis with CNAC leader Gloria Richardson (b. 1922) resulted in what became known as the "Treaty of Cambridge," but that failed to last, and conflicts continued in Cambridge for many years.

Courtesy of NBC News

President Kennedy Ponders Making a Major Civil Rights Address

On June 11, 1963, President John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) delivered a major televised address to the nation announcing that he soon would ask Congress to enact civil rights legislation. Kennedy allowed documentary filmmaker Robert Drew unprecedented access to Oval Office discussions with his advisors, which were included in the film Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment, first broadcast October 21, 1963, on ABC, and rebroadcast in this re-edited version, Kennedy v. Wallace: A Crisis Up Close, twenty-five years later on the PBS series The American Experience, which included new interviews with participants.

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The Civil Rights Act of 1964: A Long Struggle for Freedom Civil Rights Era (1950-1963)

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The Brown decision fueled violent resistance during which Southern states evaded the law. The Montgomery bus boycott began a campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience to protest segregation that attracted national and international attention. Media coverage of the use of fire hoses and attack dogs against protesters and bombings and riots in Birmingham compelled Kennedy to act, sending a civil rights bill to Congress.

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1. Who were the "Little Rock Nine?"

2. Which landmark Supreme Court Case did the students test?

3. What was the Supreme Court's ruling during that case?

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Desegregation of Schools

In its Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka decision, issued May 17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregation of America's public schools was unconstitutional.

Until the court's decision, many states across the nation had mandatory segregation laws, or Jim Crow laws, requiring African American and white children to attend separate schools. Resistance to the ruling was so widespread that the court issued a second decision in 1955, known as Brown II, ordering school districts to integrate "with all deliberate speed."

Little Rock Central High School

In response to the Brown decisions and pressure from the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ( NAACP), the Little Rock, Arkansas, school board adopted a plan for gradual integration of its schools.

The first institutions to integrate would be the high schools, beginning in September 1957. Among these was Little Rock Central High School, which opened in 1927 and was originally called Little Rock Senior High School.

Two pro-segregation groups formed to oppose the plan: The Capital Citizens Council and the Mother's League of Central High School.

Who Were the Little Rock Nine?

Despite the virulent opposition, nine students registered to be the first African Americans to attend Central High School. Minnijean Brown, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Thelma Mothershed, Melba Patillo, Gloria Ray, Terrence Roberts, Jefferson Thomas and Carlotta Walls had been recruited by Daisy Gaston Bates, president of the Arkansas NAACP and co-publisher of the Arkansas State Press, an influential African American newspaper.

Daisy Bates and others from the Arkansas NAACP carefully vetted the group of students and determined they all possessed the strength and determination to face the resistance they would encounter. In the weeks prior to the start of the new school year, the students participated in intensive counseling sessions guiding them on what to expect once classes began and how to respond to anticipated hostile situations.

The group soon became famous as the Little Rock Nine.

Orval Faubus

On September 2, 1957, Governor Orval Faubus announced that he would call in the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the African American students' entry to Central High, claiming this action was for the students' own protection. In a televised address, Faubus insisted that violence and bloodshed might break out if Black students were allowed to enter the school.

The Mother's League held a sunrise service at the school on September 3 as a protest against integration. But that afternoon, federal judge Ronald Davies issued a ruling that desegregation would continue as planned the next day.

Elizabeth Eckford

The Little Rock Nine arrived for the first day of school at Central High on September 4, 1957. Eight arrived together, driven by Bates.

Elizabeth Eckford's family, however, did not have a telephone, and Bates could not reach her to let her know of the carpool plans. Therefore, Eckford arrived alone.

The Arkansas National Guard, under orders of Governor Faubus, prevented any of the Little Rock Nine from entering the doors of Central High. One of the most enduring images from this day is a photograph of Eckford, alone with a notebook in her hand, stoically approaching the school as a crowd of hostile and screaming white students and adults surround her.

Eckford later recalled that one of the women spat on her. The image was printed and broadcast widely in the United States and abroad, bringing the Little Rock controversy to national and international attention.

Ronald Davies

In the following weeks, federal judge Ronald Davies began legal proceedings against Governor Faubus, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower attempted to persuade Faubus to remove the National Guard and let the Little Rock Nine enter the school.

Judge Davies ordered the Guard removed on September 20, and the Little Rock Police Department took over to maintain order. The police escorted the nine African American students into the school on September 23, through an angry mob of some 1,000 white protesters gathered outside. Amidst ensuing rioting, the police removed the nine students.

The following day, President Eisenhower sent in 1,200 members of the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and placed them in charge of the 10,000 National Guardsmen on duty. Escorted by the troops, the Little Rock Nine attended their first full day of classes on September 25.

Numerous legal challenges to integration continued throughout the year, and Faubus repeatedly expressed his wish that the Little Rock Nine be removed from Central High.

Although several of the Black students had positive experiences on their first day of school, according to a September 25, 1957, report in The New York Times, they experienced routine harassment and even violence throughout the rest of the year.

Melba Patillo, for instance, was kicked, beaten and had acid thrown in her face. At one point, white students burned an African American effigy in a vacant lot across from the school. Gloria Ray was pushed down a flight of stairs, and the Little Rock Nine were barred from participating in extracurricular activities.

Minnijean Brown was expelled from Central High School in February 1958 for retaliating against the attacks. Harassment went beyond the students: Gloria Ray's mother was fired from her job with the State of Arkansas when she refused to remove her daughter from the school. The 101st Airborne and the National Guard remained at Central High School for the duration of the year.

Ernest Green

On May 25, 1958, Ernest Green, the only senior among the Little Rock Nine, became the first African American graduate of Central High.

In September 1958, one year after Central High was integrated, Governor Faubus closed all of Little Rock's high schools for the entire year, pending a public vote, to prevent African American attendance. Little Rock citizens voted 19,470 to 7,561 against integration and the schools remained closed.

Other than Green, the rest of the Little Rock Nine completed their high school careers via correspondence or at other high schools across the country. Eckford joined the Army and later earned her General Education Equivalency diploma. Little Rock's high schools reopened in August 1959.

Did you know? Civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. attended graduation ceremonies at Central High School in May 1958 to see Ernest Green, the only senior among the Little Rock Nine, receive his diploma.

Little Rock Nine Aftermath

Several of the Little Rock Nine went on to distinguished careers.

Green served as assistant secretary of the federal Department of Labor under President Jimmy Carter. Brown worked as deputy assistant secretary for workforce diversity in the Department of the Interior under President Bill Clinton. Patillo worked as a reporter for NBC.

The group has been widely recognized for their significant role in the civil rights movement. In 1999, President Clinton awarded each member of the group the Congressional Gold Medal. The nine also all received personal invitations to attend the inauguration of President Barack Obama in 2009.

Jefferson Thomas became the first of the Little Rock Nine to die when he succumbed to pancreatic cancer at the age of 67 on September 5, 2010. After graduating from Central High, Thomas served in the Army in Vietnam, earned a business degree and worked as an accountant for private companies and the Pentagon.

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Little Rock Nine - Definition, Names & Facts | HISTORY

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The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine Black students who enrolled at formerly all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, in September 1957. Their attendance at the school was a test of Brown v. Board of Education, a landmark 1954 Supreme Court ruling that declared segregation in public schools unconstitutional.

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African Americans and Major League Baseball

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African Americans and Major League Baseball

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1. Who was the first African American to play major league baseball?

2. List three examples of racism Robinson faced.

3. Which famous Civil Right's speech did Robinson attend?

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Jackie Robinson: Baseball Star Who Broke Barriers

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Jackie Robinson broke Major League Baseball’s color barrier in 1947 as a player for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

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1. What was the Greensboro Sit-In?

2. Who inspired the protestor's nonviolent techniques.

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The Greensboro sit-in was a civil rights protest that started in 1960, when young African American students staged a sit-in at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, and refused to leave after being denied service. The sit-in movement soon spread to college towns throughout the South. Though many of the protesters were arrested for trespassing, disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace, their actions made an immediate and lasting impact, forcing Woolworth's and other establishments to change their segregationist policies.

Greensboro Four

The Greensboro Four were four young Black men who staged the first sit-in at Greensboro: Ezell Blair Jr., David Richmond, Franklin McCain and Joseph McNeil. All four were students from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College.

They were influenced by the nonviolent protest techniques practiced by Mohandas Gandhi, as well as the Freedom Rides organized by the Congress for Racial Equality ( CORE) in 1947, in which interracial activists rode across the South in buses to test a recent Supreme Court decision banning segregation in interstate bus travel.

The Greensboro Four, as they became known, had also been spurred to action by the brutal murder in 1955 of a young Black boy, Emmett Till, who had allegedly whistled at a white woman in a Mississippi store.

Did you know? The former Woolworth's in Greensboro now houses the International Civil Rights Center and Museum, which features a restored version of the lunch counter where the Greensboro Four sat. Part of the original counter is on display at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.

Sit-In Begins

Blair, Richmond, McCain and McNeil planned their protest carefully, and enlisted the help of a local white businessman, Ralph Johns, to put their plan into action.

On February 1, 1960, the four students sat down at the lunch counter at the Woolworth's in downtown Greensboro, where the official policy was to refuse service to anyone but whites. Denied service, the four young men refused to give up their seats.

Police arrived on the scene but were unable to take action due to the lack of provocation. By that time, Johns had already alerted the local media, who had arrived in full force to cover the events on television. The Greensboro Four stayed put until the store closed, then returned the next day with more students from local colleges.

Sit-Ins Spread Nationwide

By February 5, some 300 students had joined the protest at Woolworth's, paralyzing the lunch counter and other local businesses. Heavy television coverage of the Greensboro sit-ins sparked a sit-in movement that quickly spread to college towns throughout the South and into the North, as young Black and white people joined in various forms of peaceful protest against segregation in libraries, beaches, hotels and other establishments.

Some of the first sit-ins during the civil rights movement were organized by history teacher Clara Luper and the NAACP Youth Council in Oklahoma City in 1958. By the end of March 1960, the movement had spread to 55 cities in 13 states. Though many were arrested for trespassing, disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace, national media coverage of the sit-ins brought increasing attention to the civil rights movement.

In response to the success of the sit-in movement, dining facilities across the South were being integrated by the summer of 1960. At the end of July, when many local college students were on summer vacation, the Greensboro Woolworth's quietly integrated its lunch counter. Four Black Woolworth's employees-Geneva Tisdale, Susie Morrison, Anetha Jones and Charles Best-were the first to be served.

SNCC

To capitalize on the momentum of the sit-in movement, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ( SNCC) was founded in Raleigh, North Carolina, in April 1960.

Over the next few years, SNCC served as one of the leading forces in the civil rights movement, organizing Freedom Rides through the South in 1961 and the historic March on Washington in 1963, at which Martin Luther King Jr. gave his seminal " I Have a Dream " speech.

SNCC worked alongside the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ( NAACP) to push passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and would later mount an organized resistance to the Vietnam War.

As its members faced increased violence, however, SNCC became more militant, and by the late 1960s it was advocating the "Black Power" philosophy of Stokely Carmichael (SNCC's chairman from 1966-67) and his successor, H. Rap Brown. By the early 1970s, SNCC had lost much of its mainstream support and was effectively disbanded.

Greensboro Sit-In Impact

The Greensboro Sit-In was a critical turning point in Black history and American history, bringing the fight for civil rights to the national stage. Its use of nonviolence inspired the Freedom Riders and others to take up the cause of integration in the South, furthering the cause of equal rights in the United States.

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Greensboro Sit-In - Facts, Date & Definition | HISTORY

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The Greensboro Sit-in was a major civil rights protest that started in 1960, when young Black students staged a sit-in at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, and refused to leave after being denied service.

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1. Who were the Freedom Riders, and what did they do?

2. What kind of opposition did the Freedom Riders face when they got to the deep south?

3. What part did Robert Kennedy play in the freed rides?

4. In what way were the freedom rides successful?

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Who Were the Freedom Riders? | The Civil Rights Movement

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1. What was the Children's Crusade of 1963?

2. What happened to the children that participated in the nonviolent protest?

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Children's Crusade of 1963 | American Freedom Stories | Biography

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1. What was the goal of the Birmingham campaign?

2. How did the Jim Crow laws affect employment for African Americans?

3. What percentage of the black population was registered to vote by 1960?

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The BRUTAL Truth Behind the Birmingham Campaign #blackhistory

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1. How was the Civil Rights Act of 1957 limited?

2. Who proposed a new civil rights act?

3. What did the Civil Rights Act of 1964 do?

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Civil Rights Act of 1964: In Pursuit of Equality - Civil Rights in the U.S. Series | Academy 4 S...

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1. When was the 16th Street Baptist Church bombed?

2. Why was the church targeted?

3. How many lives were lost?

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Bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church | American Freedom Stories | Biography

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1. What sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott?

2. How long did the boycott last, and how many people participated?

3. What happened to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as a result of his participation in the boycott?

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1. Who was Martin Luther King Jr.?

2. What did King do when we was arrested in Alabama in 1963?

3. Where did King deliver his famous "I Have a Dream" speech?

4. What did King win in 1963?

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Martin Luther King Jr: Risked Life for Civil Rights Movement | Biography

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1. What aspect of segregation does the image highlight?

2. Compare how the South is depicted and how African Americans are depicted.

3. What affect does the artist's choice have overall?

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1. How does the artist use irony?

2. Who was the artist's intended audience when the cartoon was published in 1968? Explain your reasoning.

3. The artist intentionally omits King's greater messages of peace and equality. What does the artist's ommission imply?

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Released in 1963, this song became a rallying cry during the 1960s.

1. List all the people Bob Dylan addresses and explain their significance.

2. What is Dylan's overall message?

3. Choose one metaphor in the song and explain its affect.

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Bob Dylan - The Times They Are A-Changin' (Official Audio)

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1. How do the weapons and strong military presence impact the mood of the photograph, as well as the photographer's overall message?

2. Explain the significance and profound impact of the protestors' simple message.