Other Civil Rights Movements

Essential Question: What other groups also pushed for Civil Rights in the 1960s?

Chicano Movement Mexican American Civil Rights Movement – Cultural and political movement Focuses: restoration of land, education reforms, rights for farm workers – Lacked influence in national politics

Mexican American Movement Restoration of land rights: – Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (Mexican-American War) Land taken from Mexico should be given to Mexican Americans Education Reforms: – 1947: Mendez v. Westminster Supreme Court Prohibit segregation of Latino schoolchildren from white – 1954: Hernandez v. Texas 14 th Amendment= equal protection to all racial groups

Cesar Chavez “Farmworker Movement” (also included Filipino workers) – Horrible working conditions: no water, no health benefits, hot conditions in the fields, pesticides – Unionization for farm workers in California United Farm Workers– Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta “Viva La Causa”

Cesar Chavez National boycott on grapes: 1965 Workers strike Chavez: 25-day hunger strike: 1968 Continued through 1970: – Grape growers acknowledge UFW as a union

Feminist Movement Focuses: end workplace inequality – 38% of U.S. women (1960): teachers, nurses, secretaries Few women in professional programs (6%: doctors, 3% lawyers, less than 1% engineers) 1962: Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique – Women feel trapped an unfulfilled

Feminist Movement National Organization for Women (NOW) – “true equality for all women” – “full and equal partnership of the sexes” – Break down discrimination in workplace and education – Gloria Steinem

Feminist Movement Proposed: Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) – Guarantee gender equality under the law Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article. Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification. – Proposed: 1923 (Alice Paul); passed by Congress 1972 – 3 states short of ratification before time limit expires Protect reproductive rights, especially the right to an abortion Phyllis Schlafly: anti-ERA

LGBT Movement Goals: – End job discrimination – End discrimination by churches and military – “coming out of the closet” – Family Rights Adoption and Marriage

LGBT Movement Stonewall Riot, 1969 – Gay customers at a bar take stand against harassment by police – Protestors outside Stonewall Inn – Inspire organization of gay rights groups December 15, 1973: American Psychiatric Association – Removal of homosexuality from mental illness list

LGBT Movement October 1979: National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights 1980s: AIDS – Stigmatization and oppression – Changed perceptions: “showed a more humane side”

LGBT Movement Matthew Shepard University of Wyoming – 21 year old student- brutally attacked, tied to a fence – Anti-gay hate crime– spawned activist movement Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) – 1996: Passed in Congress – 2013: Presented in Supreme Court; DOMA overturned

American Indian Movement (AIM) Focuses: unemployment, slum housing, racism U.S. government needs to honor treaty obligations – Bureau of Indian Affairs control Reservation land

American Indian Movement 1969: group occupies island of Alcatraz for 19 months – Sioux claim it belongs to them Fall 1972: “Trail of Broken Treaties”– protested U.S. government’s inability to honor treaty responsibilities

AIM The Second Battle at Wounded Knee – Took over village – Government must agree to investigate reservation conditions – Federal authorities siege village – Two die in gunfight – Government agrees to investigate

American Indian Movement- Legislation Indian Civil Rights Act- April 1968 – Certain parts of Bill of Rights applicable within Native American tribes Grievances against tribal governments – Tribes subjected to power of Congress and Constitution American Indian Religious Freedom Act- August 1978 – Protect and preserve traditional religious rights and cultural practices Sacred sites, freedom to worship, use and possession of sacred objects