The Civil Rights Movement I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. Martin Luther King. Jr. The Civil Rights Movement
Make Up of the Civil Rights Movement N.A.A.C.P. Grass Roots Movements Legal battle in the courts against segregation & discrimination Grass Roots Movements Everyday people standing up to fight injustice.
Background
African-American activism N.A.A.C.P. W.E.B. du Bois James Weldon Johnson Marcus Garvey A. Philip Randolph Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters March on Washington
Changes after world War II Defense Plants under orders to hire regardless of race African-American G.I.’s Segregated battalions with few Black officers Red Cross segregated blood Greeted as heroes by Europeans G.I. Bill enable African-Americans veterans to go to college, own their own business, own their own home, but discrimination blocked their way
The Movement began…
N.A.A.C.P. legal defense Fund N.A.A.C.P.’s Legal Defense Fund Walter White head of NAACP Charles Houston head of Legal Defense Fund Howard University Law School Professor Began to challenge Plessy v. Ferguson in the courts
Truman desegregated the army, 1948: Executive Order #9981
Brown v. Board of education of topeka, 1954 Case based on 3 lower court decisions Oliver Brown in Topeka, Kansas Barbara Johns & fellow students in Virginia Parents in Clarendon County, South Carolina Warren Court reversed Plessy’s Separate but Equal decision Segregation is unconstitutional Schools must desegregate with “all deliberate speed
Montgomery Bus Boycott, 1955-56 Rosa Parks arrested for sitting in white section Martin Luther King, Jr. organized boycott using nonviolent protest lasted 381 days Montgomery, Alabama busses desegregated King was 26 years old Influenced by Howard Thurman friend of his fathers who had been a missionary and met & worked with Gandhi
Civil Rights Act of 1957 Set up congressional committee to investigate voting violations in the south.