The Civil Rights Movement (Noun) the rights of citizens to political and social freedom as well as equality What is Civil Rights?

1865: Post-Slavery (“Reconstruction”) The Union Army occupied the South, and the U.S. passed amendments banning slavery and saying men (not women) could vote regardless of their ethnicity/race. Many former slaves moved to cities in the North; those who couldn't move often lived in conditions similar to slavery, renting parts of the former slavemaster's plantations (called sharecropping).

Jim Crow Laws After the military left the South in 1876, new Southern governments began to exclude black men. Laws were passed requiring a poll tax or literacy test. Since most black freedmen couldn't read or write or afford the tax, blacks were prevented from voting. Whites in the South, though, didn't have to pay or pass the literacy test because of “Grandfather Clauses” (laws created before).

Jim Crow Laws (cont.) Those blacks that tried to vote were intimidated by the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), who would burn houses and murder just to prevent blacks from voting. In Southern states--and many Northern ones as well--whites and blacks had separate facilities: bathrooms, schools, drinking fountains. Many restaurants and hotels refused to serve blacks.

In 1896, the Supreme Court said "separate but equal" facilities were legal and fair.

Brown vs. Board of Education In 1954, the Supreme Court decided that "separate but equal" schools were illegal and inherently *unequal.* So schools, restaurants, bathrooms, etc. were meant for people of ALL races/ethnicities. Over the next few years, other "separate" facilities-- like buses--were deemed illegal. Think Rosa Parks.

Integration Integration is combining people of all races/ethnicities/gende rs together to form a community. Many cities and states tried to prevent integration. In 1957, President Eisenhower had to call in the army to desegregate (unite) Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Emmett Till 1955: 13-year-old Emmett Till of Chicago was visiting his cousins in Mississippi. Allegedly, at a store, he whistled at a white woman. That night, the woman's husband and his brother kidnapped Emmett, tortured him, shot him, and dumped him in the river. His body was so disfigured that his mom only recognized him from a ring on his finger. Emmet’s mom decided to have an open casket to show the world the racism that was going on. Emmett's death was one of the main motivations for the Civil Rights Movement. People could not ignore the discrimination and gruesome violence taking place in the South.

Rosa Parks A few months later in 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Alabama for refusing to move her seat on the bus. Following the arrest, she and other women from her church asked Martin Luther King, Jr., a relatively unknown pastor, to lead a bus boycott. So many blacks refused to ride the bus that the system almost went bankrupt. Months later, buses were finally integrated (united).

Peaceful Demonstrations; Violent Reactions “Freedom Riders”--people of all ethnicities, usually college students--would take buses down to the south to do "sit-ins" at counters, register voters, and protest against racism and segregation. Sit-ins were peaceful protests to show that blacks deserve equal service and rights. Many Freedom Riders were assaulted by townspeople and policemen--and many were murdered.

Martin Luther King, Jr. After the success of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Martin Luther King, Jr. became the primary leader of the Civil Rights Movement. He preached nonviolent protesting (based partially on Gandhi’s example), even though he was arrested, beaten, and threatened many times. In 1963, he gave his famous "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. In 1968, after years of death threats, Martin Luther King was assassinated (killed) on the balcony of his hotel in Memphis, Tennessee.

“I Have a Dream” Martin Luther King, Jr. “…And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.“ I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. 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. I have a dream today! …With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day…” (The ellipsis … indicates a deletion of the speech to shorten it for our purposes)