Bell Ringer

What was the court case that inspired the Brown v. Board of Education case? Who was the lawyer that argued the landmark Supreme Court case?

The Civil Rights Movement

Changing Laws and Changing Minds

Young People Make Waves

How the Youth of America Helped End Segregation

Little Rock Nine

The Little Rock Nine was a group of African-American students enrolled at Little Rock Central High School in 1957.

The NAACP registered the nine black students to attend the previously all-white Little Rock Central High, selected on the criteria of excellent grades and attendance.

On their first day of school, under orders by Governor Orval Faubus, troops from the Arkansas National Guard would not let the students enter the school and they were followed by mobs making threats to lynch

President Eisenhower ordered the United States Army to Little Rock and federalized the entire 10,000 member Arkansas National Guard, ordering them to escort the students to school.

Little Rock, Arkansas 1957

Standing UpBy Sitting Down

The Woolworth’s Sit-in On February 1, 1960, four black students from the

Agricultural and Technical College of North Carolina sat down at the lunch counter inside the Woolworth's store in Greensboro, North Carolina and ordered coffee

Following store policy, the lunch counter staff refused to serve the African American men at the "whites only" counter and the store's manager asked them to leave; the four men stayed until the store closed. The group came back the

following days with more and more participants, and then the movement began to spread to other store locations in the South.

July 26, 1960, the entire Woolworth's chain was desegregated, serving blacks and whites alike.

Sit-in TacticsDress in your Sunday best.Be respectful to employees and police.

Do not resist arrest!Do not fight back!Remember, journalists are everywhere!

Other students were ready to take your place if you had a

class to attend.

Who looks likethe bad guy?

Freedom Rides In 1961, CORE volunteers, white and black, got on

buses and sat inter-racially on the bus. They went into bus station lunch counters in order to test recent legislation on the desegregation of interstate bus lines.

The Freedom Rides, and the violent reactions they provoked, bolstered the credibility of the American Civil Rights Movement. They called national attention to the disregard for the federal law and the local violence used to enforce segregation in the southern United States.

Police arrested riders for trespassing, unlawful assembly, and violating state and local Jim Crow laws, along with other alleged offenses, but they often let white mobs attack them without intervention.

Freedom Riders Attacked!

Jim Zwerg

Bobby Kennedy and Civil Rights Robert F. “Bobby” Kennedy

served as chief advisor to President John F. Kennedy, his older brother. he served as the U.S. Attorney General, and was a noted civil rights activist.

Like his brother, his youth inspired the belief of many in his ability to create change.

He was instrumental in proving the White House’s support of the civil rights movement and its protesters.

Bobby Kennedy and the Freedom Rides After the initial attacks on the Freedom Riders, Bobby Kennedy sent his

administrative assistant to Alabama to attempt to secure the riders' safety there. Kennedy also persuaded a manager of The Greyhound Corporation to obtain a coach operator who was willing to drive a special bus for the continuance of the Freedom Ride from Birmingham to Montgomery.

Later, during the attack and burning by a white mob of the First Baptist Church in Montgomery, at which Martin Luther King Jr. and some 1,500 sympathizers were in attendance, the Attorney General telephoned King to ask his assurance that they would not leave the building until the force of U.S. Marshals and National Guard he sent had secured the area. King proceeded to berate Kennedy for "allowing the situation to continue". King later publicly thanked Robert Kennedy for his commanding of the force dispatched to break up an attack that might otherwise have ended King's life.

Kennedy then negotiated the safe passage of the Freedom Riders from the First Baptist Church to Jackson Mississippi, where they were arrested. He offered to bail the Freedom Riders out of jail, but they refused.

Freedom Riders Extra Credit Opportunity

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/freedomriders/

Watch the video and complete the questions. (??? Points)

James Meredith and Ole Miss James Meredith was determined to attend

the segregated University of Mississippi (“Ole Miss”). He was denied twice.

On May 31, 1961, the NAACP filed suit in the U.S. District Court, alleging that the university had rejected Meredith only because of the color of his skin, as he had a highly successful record. The case went to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that Meredith had the right to be admitted to the state school.

Mississippi Governor, Ross Barnett, tried to block him by having the Legislature pass a law that “prohibited any person who was convicted of a state crime from admission to a state school.” The law was directed at Meredith, who had been convicted of “false voter registration” under Mississippi State law.

Bobby Kennedy consulted with Governor Barnett, who agreed to have Meredith enroll in the university. White students and anti-desegregation supporters protested his enrollment by rioting on the Oxford campus.

Bobby Kennedy and James Meredith Robert Kennedy called in 500 U.S.

Marshals to take control. To bolster law enforcement, President John F. Kennedy sent in U.S. Army military police and called in troops from the Mississippi Army National Guard and the U.S. Border Patrol as well. Kennedy had hoped that legal means, along with the escort of U.S. Marshals, would be enough to force the Governor to allow the school admission.

The student protests turned violent. In the ensuing riot, two people died, 160 US Marshals were injured, and 40 soldiers and National Guardsmen were wounded.

Despite intense discrimination by his classmates, James Meredith graduated on August 18, 1963 with a degree in political science.

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. was an

American clergyman, activist, and leader in the Civil Rights Movement.

He is best known for his role in the advancement of civil rights using nonviolent civil disobedience. Nonviolent civil disobedience:  the

refusal to obey certain laws considered to be unjust or immoral.

Popularized by Thoreau, which inspired the works of Gandhi, and later, MLK.

He led the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in 1957, serving as its first president.

The Birmingham Campaign - 1963 The Birmingham campaign was

a strategic movement organized by MLK and the SCLC to bring attention to the unequal treatment that black Americans endured in Birmingham, Alabama.

Protesters used nonviolent direct action tactics to defy laws they considered unfair, beginning with a boycott to pressure business leaders to provide fair employment opportunities, and end segregation in public facilities, restaurants, and stores. A series of sit-ins and marches intended to provoke mass arrests.

A Letter from Birmingham Jail Written on April 16, 1963, by Martin Luther King,

Jr. after being arrested for his part in the Birmingham campaign, the “Letter” is a response to a recent statement made by eight white Alabama clergymen titled "A Call for Unity".

The clergymen agreed that social injustices existed but argued that the battle against racial segregation should be fought solely in the courts, not in the streets. They criticized Martin Luther King, calling him an “outsider” who causes trouble in the streets of Birmingham.

King expressed remorse for bringing conflict to Birmingham, but also explained that the conflict existed before his arrival, and that nonviolent protest was necessary for change.

“one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws."

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

The Children’s Crusade After the campaign ran low on adult volunteers, high

school, college, and elementary students were trained by SCLC coordinator James Bevel to participate, resulting in hundreds of arrests and an instant intensification of national media attention on the campaign.

To dissuade demonstrators and control the protests the Birmingham Police Department, led by Eugene "Bull" Connor, used high-pressure water jets and police dogs on children and bystanders.

Students were hauled off to jail (and later holding pens at the state fairgrounds when the jails were full), singing songs of the movement.

Media coverage of these events brought intense scrutiny on racial segregation in the South.

• Parker High School student Walter Gadsden had been attending the demonstration as an observer for a local newspaper, but was arrested for "parading without a permit.”

• Bill Hudson's image of Gadsden was published in The New York Times on May 4, 1963

• After witnessing Gadsden’s arrest, Commissioner Connor remarked to the officer, "Why didn't you bring a meaner dog; this one is not the vicious one.”

• JFK called the scenes "shameful”, and said the photo made him “sick.”

16th Street Baptist Church Bombing The 16th Street Baptist Church in

Birmingham, Alabama had been a rallying point during the recent Birmingham Campaign.

In the early morning of Sunday, September 15, 1963, a box of dynamite with a time delay was placed under the steps of the church, near the basement. At about 10:22 a.m., twenty-six children were walking into the basement assembly room to prepare for the sermon entitled “The Love That Forgives,” when the bomb exploded. Four girls, Addie Mae Collins (age 14), Denise McNair (age 11), Carole Robertson (age 14), and Cynthia Wesley (age 14), were killed.

The explosion blew a hole in the church's rear wall, destroyed the back steps and all but one stained-glass window, which showed Christ leading a group of little children.

The Case A witness identified Robert Chambliss, a member of the Ku

Klux Klan, as the man responsible for the bomb. He was arrested and charged with murder and possessing a box of 122 sticks of dynamite without a permit. On October 8, 1963, Chambliss was found not guilty of murder and received a hundred-dollar fine and a six-month jail sentence for having the dynamite.

In November 1977 Chambliss was tried once again with previously unused evidence from the FBI for the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing. Now aged 73, Chambliss was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment.

On May 18, 2000, the FBI announced that the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing had been carried out by the Ku Klux Klan splinter group, the Cahaba Boys. It was claimed that four men, Robert Chambliss, Herman Cash, Thomas Blanton and Bobby Cherry had been responsible for the crime. Cash was dead but Blanton and Cherry were arrested have since been tried and convicted.

Bell Ringer

What are some of the benefits to nonviolent civil disobedience? Are there any drawbacks or consequences to using this method of protest?

Changing Laws Doesn’t Always Change Minds

The Successes and Failures of Civil Rights Legislation

Civil Rights Act of 1957 The Civil Rights Act of 1957:  Set forth

prohibitions against intimidating, coercing or otherwise interfering with the rights of persons to vote for the President and members of Congress; was the first civil rights legislation enacted by Congress since Reconstruction.

Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, an ardent segregationist, sustained the longest one-person filibuster in history in an attempt to keep the bill from becoming law.

His one-man filibuster lasted 24 hours and 18 minutes; he began with readings of every state‘s election laws in alphabetical order. Thurmond later read from the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and George Washington's Farewell Address.

He would serve as a senator until his retirement in January 2003 at the age of 100.

Voter Education Project

From 1962 to 1968, the Voter Education Project raised and distributed foundation funds to civil rights organizations for voter education and registration work in the American South. The project was federally endorsed by the Kennedy administration in hopes that the organizations of the civil rights movement would shift their focus away from demonstrations and more towards the support of voter registration.

Mississippi Civil Rights Workers' Lynching

On Memorial Day in 1964, James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael “Mickey” Schwerner spoke to the congregation at Mount Zion Methodist Church in Longdale, Mississippi, imploring them to register to vote.

The White Knights learned of Schwerner’s voting drive in Neshoba County and soon set in motion a plot to hinder their work and ultimately destroy their efforts. The White Knights wanted to lure CORE workers to Neshoba County so they beat the congregation members and then torched the church burning it to the ground.

On June 21, 1964, Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner met to prepare to leave for Longdale, Mississippi to investigate the destruction of the Mount Zion Church. They told local civil rights leadersto search for them if they are not back by 4 pm; he says "if we're not back by then start trying to locate us."

Mississippi Civil Rights Workers' Lynching On the night of June 21–22, 1964,

Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner were threatened, intimidated, beaten, shot, and buried by members of the Mississippi White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the Neshoba County’s Sheriff Office and the Philadelphia Police Department located in Philadelphia, Mississippi. After the largest and most televised search at the time, their bodies were found 44 days later in an earthen dam near the murder site.

Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner’s murders sparked national outrage and spurred the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Medgar Evers Medgar Evers was an African-American civil

rights activist from Mississippi. He was involved in helping James Meredith gain admittance to Ole Miss, and helped organize boycotts and set up new local chapters of the NAACP as the first field secretary of Mississippi.

In the early morning of June 12, 1963, Evers pulled into his driveway after returning from a meeting with NAACP lawyers. Emerging from his car and carrying NAACP T-shirts that read "Jim Crow Must Go," Evers was shot in the back; the bullet ricocheted into his home. He died at a local hospital 50 minutes later.

Mourned nationally, Evers was buried on June 19 in Arlington National Cemetery, where he received full military honors before a crowd of more than 3,000.

On June 21, 1963, Byron De La Beckwith, a fertilizer salesman and member of the White Citizens' Council (and later of the Ku Klux Klan), was arrested for Evers' murder. Juries composed solely of white men twice that year deadlocked on De La Beckwith's guilt.

In 1994, 30 years after the two previous trials had failed to reach a verdict, De La Beckwith was brought to trial based on new evidence. De La Beckwith was convicted of murder on February 5, 1994, and died at age 80 in prison in January 2001.

March on Washington 1963

The march was organized by a group of civil rights, labor, and religious organizations,

under the theme "jobs, and freedom.“

An estimated 200,000+ people participated, including notable actors and musicians

The event was highlighted by Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, in which he called for racial harmony.

I Have a Dream!

Free at last! Free at last!Thank God Almighty,we are free at last!

Civil Rights Act of 1964 Civil Rights Act of 1964 -

outlawed major forms of discrimination against racial, ethnic, national and religious minorities, and women. It ended unequal application of voter registration requirements and racial segregation in schools, at the workplace and by facilities that served the general public.

Voting Rights Success

24th AmendmentVoting Rights Act of 1965

Prohibits the use of a poll tax or other types of tax in federal elections. At the time of this amendment's passage, five states still retained a poll tax:  Virginia,  Alabama, Texas,  Arkansas, and Mississippi.

Outlawed discriminatory voting practices that had been responsible for the widespread disenfranchisement of African Americans in the U.S., specifically outlawing the practice of requiring otherwise qualified voters to pass literacy tests in order to register to vote.

Selma to Montgomery Marches Organized by SNCC and the SCLC under Martin Luther King Jr., the Selma

marches were attempts to march from Selma to the capitol in Montgomery, Alabama to support African-American voting rights.

"Bloody Sunday“: 600 marchers were attacked by state and local police with billy clubs and tear gas.

The second march, the following Tuesday, resulted in 2,500 protesters turning around after crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge in accordance with a court injunction.

The third march began the next week. Protected by 2,000 soldiers of the U.S. Army, 1,900 members of the Alabama National Guard, and many FBI agents and Federal Marshals, they safely arrived at the Alabama State Capitol on March 25.

…Divided We Fall

Divisions Destroy the Civil Rights Movement

Black Power Movement and Stokely Carmichael

Stokely Carmichael became involved in the civil rights movement as a leader of SNCC, but became unhappy with the slow progress of MLK’s nonviolent civil disobedience and the racism that continued despite successful new laws.

He coined the term “black power”, which empasized racial pride and the desire to create black political and cultural institutions to promote black collective interests and advance black values.

Malcolm X Born in Omaha

Nebraska, Malcolm Little was the son of a Baptist preacher who was killed by a White Supremacist in 1931.

Followed the teachings of Elijah Muhammad (The Nation Of Islam), who preached complete separation from Whites in society.

The “X” in his name refers to the rejection of his slave name.

Malcolm X Malcolm X made

constant accusations of racism and demanded violent actions of self defense.

“Be peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, send him to the cemetery.”

By the start of the 60’s Malcolm X was exposed to rumors that Elijah Muhammad had indulged in extramarital affairs, and that Elijah Muhammad was jealous of his increasing popularity.

Malcolm X After the assassination of

John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X made a speech that claimed that the violence Kennedy failed to prevent ended up to come back and claim his life.

In 1964, during a pilgrimage to Mecca, Malcolm discovered that orthodox Muslims preach equality among races, causing him to desert his argument that all Whites are the devil.

In 1965 Malcolm X was assassinated by a Black Muslim at a New York City rally.

Black Panthers The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was founded in Oakland,

California by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in 1966. The organization initially aimed at the protection of African-

American neighborhoods from police brutality, The group grew rapidly, with membership of over 10,000 by

1969. The Black Panther Party's most widely known programs were its

armed citizens' patrols to evaluate behavior of police officers. However, the group's political goals were often overshadowed by their criminality and their confrontational, militant, and violent tactics against police.

Ultimately, the Panthers condemned black nationalism as "black racism" and became more focused on socialism without racial exclusivity. They instituted a variety of community social programs designed to alleviate poverty, improve health among inner city black communities, and soften the Party's public image.

Assassination of MLK Martin Luther King Jr. was

assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968, at the age of 39.

 James Earl Ray, a fugitive from the Missouri State Penitentiary, was arrested in London at Heathrow Airport, extradited to the United States, and charged with the crime. On March 10, 1969, Ray entered a plea of guilty and was sentenced to 99 years in the Tennessee state penitentiary. Ray later made many attempts to withdraw his guilty plea and be tried by a jury, but was unsuccessful; he died in prison on April 23, 1998, at the age of 70.

Bobby Kennedy and MLK On April 4, 1968,

Kennedy learned of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. and gave a heartfelt, impromptu speech in Indianapolis's inner city, in which Kennedy called for a reconciliation between the races. Riots broke out in 60 cities in the wake of King's death, but not in Indianapolis, a fact many attribute to the effect of this speech.

Black Power at the Olympics At the 1968 Olympics, African

American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos gave the black power salute during their medal ceremony after winning the gold and bronze medals in the 200m race.

As they turned to face their flags and hear the American national anthem, they each raised a black-gloved fist and kept them raised until the anthem had finished. Smith, Carlos and Australian silver medalist Peter Norman wore human rights badges on their jackets. The event was one of the most overtly political statements in the history of the modern Olympic Games. 

Watts Riots The Watts Riots took place from August 11 to 17, 1965 due to residential

segregation and police discrimination and brutality. The five-day riot resulted in 34 deaths, 1,032 injuries, 3,438 arrests, and over $40 million in property damage.

The riots were the result of police brutality in the arrest of 21-year-old Marquette Frye, an African American man.

After a night of increasing unrest, police and local black community leaders held a community meeting on Thursday, August 12, to discuss an action plan and to urge calm; the meeting failed. Later that day, Los Angeles police chief William H. Parker called for the assistance of the California Army National Guard.

The rioting intensified and on Friday, August 13, about 2,300 National Guardsmen joined the police trying to maintain order on the streets. That number increased to 3,900 by midnight on Saturday, August 14. Sergeant Ben Dunn said "The streets of Watts resembled an all-out war zone in some far-off foreign country, it bore no resemblance to the United States of America." Martial law was declared and curfew was enforced by the National Guardsmen who put a cordon around a vast region of South Central Los Angeles.

Mainstream white America viewed those actively participating in the riot as criminals destroying and looting their own neighborhood. Many in the black community, however, saw the rioters as taking part in an "uprising against an oppressive system.“

Riots would break out in several other US cities between 1965-1968.

Kerner Commission The Kerner Commission was an 11-member commission

established by President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the causes of race riots in the United States and to provide recommendations for the future. LBJ asked for answers to three basic questions about the riots: "What

happened? Why did it happen? What can be done to prevent it from happening again and again?”

The Kerner Report The Kerner Report was released after seven

months of investigation. The report became an instant best-seller, and over two million Americans bought copies of the 426-page document. Its finding was that the riots resulted from black frustration at lack of economic opportunity.  The report berated federal and state governments for

failed housing, education and social-service policies. The report also aimed some of its sharpest criticism at the mainstream media. "The press has too long basked in a white world looking out of it, if at all, with white men's eyes and white perspective."

The report's most infamous passage warned, "Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal."

It called to create new jobs, construct new housing, and put a stop to de facto segregation in order to wipe out the destructive ghetto environment. In order to do so, the report recommended for government programs to provide needed services, to hire more diverse and sensitive police forces and, most notably, to invest billions in housing programs aimed at breaking up residential segregation.