overview of the highlights of the Movement

2. •
“A promise deferred is a promise
denied.” – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
A legacy of slavery
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Considered a sub-class if not sub-human
Uneducated by law [self-fulfilling prophecy]
The South after Reconstruction
Role of the Supreme Court [Dred Scott]
Jim Crow [Black Codes] – legal
segregation and discrimination: denial of
rights and voice
• The Civil War amendments [13, 14, 15]
– Full citizenship and right to vote
– South passes laws to get around the
Constitution [Jim Crow v. suffrage]
• Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) establishes
“separate but equal” doctrine
“What that say”?

3. The modern Civil Rights Movement
• Frustrated by Congress, President
Truman desegregates the Exec.
Branch – including the armed forces in
1948 [Exec. Order #9981] -Just in time for Korea
• Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka
KS (1954)
– Public schools to be desegregated
– Overturns “separate but equal”
– Resistance at Central High School – Little
Rock Arkansas – “Little Rock Nine”
– AK National Guard federalized; 101st
Airborne sent in [there will be many more]
– Brown II – court orders states to
desegregate schools “with all deliberate
speed.”

4. The Montgomery Bus Boycott
• 1955 NAACP officer Rosa Parks
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arrested for not giving up seat on bus
Montgomery Improvement Association
formed, organizes bus boycott [will last
11 mos.]
Elect 26-year-old Baptist pastor Martin
Luther King, Jr. leader
African Americans file lawsuits, boycott
buses, use carpools, walk
Get support from black community,
outside groups, sympathetic whites
1956, Supreme Court outlaws bus
segregation

5. Gaining national attention
• Television a powerful tool of
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•
•
information and emotion
Sit-in at Greensboro, NC
Woolworth seen nationwide [many
other sit-ins, marches and
demonstrations]
Getting arrested on purpose – breaking
the system and making a statement
Southern Christian Leadership Conf.
[SCLC] and Student Non-violent
Coordinating Comm. [SNCC] lead the
movement
Freedom Summer 1961
– Target is to desegregate busses; encourage
blacks to register to vote
– Violence directed toward “Freedom Riders”;

6. Triumph [?]
• 250,000 March on Washington to
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•
demand Civil Rights legislation
Dr. King delivers the “I have a dream”
speech.
LBJ signs Civil Rights Act into law, 1964
24th Amendment ends poll tax
Followed by the Voting Rights Act 1965
Swann v. Charlotte-Meck. Schools
(1971) orders nationwide busing of
students to desegregate
Affirmative action programs [Regents of
Univ of Cal. Berkeley v. Bakke (1971)]
• 1997 Chuck Burris elected mayor of
•
Stone Mountain, GA
NOT DONE YET!!

7. Triumph [?]
• 250,000 March on Washington to
•
•
•
•
•
•
demand Civil Rights legislation
Dr. King delivers the “I have a dream”
speech.
LBJ signs Civil Rights Act into law, 1964
24th Amendment ends poll tax
Followed by the Voting Rights Act 1965
Swann v. Charlotte-Meck. Schools
(1971) orders nationwide busing of
students to desegregate
Affirmative action programs [Regents of
Univ of Cal. Berkeley v. Bakke (1971)]
• 1997 Chuck Burris elected mayor of
•
Stone Mountain, GA
NOT DONE YET!!