THE CIVIL RIGHTS

MOVEMENT
After World War Two an
important struggle for
human rights took place in
the United States. It was
called the Civil Rights
Movement. As a result,
the human rights of
African Americans were
finally recognized.
The ancestors of African Americans were the millions
of slaves who were brought from Africa in the
Atlantic slave trade. In America they worked on the
cotton and tobacco plantations. They had no rights
at all and could be bought and sold by their owners.
In 1863, during the American Civil War slaves were
emancipated (set Free).
 About 12,000,000 African slaves were brought to the New World via
the hellish “middle passage” over a period of about 400 years.
About 645,000 (5 percent) came first to the British colonies in North
America and then to what had become the U.S. The U.S., which
outlawed the importation of slaves in 1807, permitted legal slavery
for a total of about 85 years.
Even though African Americans
were no longer slaves, they did not
get equality with whites. There was
prejudice and discrimination
against them.
In the Southern States, where the most
African Americans lived, there were
segregation laws which discriminated
against them and prevented them from
voting.
They were also forced to use separate
facilities, such as drinking fountains,
restaurants, park, beaches buses, trains,
libraries, etc. .
Even in the northern states African
Americans did not have the same
opportunities as white Americans.
There were usually paid lower wages,
and many lived in poor areas of town.
• The Ku Klux Klan was a racist secret
society.
• In the 1920s it had six million members,
which showed that racism and persecution
were an ever –present threat.
• It used extreme violence against African
American and anyone who sympathized with
them.
• Murders of African- Americans were still
common in the 1950s and still unpunished in
large areas of the South, for example the
murder of Emmet Till.
• The Ku Klux Klan wanted to keep black
people scared so that they would not dare to
stand up for their rights.
The struggle for
civil rights started
in the education
system. The
American
Supreme Court
ruled that
segregated schools
were illegal. But
many schools in
the southern states
continued to
exclude black
students from
white schools.
Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a detrimental
effect upon the colored children. The impact is greater when it has the sanction
of the law, for the policy of separating the races is usually interpreted as denoting
the inferiority of the negro group. A sense of inferiority affects the motivation of a
child to learn. Segregation with the sanction of law, therefore, has a tendency to
[retard] the educational and mental development of negro children and to deprive
of some of the benefits they would receive in a racial[ly] integrated school system...
We conclude that, in the field of public education, the doctrine of "separate but
" has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal. Therefore,
hold that the plaintiffs and others similarly situated for whom the actions have
been brought are, by reason of the segregation complained of, deprived of the
equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.

"doll test"
studies,
During the 1950s, black leaders began to use
marches, demonstrations and the courts to
defeat racist laws. Their efforts are known as the
civil rights movement. The most famous court
case of the civil rights movement began in 1950
when 7-year-old Linda Brown of Topeka, Kansas,
was denied access to a school that was just four
blocks from her home because she was black.
Linda's father went to court and on May 17,
1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that racial
segregation (or separating races) in public
schools violates the Constitution.
In Little Rock, Arkansas white racist were
determined to keep the schools all- white.
Elizabeth Eckford and Dorothy Counts had to
face the abuse of angry crowds. Angry white
crowds swore and shouted racist insults at
them The federal government in Washington
forced the southern states to give up
segregation in schools by sending federal
troops to protect children who wanted to
attend local high schools
Segregation in schools
The Montgomery bus boycott came about a year after a landmark
1954 Supreme Court ruling outlawed deliberate racial
segregation in public schools. But divisions remained.
Three students at Clinton High School picketed their school as it
became the first state-supported school in Tennessee to integrate,
in August 1956.
Bus protest
Rosa Parks' refusal to give up her
seat to a white man sparked the
Montgomery bus boycott and the
start of the civil rights movement.
Mrs Parks was a 42-year-old
seamstress when she made her stand
in Alabama, on 1 December 1955.
She was arrested and fined $14
 Martin Luther King Jr
Her arrest triggered a 381-day boycott of
the bus system organised by the then little-
known Baptist minister, Martin Luther King
Jr. (pictured here with his wife). In March
.
1956 Dr King was found guilty of conspiracy
to boycott Montgomery buses, but a judge
suspended his $500 fine, pending an appeal.
The protest led to the desegregation of the
transport system.
Oxford, Mi
African-Amer. student James
Meredith
accompanied by two US
Marshalls,
surrounded by jeering white
students after registering for
entry at Univ. of Mississippi.
Location: Oxford, MS, US
Date taken: September 1962

Photographer: Francis Miller

Life Images
Sit-ins and Freedom Rides
Activists also staged sit-ins at white-only lunch
counters. In 1961 volunteers began to take bus
trips, or Freedom Rides, to test the implementation
of new laws banning segregation in interstate bus
terminals.
That May, Freedom Riders had breakfast at a lunch
counter in the bus station in Montgomery - the first
time the eating facilities at the station were
integrated.
The Birmingham campaign
In 1963, a pivotal civil rights campaign was
fought in Birmingham, Alabama, the most
segregated city in the US. "In Birmingham, white
people had a lot of hate and little respect for
black folk," one campaigner recalled.
"Segregation was the law and it was way out of
line - a lot of folk were afraid," he told the BBC.
March on Washington
In August 1963, 250,000 people gathered
in Washington DC to demand jobs and
freedom for millions of black Americans. It
was a watershed for the movement.
Dr King stood on the steps of the Lincoln
Memorial and gave his "I have a dream"
speech.
"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 a table of
brotherhood," he said.
Selma and Voting Rights Act
Dr King's protest movement brought
about the 1964 Civil Rights Act,
which outlawed racial discrimination
in the US. But the struggle
continued.
In March 1965, deputies and
troopers attacked voting rights
activists with clubs and tear gas, on a
march from the Alabama town of
Selma to Montgomery.
The events helped to pave the way
for the Voting Rights Act of 1965,
which enabled far wider registration
of black voters.
Mrs Parks' legacy
Mrs Parks died on 24
October 2005, aged 92.
Civil rights leader Jesse
Jackson said her legacy
The actual bus on
would never die. which Rosa Parks
"I am leaving this legacy to made history, on
exhibit at the
all of you," she said in 1988, Henry Ford
"to bring peace, justice, Museum,
Dearborn, MI
equality, love and a
fulfilment of what our lives
should be.
"Without vision, the people
will perish, and without