Civil Rights Flashcards
CONTEXT
Emancipation Act 1965 - 13thAmendment to the US Constitution abolished slavery
Civil Rights: equal treatment under the law, access to equal opportunities
Jim Crow Laws - Laws in the Southern states that legalised segregation
Plessy vs. Ferguson (1896) - “separate but equal”
Impact of WW1 on the circumstances of AM
Great Migration:
Movement of blacks from the South to the North (impacts on work and housing)
Increased consciousness and activism:
Growth in membership of CR organisations
The realisation of economic power
Increased interactions between whites and blacks:
Overcrowded cities and competition for housing
Working together in war economy eg. factories
The emergence of organised non-violent protests:
Sit-ins
Economic boycotts
Exposure of US hypocrisy
Fighting Nazism etc. Europe but still maintaining segregation
(Desegregation of all US armed forces 1948)
The extent of racial segregation and various forms of discrimination
Federal vs State legislation (the difference between what was happening on national level vs what was happening in the Southern states)
Enshrined legislation at the state level (Jim Crow Laws)
Segregation (physical separation) - public facilities, education, retail, transport
Separate but equal
Discrimination - employment, housing, healthcare
Legal inequality - injustice in the legal system and courts
Voting rights - registration
Personal daily discrimination - comments, gestures, manners etc.
formation/role of groups supporting Civil Rights + their ideas
The Congress for Racial Equality (CORE) was formed in 1942 as an interracial organization committed to achieving integration through nonviolent direct action and civil disobedience.
Freedom rides
Voter registration drives
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), formed in 1960, focused on mobilizing local communities in nonviolent protests to expose injustice and demand federal action.
Sit-ins
contributed participants to the 1961 Freedom Rides,
cosponsored the 1963 March on Washington
contributed to voter education and registration drives across the South.
Efforts of MLK
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Methods employed by CRM movements (local/national boycotts, direct action, political agitation)
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MLK (beliefs, aims, methods)
MLK began to understand how the destiny of blacks is tied to America’s destiny
formulated a philosophical position “in the final analysis the white man cannot ignore the Negro problem, because he is part of the Negro and the Negro is part of him. The Negro agony diminishes the white man, and the Negro’s salvation englarges the white man”
Moral obligation to help african americans rise up from poverty
non-violent - opposing MX
desegregation
improve quality of life in all areas where black people were treated differently than whites
established the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC ) to boraden the base of the civil rights movement.
Freedom rides
boycotts
MX (beliefs, aims, methods)
more contemporary than MLK
drew on teachings of Islam his brother had introduced to him
promoting the concept of black pride and black nationalism
militant views
political philosophy: black nationalism
leader of Nation of Islam
urged blacks to exercise their constitutional right to vote (in hs speech ‘The Ballot or the Bullet’)
He urged followers to defend themselves against white aggression “by any means necessary.”
Violent
Radical
“Black supremacy”/self determination
Opposition to civil rights (KKK, White Citizens’ Council)
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Montgomery Bus Boycott + role of Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks → American civil rights activist. Refused to surrender her seat to a white passenger on a segregated bus in Alabama. Sparked the boycott which ended in success after nationwide efforts to end the segregation of public facilities (1955). She was fined $10 and arrested. “I want to be remembered as a person who wanted to be free… so other people would also be free”
Desegregation of little rock high school
In 1957 the SUpreme Court ruled on a case with nine black Americans that wanted to go but were refused by their local schools in Arkansas. Eisenhower brought in 1000 Army units as people lined the street to block the children from going to school. Bayonetts of the guards were raised against the children by guards they thought would protect the. This violated the first amendment rights of citizens to life, liberty and happiness and redefined the CRM. “somewhere along the line staying at Central high school became an obligation. I realized that what we were doing was not for ourselves” → E.Eckford (one of the little rock nine)
Freedom rides
An agglomeration of political protests by activists that road buses through the American South to expose descrimination in 1961. Main goal was to desegregate public transport. The violence that resulted from the Freedom Rides put an enormous amount of pressure on the governments to take action and respond; it revealed to the nation the extent to which discrimination was still prevalent. Rather than intimidate other activists, the brutality the riders encountered inspired others to take up the cause.
March on Washington
Occurred in 1963 - one of the greatest examples of nonviolent mass direct action. MLK said his “I Have a Dream” speech. Highly publicized and gained momentum and support for the civil rights act of 1964. Aimed at putting pressure on the Kennedy administration for “jobs and freedom” “the March on Washington helped create a new national understanding of the problems of racial and economic injustice.” → Nathan Connolly
‘Mississippi Freedom Summer’ of 1964
The training of activists in order to register black voters, establish 41 freedom schools to address learning gaps - aimed to raise awareness of the nation at the oppression faced by african-Americans in mississippi. A group of summer volunteers began working at Western College for Women in Ohio -went into mississippi to train over 1000 volunteers. 3 civil rights workers were brutally murdered “an attack on the human brotherhood taught by all the great religions of mankind” → MLK
Assassination of MLK
1968, at the Lorraine Motel MLK was standing on the balcony when he was struck by a sniper bullet to the neck and later died. Johnson urged people to “reject the blind violence” that killed King whom he called the “apostle of non-violence”.
Called congress to quickly pass the Fair Housing Act
MLK’s death sparked uprising in 125 cities across America and buildings were destroyed with fire → Chicago Fires lost 20 blocks and police were ordered by mayor to shoot and wound protestors
Army units used in Washington to quell riots
3000 people injured/ wounded and $45 million in damages
