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13th Amendment
13th Amendment: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
The 13th Amendment was important because it created a constitutional amendment that banned slavery in all of the American states. -
14th amendment
The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments. The amendment addresses citizenship rights and equal protection of the laws and was proposed in response to issues related to former slaves following the American Civil War.
This was important because says that state and federal citizenship for all persons regardless of race both born or naturalized in the United States was reaffirmed. -
15th amendment
The 15th Amendment to the Constitution granted African American men the right to vote by declaring that the "right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."
The 15th amendment was important in that it not only finally gave African Americans the right to vote, but also allowed the most African Americans in history to be elected into public office. -
Plessy v. Ferguson,
Plessy v. Ferguson was a landmark constitutional law case of the US Supreme Court. It upheld state racial segregation laws for public facilities under the doctrine of "separate but equal". Plessy v. Ferguson, an important Supreme Court decision made in 1896. The Court ruled on the concept of 'separate but equal' and set back civil rights in the United States for decades to come. -
Mendez vs. Westminster School District of Orange County
Mendez. Westminster School District of Orange County was a 1947 federal court case that challenged Mexican remedial schools in Orange County, California.
This was important because this led to a paramount requisite in the American system of public education is social equality. It must be open to all children by unified school association regardless of lineage." It was the first ruling in the United States in favor of school desegregation. -
Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. State-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment and was therefore unconstitutional.Brown v. Board was important because the United States Supreme Court case that held that race-based segregation of children into 'separate but equal' public schools violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. -
The Montgomery Bus Boycott
The Montgomery bus boycott, a seminal event in the Civil Rights Movement, was a political and social protest campaign against the policy of racial segregation on the public transit system of Montgomery, Alabama. This is important because Rosa Parks ignites 381-day bus boycott organized by Martin Luther King, Jr. -
"Letter from Birmingham jail"
The Letter from Birmingham Jail, also known as the Letter from Birmingham City Jail and The Negro Is Your Brother, is an open letter written on April 16, 1963, by Martin Luther King Jr. This is important because in response to white ministers who urge him to stop causing disturbances, King issues articulate statement of nonviolent resistance to wrongs of American society. -
Medgar Evers murdered
Medgar Wiley Evers was an American civil rights activist from Mississippi who worked to overturn segregation at the University of Mississippi and to enact social justice and voting rights. He was murdered by a white supremacist and Klansman. This is important because Head of Mississippi NAACP is shot outside his home on the same night that Pres. Kennedy addresses the nation on race, asking "Are we to say to the world...that this is a land of the free except for Negroes" -
March on Washington
March on Washington, in full March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, political demonstration held in Washington, D.C., in 1963 by civil rights leaders to protest racial discrimination and to show support for major civil rights legislation that was pending in Congress. This is important because More than 200,000 blacks and whites gather before Lincoln Memorial to hear speeches (including King's "I Have a Dream") and protest racial injustice. -
Bombing of Birmingham church
The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was an act of white supremacist terrorism which occurred at the African-American 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama on Sunday, September 15, 1963, when four members of the Ku Klux Klan planted at least 15 sticks of dynamite attached to a timing device beneath them. This is important because 4 black girls are killed by bomb planted in church. -
Mississippi Summer Freedom Project
Freedom Summer was a 1964 voter registration project in Mississippi, part of a larger effort by civil rights groups such as the Congress on Racial Equality and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee to expand black voting in the South.The was important because civil rights workers seek to register blacks to vote. 3 are killed and many black homes and churches are burned. National outrage helps pass civil rights legislation -
24th Amendment passed
The 24th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America abolished the poll tax for all federal elections. A poll tax was a tax of anywhere from one to a few dollars that had to be paid annually by each voter in order to be able to cast a vote. This is important because poll tax (which had been used to prevent blacks from voting) outlawed. Black voter registration increases and candidates begin to turn away from white supremacy views in attempt to attract black voters. -
Civil Rights Act passed
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a landmark civil rights and US labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.This is important because Overcoming Senate filibuster, Congress passes law forbidding racial discrimination in many areas of life, including hotels, voting, employment, and schools. -
Voting Rights Act approved
Voting Rights Act of 1965 definition. A law passed at the time of the civil rights movement. It eliminated various devices, such as literacy tests, that had traditionally been used to restrict voting by black people.This is important because after passage, southern black voter registration grows by over 50% and black officials are elected to various positions. In Mississippi, black voter registration grew from 7% to 67%. -
King assassinated
Martin Luther King Jr., American clergyman and civil rights leader, was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968. This is important because While supporting sanitation workers' strike which had been marred by violence in Memphis, King is shot by James Earl Ray. Riots result in 125 cities