Civil rights march on washington 27 0276a

Civil Rights Timeline

By ayamans
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    Slavery

    When the United States first became a country, its leaders could not decide what to do about slavery. The southern states, which used by far the most slaves to work on its plantations, insisted they be allowed to keep it. As a result, the Constitution of the new American government said nothing about slavery, and the South was allowed to keep its slaved.
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    Different Cultures

    As the US got bigger, life began to change for Americans. In the North, towns and cities got bigger, and an industrial revolution bringing new factories and technology happened. Immigrants arrived from all over Europe and began to build new lives. In the South, farming continued to be the main way people made their living, ideas about life and religion did not change very much. This meant that the North and South has less in common.
  • The Missouri Compromise

    The Missouri Compromise
    The North and South argued constantly over whether slavery should or should not be allowed. In an attempt at compromise, an agreement was reached in 1820 which drew a line between the North and the South and determined that slavery could be used below the line, but not above it.
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    Abolitionists

    In the North, more organisations that wanted to end slavery began to appear. Members of these groups were called "Abolitionists". These organisations often included popular authors such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, and their books were widely read. In the South, many people worried that the whole of the North wanted to end slavery.
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    State Rights

    During the War of Independence, the American states began to feel like they were being told what to do by the North and wanted the right to run their own states in the way that they wished.
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    John Collier

    John Maler Collier OBE RP ROI was a leading English artist, and an author. He painted in the Pre-Raphaelite style, and was one of the most prominent portrait painters of his generation. Both his marriages were to daughters of Thomas Henry Huxley. He studied painting at the Munich Academy starting in 1875.
  • Fort Laramie Treaty

    Fort Laramie Treaty
  • Uncle Tom's Cabin

    Uncle Tom's Cabin
    This was a very famous fictional novel written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, an opponent of slavery. It told the story of a slave (Uncle Tom) and the conditions in which he lived. The book was a huge hit in the North, and helped to persuade many Northerners that slavery needed to be ended.
  • Bleeding Kansas

    Bleeding Kansas
    During the 1800s, the USA continued to get bigger, taking over new land in North America. This caused arguments between Northern and Southern states about whether slavery should be allowed in new states. In 1854, the new state of Kansas was allowed to vote on whether to allow slavery. This led to violence between supporters and enemies of slavery, and even some deaths.
  • John Brown's Raid

    John Brown's Raid
    In 1859, a man called John Brown attacked an army base in the Southern state of Virginia. He did this because he hated slavery and thought that he could set slaves free by force. He thought that when he attacked, slaves in Virginia would rebel. He was wrong, his raid failed and he was executed. However, the South were now terrified of Northerners who wanted to force them to get rid of slavery.
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    Everett J. Waring

    An active Baptist in Baltimore.
  • Secession

    Secession
    After Lincoln's election, many of the Southern states decided that they did not want to be a part of the USA. They declared that they were independent countries, not ruled by the American government, just as the USA had when it broke away from Britain.
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    President Abraham Lincoln

    The South were unhappy after his election because they believed he'd force them to abolish slavery. (Spoiler Alert: They were right.)
  • Confederacy

    Confederacy
    In total, eleven Southern states decided to leave the Union. These were: South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee. These states formed a new nation of their own - the Confederate States of America. Abraham Lincoln decided that he could not allow this and called for an army to bring the states back into the USA July 1861.
  • Fort Sumter

    Fort Sumter
    After South Carolina declared that it was no longer part of the United States, it wanted to remove any US presence from the state. There was a large army base at Fort Sumter, in the state capital of Charleston, At the time it was occupied by soldiers of the North. South Carolina used its own army to bomb the base and force it to surrender, and the soldiers inside to leave. These were the first shots of the Civil War.
  • Fort Wise Treaty

    Fort Wise Treaty
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    The American Civil War

    The American Civil War (also known by other names) was a civil war fought in the United States from 1861 to 1865, between the North (Union) and the South (Confederacy).[c] The most studied and written about episode in U.S. history,[16] the Civil War began primarily as a result of the long-standing controversy over the enslavement of black people.
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    Ida B. Wells

    Ida Bell Wells-Barnett, more commonly known as Ida B. Wells, was an African-American investigative journalist, educator, and an early leader in the civil rights movement. She was one of the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of "Coloured People".
  • Thirteenth Amendment is approved

    Thirteenth Amendment is approved
    The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. In Congress, it was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, and by the House on January 31, 1865. The amendment was ratified by the required number of states on December 6, 1865.
  • Mississippi enacts the Black Code

    Mississippi enacts the Black Code
    The Black Codes were laws passed by Southern states in 1865 and 1866 in the United States after the American Civil War with the intent and the effect of restricting African Americans' freedom, and of compelling them to work in a labor economy based on low wages or debt.
  • Ku Klux Klan is created in Tennesse

    Ku Klux Klan is created in Tennesse
    The Ku Klux Klan, commonly called the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist hate group. The Klan has existed in three distinct eras at different points in time during the history of the United States.
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    CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS FOR CIVIL RIGHTS

    13th 1865 Abolition of Slavery and Involuntary Servitude 14th 1868 Protects rights against state infringements, defines citizenship, prohibits states from interfering with privileges and immunities, requires due process and equal protection, punishes states for denying vote, and disqualifies Confederate officials and debts 15th 1870 Voting Rights
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    THE ERA OF RECONSTRUCTION

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    Civil Rights in the USA OCR

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    President Andrew Johnson

  • Assassination of President Lincoln

    Assassination of President Lincoln
    Abraham Lincoln was an American statesman, politician, and lawyer who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. Lincoln led the nation through the American Civil War, its bloodiest war and its greatest moral, constitutional, and political crisis. Lincoln was assassinated by a young pro-slavery actor while at the theatre.
  • Civil Rights Act is passed

    Civil Rights Act is passed
    The Civil Rights Act of 1966 is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. It prohibits unequal application of voter registration requirements, and racial segregation in schools, employment, and public accommodations.
  • Fourteenth Amendment is approved

    Fourteenth Amendment is approved
    The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States—including former slaves—and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.”
  • Memphis Race Riot/Massacre

    Memphis Race Riot/Massacre
    The Memphis massacre of 1866 was a series of violent events that occurred from May 1 to 3, 1866 in Memphis, Tennessee. The racial violence was ignited by political, social, and racial tensions following the American Civil War, in the early stages of Reconstruction.
  • New Orleans Race Riot/Massacre

    The New Orleans Massacre of 1866 occurred on July 30, during a violent conflict as white Democrats, including police and firemen, attacked Republicans, most of them black, parading outside the Mechanics Institute in New Orleans. It was the site of a reconvened Louisiana Constitutional Convention.
  • First, Second and Third Reconstruction Acts passed

    The Reconstruction Acts of 1867 laid out the process for readmitting Southern states into the Union. The Fourteenth Amendment (1868) provided former slaves with national citizenship, and the Fifteenth Amendment (1870) granted black men the right to vote.
  • Medicine Lodge Treaty

  • Fourth Reconstruction Act passed

  • Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments are Ratified

  • Second Fort Laramie Treaty

  • Knights of Labour founded

  • NWSA and AWSA, rival suffrage organisations, founded

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    Mohandas Gandhi

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    President Ulysses S. Grant

  • First Black Senator Hiram Revels is elected

  • Forty-First Congress

  • Forty-Second Congress

  • The "Ku Klux Klan Act"

    The Enforcement Act of 1871 (17 Stat. 13), also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1871, Force Act of 1871, Ku Klux Klan Act, Third Enforcement Act, or Third Ku Klux Klan Act, is an Act of the United States Congress which empowered the President to suspend the writ of habeas corpus to combat the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and other white supremacy organizations. The act was passed by the 42nd United States Congress and signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on April 20, 1871.
  • Forty-Third Congress

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    THE GILDED AGE

  • The Civil Rights Act is enacted by Congress

    The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. It prohibits unequal application of voter registration requirements, and racial segregation in schools, employment, and public accommodations.
  • Rutherford B. Hayes elected President

  • Forty-Fifth Congress

  • Hayes-Tilden Compromise

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    President Rutherford B. Hayes

  • First Combustion Engine vehicle

    German engineer Karl Benz produces the first automobile powered by a combustion engine.
  • Women allowed to defend in Supreme Court

    Congress grants female attorneys the right to argue cases before the Supreme Court.
  • Light Bulb is invented

    Thomas Edison
  • US Population: 50,155,783

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    Frances Perkins

    Frances Perkins was an American sociologist and workers-rights advocate who served as the U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945, the longest serving in that position, and the first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet.
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    President James Garfield

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    President Chester Arthur

  • President James Garfield is shot

  • Tuskegee Institute

    Booker T. Washington opens the Tuskegee Institute: a historically black University in Alabama, US.
  • Pace VS Alabama

    The Supreme Court rules that an Alabama law imposing severe punishment in illegal interracial intercourse than for illegal intercourse between parties of the same race did not violate the Equal Protection cause of the 14th Amendment.
  • The Chinese Exclusion Act

    Congress passes this act, which bans Chinese immigration for a decade.
  • Pendleton Act is passed

    This act established a Civil Service Commission and filled government positions through a merit system, including competitive examinations.
  • Amendment to the Civil Rights Act

    The Supreme Court rules that the Civil Rights Act of 1875 only forbids state-imposed discrimination, not that by individuals or corporations.
  • Grover Cleveland is elected President

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    President Grover Cleveland

  • The Haymarket Square Bombing

    Killed seven police officers and wounded sixty.
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    President Benjamin Harrison

  • Sherman Anti-Trust Act

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    Philip Randolph

    Asa Philip Randolph was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement, the American labor movement, and socialist political parties. In 1925, he organized and led the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first predominantly African-American labor union.
  • Homestead Strike

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    Wallace Ford Muhammad

    Wallace D. Fard, also known as Wallace Fard Muhammad, was the founder of the Nation of Islam. He arrived in Detroit in 1930 with an obscure background and several aliases, and taught an idiosyncratic form of Islam to members of the city's black population.
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    President Grover Cleveland

  • Pullman Strike

  • Plessy v. Ferguson

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    REFORM AND WAR

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    Eugene 'Bull' Connor

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    President William McKinley

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    President Theodore Roosevelt

  • Lochner v. New York

  • The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is founded

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    President William H. Taft

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    Martha Griffiths

    Martha Wright Griffiths was an American lawyer and judge before being elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1954.
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    President Woodrow Wilson

  • Clayton Anti-Trust Act

  • The National Women's Party Founded

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    George Wallace

    George Corley Wallace Jr. was the 45th Governor of Alabama, a position he occupied for four terms, during which he promoted "low-grade industrial development, low taxes, and trade schools."
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    THE ROARING TWENTIES

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    President Warren Harding

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    President Calvin Coolidge

  • Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and Maids Established

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    Malcom X

    Malcolm X was an American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a popular figure during the civil rights movement.
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    Cesar Chavez

    Cesar Chavez was an American labor leader and civil rights activist who, with Dolores Huerta, co-founded the National Farm Workers Association in 1962.
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    THE GREAT DEPRESSION AND THE NEW DEAL

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    President Herbert Hoover

  • NIRA and NRA

    The National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 was a US labor law and consumer law passed by the US Congress to authorize the President to regulate industry for fair wages and prices that would stimulate economic recovery. It also established a national public works program known as the Public Works Administration.
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    President Franklin D. Roosevelt

  • Wagner Act

  • Congress of Industrial Organisations

  • USA enters the Second World War

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    Stokely Carmichael

    Kwame Ture was a Trinidadian-American prominent socialist organizer in the Civil Rights Movement in the United States and the global Pan-African movement. Born in Trinidad, he grew up in the United States from the age of 11 and became an activist while attending Howard University.
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    THE SECOND WORLD WAR AND THE COLD WAR

  • Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) Founded

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    Harry S. Truman

  • Taft-Hartley Act

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    President Dwight Eisenhower

  • Brown v. Topeka Board of Education

  • Merger of AFL and CIO

  • Montgomery Bus Boycott

  • Number of women and men voting was approximately equal for the first time

  • Boynton v. Virginia

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    REFORM AND REACTION

  • National Indian Youth Council Founded

    With the belief that we can serve a realistic need, the National Indian Youth Council dedicated its activities and projects to attaining a greater future for our Indian People.
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    President John F. Kennedy

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    Lyndon Johnson

  • Twenty-Fourth Amendment

  • Civil Rights Act (Public Accommodations and Employment)

  • The Supreme Court upholds 'Accommodation' in the Civil Right's Act

  • The Supreme Court overturns a discriminatory Mississippi law

  • Civil Rights Act (Voting Rights)

  • Executive Order 11246

  • Immigration Act

  • Black Panthers Formed

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    President Richard Nixon

  • Occupational Safety and Health Act

  • Roe v. Wade

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    President Gerald Ford

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    SOCIAL FREEDOM; THE LATER YEARS

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    President Jimmy Carter

  • PATCO Strike

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    President Ronald Reagan

  • Jesse Jackson

    Jesse Jackson stands as Democratic Presidential Candidate
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    President George H. W. Bush

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    President William ('Bill') J. Clinton