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plessy v ferguson
US supreme court appoved the separate but equal doctrine when Homer Plessy refused to sit in a james crow car on the train. Plessy said his constitutional rights were violated. The court ruled that there was a legal distinction between whites and blacks.
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/plessy-v-ferguson -
Congress of Racial Equality
The Congress of Racial Equality ( CORE ) was founded by a group of students in Chicago. James R. Robinson, James L. Farmer, Joe Guinn, George Houser, and Homer Jack were the founders. They began protests because of segregation. They were apart of a few sit ins and provided support with the Greensboro sit in. They also had a lot of enemies but that didn't stop them.
http://www.core-online.org/History/history.htm -
Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson made history in 1947 for breaking baseballs color barrier and playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers.He took six trips to the World Series. He also went into the baseball hall of fame in 1962. Robinson's courage helped a lot of people get through the hard times of the civil rights movement.He also helped African Americans to question the separate but equal doctrine.
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/jackie-robinson -
Sweatt v Painter
In 1946 Heman Marion Sweatt applied for the university of Texas law which at the time was whites only. After being rejected Sweatt took it to the courts and the school attempted to have a separate but equal program for african american students. The court was deciding on having a whole separate school building for these students but decided it wouldn't be equal to have that. They feared that the separation would harm students abilities to compete in legal arenas.
https://www.oyez.org -
Brown v Board of Education
This ended the tolerance of racial segregation. In the 1930's there was a ruling for the states to improve all black schools but then it was decided that this segregation didn't give the students equal opportunity or education. It also didnt provide black students equal protection under the law. Later the court published guidlines that required the federal districts to supervise desegregation.
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/brown-v-board-of-education-of-topeka -
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Montgomery bus boycott
This boycott occurred when African Americans refused to ride city buses in Alabama to protest segregated seating. This is regarded as the first large scale demonstration against segregation. Four days before this boycott Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to get up for a white man.This boycott lasted about 381 days. Later the courts ruled that Montgomery should integrate its bus system.
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/montgomery-bus-boycott -
The Southern Manifesto
The southern Manifesto stated that seperate schools was unequal and 82 Representatives and 19 Senators signed off on this document. It urged southerners to exhaust all “lawful means” to resist the “chaos and confusion” that would result from them desegregating schools. This helped stop a lot of unlawful/ unequal activity that was going on at the time.
http://history.house.gov/Historical-Highlights/1951-2000/The-Southern-Manifesto-of-1956/ -
Southern Christian Leadership Conference ( SCLC )
The SCLC was created to bring together the action of different protest groups in the south. This organization drew power from local black churches that supported the organizations activities. They started off their protest with a bus boycott which inspired further protests. It differed from other organizations because instead of gathering individual members they gathered groups and activities.
http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu -
Little Rock - Cenral High School
Nine African american students were enrolled into a former all white school which tested a supreme court ruling of segregation in public schools being unconstitutional. The first day of this integration the National Guard was sent to stand outside of the school and watch out for the kids. Eight of these students arrived together while Eckford arrived alone. She spoke of a woman spitting on her and other violence that occured.
history.com/topics/black-history/central-high-school -
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Greensboro sit in
The Greensboro sit in was a nonviolent protest by a students in Greensboro, North Carolina. This soon spread to colleges and other schools. Though many of these students were arrested, these sit ins had a huge impact. This forced a lot of schools to change their segregation policies. Some say they were influenced by the nonviolent protests of Mohandas Gandhi. These students also went into action after Emmett Till was killed for whistling at a white woman in Mississippi.
www.history.com -
Student nonviolent coordinating committee ( SNCC )
This group formed to give younger African Americans a voice during the civil rights. The director of SCLC was the one who set up SNCC. She thought that kings way of being nonviolent should be more of a political tactic instead of a way of life. Stocklely Carmichael was elected head of SNCC in 1966 and popularized the term black power. The SNCC kindve went away as did the civil rights movement.
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/sncc -
Freedom rides
A group of 13 activists took bus trips across the southern part of america to protest against segregation. The members of CORE gathered people and attempted to integrate places at bus terminals. These activists tried to use " whites only " restrooms and lunchrooms. These protesters faced a lot of violence along the way and eventually regulations occurred and they could no longer have bus protests.
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/freedom-rides -
Letter from Birmingham Jail
This letter, also known as "The Negro Is Your Brother," was written by Martin Luther King Jr while he was held in jail. This letter promotes nonviolent resistance to racism. Altogether, King's letter was a powerful defense of the motivations, tactics, and goals of the Birmingham campaign and the Civil Rights Movement. King sent this letter to the clergymen, who disapproved sit-ins and marches, even if they were peaceful.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_from_Birmingham_Jail -
March on Washington
More than 200,000 Americans gathered in Washington, D.C., for a political rally known as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. The event was designed to shed light on challenges African Americans continued to face across the country. Black and white groups across the country were urged to attend and shared a day of speeches, songs, and prayers. This is where MLK told his famous "I Have a Dream" speech at.
www.history.com/topics/black-history/march-on-washington -
Bombing of Birmingham Church
A bomb exploded before Sunday morning services at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. This was a church with mostly a black congregation that served as a meeting place for civil rights leaders. Four young girls were killed and many other people injured. This bombing was the third bombing in 11 days, after a federal court order had mandated the integration of Alabama’s school system.
www.history.com/topics/black-history/birmingham-church-bombing -
Twenty-Fourth Amendment
Although passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments helped remove many of the discriminatory laws left over from slavery, they did not eliminate all forms of it. The Twenty-Fourth Amendment was passed to address the poll tax, which is a state fee on voting. Poll taxes were used to keep low-income (mostly African American) citizens from participating in elections. This changed because of the Twenty-Fourth Admentment.
http://constitutioncenter.org/amendments/amendment-xxiv -
Mississippi Freedom Summer
In 1964, civil rights organizations including the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) and Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) organized a voter registration drive, known as the Mississippi Summer Project, or Freedom Summer. The Freedom Summer, comprised of black Mississippians, faced constant abuse from Mississippi’s white population. The Ku Klux Klan, police and even authorities carried out a series of violent attacks.
www.history.com/topics/black-history/freedom-summer -
Civil Rights Act Passed
This is considered one of the biggest achievements of the civil rights movement. This ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. No longer could blacks and other races be denied service simply based on the color of their skin. This act was proposed by president John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated shortly after announcing the act.
www.history.com/topics/black-history/civil-rights-act -
Malcolm X Assassinated
In June 1964, Malcolm founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity, which advocated black identity and held that racism, not the white race, was the greatest foe of the African American. Malcolm’s new movement steadily gained followers. While addressing his Organization of Afro-American Unity at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights, Malcolm was assassinated by a group of rival Black Muslims.
www.history.com/this-day-in-history/malcolm-x-assassinated -
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Selma to Montgomery March
Even after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 forbade discrimination in voting on the basis of race, efforts by civil rights organizations were met with resistance in southern states like Alabama. Martin Luther King Jr. and SCLC decided to make Selma the focus of a voter registration campaign. Some 2,000 people set out from Selma on March 21, protected by troops Johnson had. After walking 12 hours a day and sleeping in fields, they reached Montgomery on March 25.
www.history.com/topics/black-history -
Voting Rights Act Approved
The voting rights bill was passed in the U.S. Senate by a 77-19 vote on May 26, 1965. After debating the bill for a month, the House of Representatives passed the bill by a vote of 333-85. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law on August 6, with Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders present at the ceremony. The Voting Rights Act gave African American voters the means to challenge voting restrictions and improved voter turnout.
www.history.com/topics/voting-rights-act -
Black Panthers
Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. The Panthers practiced self-defense against the government and fought to establish socialism through mass organizations and community programs. In April of 1967, the first issue of The Black Panther went into action. In the following month, the party marches on the California capital fully armed, protesting the state's attempt to outlaw carrying loaded weapons in public.
www.marxists.org/usa/workers/black-panthers/ -
MLK Assassinated
