Civil Rights Timeline

  • Plessy vs. Ferguson

    Plessy vs. Ferguson
    A court case decided by the supreme court in racial segregation with seperate but equal.
  • Congress of Racial Equality

    Congress of Racial Equality
    CORE was a group created by Bernice Fisher, James R. Robinson, James L. Farmer, Joe Guinn, George Houser, and Homer Jack. They organized picket lines and sit ins. CORE gained popularity after decline in 1955 with the Montgomery bus boycotts.
  • Jackie Robinson

    Jackie Robinson
    Jackie Robinson was the first African American major league baseball player. Up until then, black players had been playing in the negro leagues. But in 1947 on April 15, Jackie Robinson playe his first game for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
  • Sweatt vs Painter

    Sweatt vs Painter
    Heman Sweatt applied to the University of Texas School of Law, and his application was denied because he was black. With the help of the NAACP, he filed suit, and was admitted to the school.
  • Brown vs the Board of Education

    Brown vs the Board of Education
    Brown vs the Board of Education was a court case where the supreme court ruled that seperate but equal in public schools was unconstitutional.
  • Montgomery Bus Boycott

    Montgomery Bus Boycott
    The Montgomery Bus Boycott started in 1955 when an African American woman named Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus. It lasted until 1956.
  • Period: to

    Montgomery Bus Boycotts

    The Montgomery Bus Boycotts lasted from 1955 to 1956.
  • The Southern Manifesto

    The Southern Manifesto
    The Southern Manifesto was a act of southern defiance against the ruling in the Brown vs the Board of Education which ruled segergation in public schools was unequal.
  • Southern Christian Leadership Conference

    Southern Christian Leadership Conference
    The SCLC started during the Montgomery Bus Boycott and as the boycotts spread throught the south, leaders of various protest groups got together and started the SCLC and had its first convention in 1957.
  • Little Rock-Central High School

    Little Rock-Central High School
    The Little Rock nine was the desegregation three years after the Brown vs the Board of Education case. With police escorts, the students entered the school.
  • Greensboro sit-in

    Greensboro sit-in
    In 1960 in Greensboro, North Carolina, protesters started a sit-in movement at lunch counters thorught college towns in the south. Many of the protesters were arrestsed, but it made a lasting impact.
  • Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee

    Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
    The SNCC was a civil rights group formed for the younger African-Americans and played a large part in the freedom rides.
  • Freedom Rides

    Freedom Rides
    Freedom Rides were a series of bus rides throughout the south in which African American protesters defied the whites only laws in the area.
  • James Meredith

    James Meredith
    On Septmeber 20, 1962, James Meredith showed up to Ole Miss to go to his classes, and the entrance was blocked, and rioting occured. Then on October 1st, 1962, he became the first black student to enroll at the University of Mississippi.
  • Letter from Birmingham Jail

    Letter from Birmingham Jail
    The Letter from Birmingham Jail was a letter from Martin Luther King Jr. where he talked about his nonviolent protests and defends his rights to get his freedoms.
  • Medgar Evers

    Medgar Evers
    Medgar Evers was a civil rights activist who was assasinated, and his murder drew national attention. He was killed on June 12, 1963.
  • March on Washington

    March on Washington
    The March on Washington was when MLK delivered his I Have a Dream speech to more than 200,000 americans.
  • Bombing of Birmingham Church

    Bombing of Birmingham Church
    The Bombing of Birmingham Church was a bombing attack at the 16th street baptist chruch in Birmingham, Alabama. Four young girls were killed. One survived, but was blinded.
  • Twenty-fourth Amendment

    Twenty-fourth Amendment
    The twenty-fourth amendment was to stop the poll taxes that prevented African-Americans from being able to vote.
  • Mississippi Freedom Summer

    Mississippi Freedom Summer
    The Mississippi Freedom Summer was organized by organization such as CORE to increase African-American voter turnout in Mississippi.
  • Civil Rights Act passed

    Civil Rights Act passed
    The Civil Rights Act was signed by president Lyndon B. Johnson, and went into law on July 2, 1964. It banned segregation in all public places.
  • Malcolm X assasinated

    Malcolm X assasinated
    Malcolm X was speaking at a rally one week after his house was firebombed on Feb 21, 1965, and he was shot by Nation of Islam members.
  • Selma to Montgomery March

    Selma to Montgomery March
    The Selma march was organized by MLK and the SCLC. It was a march from Selma to Montgomery. State troopers had continuously blocked the road, trying to prevent them from marching. President Johnson backed the marchers.
  • Voting Rights Act approved

    Voting Rights Act approved
    The Voting Rights Act was signed into a law on August 6, 1965. It was meant to help voters overcome barriers that prevented them from excercising their right to vote under the 15th amendment.
  • Black Panthers

    The Black Panther party was formed on October 10, 1966. It was a violent group. They monitored police activities to protect African-Americans from police brutality.
  • King assasinated

    King assasinated
    On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assasinated by James Earl Ray in Memphis, Tennessee. He was in Memphis supporting a sanitation workers strke. He was 39 years old.