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U.S. History – B Chapter 21

Civil Rights

Fidel

Castro assumes

power in Cuba.

1959

698 C

HAPTER 21

Dwight

D. Eisenhower

is reelected.

1956

John F.

Kennedy is

elected president.

1960

Suez Canal

crisis occurs in Egypt.

1956

African

nation of

Ghana wins

independence.

1957

Civil Rights activists lead the 1965 voting rights

march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama.

School

desegregation

crisis occurs in

Little Rock, Arkansas.

1957

Montgomery

bus boycott

begins.

1955

Brown v.

Board of Education

decision orders the

desegregation of

public schools.

1954

USA

WORLD

1955 1960

1955 19601955 1960

698-699-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:49 PM Page 698

Page 1 of 2

South African

civil rights leader

Nelson Mandela

is imprisoned.

1962

Civil Rights 699

Lyndon B.

Johnson becomes

president upon

John F. Kennedy’s

assassination.

1963

Lyndon B.

Johnson is

elected president.

Congress

passes the Civil

Rights Act.

1964

U.S.

astronauts walk

on the moon.

1969

President

Nasser of Egypt dies.

1970

Cultural Revolution

begins in China.

1966

INTERACT

WITH HISTORY

The year is 1960, and segregation

divides the nation’s people. African

Americans are denied access to jobs

and housing and are refused service

at restaurants and stores. But the

voices of the oppressed rise up in the

churches and in the streets, demand-

ing civil rights for all Americans.

What rights are

worth fighting for?

Examine the Issues

• Are all Americans entitled to the

same civil rights?

• What are the risks of demanding

rights?

• Why might some people fight

against equal rights?

Race

riots occur

in major

U.S. cities.

1967

Richard M. Nixon

is elected president.

Martin Luther

King, Jr., is assassinated.

1968

Tet offensive

begins in Vietnam.

1968

Visit the Chapter 21 links for more information

about Civil Rights.

IRESEARCH LINKS

CLASSZONE.COM

1965 1970

698-699-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:49 PM Page 699

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700 C

HAPTER 21

Terms & Names

MAIN IDEA

One American's Story

Taking on Segregation

WHY IT MATTERS NOW

•Thurgood

Marshall

•Brown v. Board

of Education of

Topeka

•Rosa Parks

•Martin Luther

King, Jr.

•Southern Christian

Leadership

Conference (SCLC)

•Student Nonviolent

Coordinating

Committee (SNCC)

•sit-in

Activism and a series of

Supreme Court decisions

advanced equal rights for

African Americans in the

1950s and 1960s.

Landmark Supreme Court

decisions beginning in 1954

have guaranteed civil rights

for Americans today.

JUSTICE IN

MONTGOMERY

Jo Ann Gibson

Robinson and

the Bus

Boycott

Jo Ann Gibson Robinson drew back in self-defense as the white bus driver raised his

hand as if to strike her. “Get up from there!” he shouted. Robinson, laden with

Christmas packages, had forgotten the rules and sat down in the front of the bus,

which was reserved for whites.

Humiliating incidents were not new to the African Americans who rode the

segregated buses of Montgomery, Alabama, in the mid-1950s. The bus company

required them to pay at the front and then exit and reboard at the rear.

“I felt like a dog,” Robinson later said. A professor at the all-black

Alabama State College, Robinson was also president of the

Women’s Political Council, a group of professional African-

American women determined to increase black political power.

A PERSONAL VOICE JO ANN GIBSON ROBINSON

“ We had members in every elementary, junior high,

and senior high school, and in federal, state, and local

jobs. Wherever there were more than ten blacks employed, we had a

member there. We were prepared to the point that we knew that in

a matter of hours, we could corral the whole city.

”

—quoted in Voices of Freedom: An Oral History of the Civil Rights Movement

On December 1, 1955, police arrested an African-American

woman for refusing to give up her seat on a bus. Robinson promptly

sent out a call for all African Americans to boycott Montgomery buses.

The Segregation System

Segregated buses might never have rolled through the streets of Montgomery if

the Civil Rights Act of 1875 had remained in force. This act outlawed segregation

in public facilities by decreeing that “all persons . . . shall be entitled to the full

and equal enjoyment of the accommodations . . . of inns, public conveyances on

land or water, theaters, and other places of public amusement.” In 1883, howev-

er, the all-white Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional.

Skillbuilder

Answer

Segregated: The

South;

Segregation

prohibited: The

Industrial

Northeast, the

northeastern

Midwest, and

the Paciﬁc

Northwest.

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Page 1 of 8

PLESSY V. FERGUSON

During the 1890s, a number of

other court decisions and state laws severely limited African-

American rights. In 1890, Louisiana passed a law requiring

railroads to provide “equal but separate accommodations for

the white and colored races.” In the Plessy v. Ferguson case of

1896, the Supreme Court ruled that this “separate but equal”

law did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment, which guar-

antees all Americans equal treatment under the law.

Armed with the Plessy decision, states throughout the

nation, but especially in the South, passed what were known

as Jim Crow laws, aimed at separating the races. These laws for-

bade marriage between blacks and whites and established

many other restrictions on social and religious contact

between the races. There were separate schools as well as sepa-

rate streetcars, waiting rooms, railroad coaches, elevators, wit-

ness stands, and public restrooms. The facilities provided for

blacks were always inferior to those for whites. Nearly every

day, African Americans faced humiliating signs that read:

“Colored Water”; “No Blacks Allowed”; “Whites Only!”

SEGREGATION CONTINUES INTO THE 20TH CENTURY

After the Civil War, some African Americans tried to escape

Southern racism by moving north. This migration of Southern

African Americans speeded up greatly during World War I, as

many African-American sharecroppers abandoned farms for

the promise of industrial jobs in Northern cities. However,

they discovered racial prejudice and segregation there, too.

Most could ﬁnd housing only in all-black neighborhoods.

Many white workers also resented the competition for jobs.

This sometimes led to violence.

Civil Rights 701

These photos of the public schools for white

children (top) and for black children (above) in a

Southern town in the 1930s show that separate

facilities were often unequal in the segregation era.

GEOGRAPHY SKILLBUILDER

Region In which regions were schools segregated by

law? In which were segregation expressly prohibited?

Segregation required

Segregation permitted

Segregation prohibited

No specific legislation, or local option

Calif.

Oreg.

Wash.

Nev.

Ariz.

Utah

Idaho

N.Mex.

Colo.

Wyo.

Mont.

N.Dak.

S.Dak.

Nebr.

Kans.

Okla.

Minn.

Iowa

Mo.

Ark.

Texas

La.

Miss.

Fla.

Ga.

Ala.

S.C.

N.C.

Ky.

Tenn.

Va.

Ill.

Ind.

Mich.

Ohio

Wis.

Va.

Pa.

Maine

Vt.

N.H.

Mass.

R.I.

Conn.

N.J.

Del.

Md.

D.C.

N.Y.

U.S. School Segregation, 1952

Background

See Plessy v.

Ferguson

on page 290.

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Effects

What were

the effects of the

Supreme Court

decision Plessy v.

Ferguson?

APARTHEID—SEGREGATION

IN SOUTH AFRICA

In 1948, the white government

of South Africa passed laws to

ensure that whites would stay in

control of the country. Those laws

established a system called

apartheid, which means “apart-

ness.” The system divided South

Africans into four segregated

racial groups—whites, blacks, col-

oreds of mixed race, and Asians.

It restricted what jobs nonwhites

could hold, where they could live,

and what rights they could exer-

cise. Because of apartheid, the

black African majority were denied

the right to vote.

In response to worldwide criti-

cism, the South African govern-

ment gradually repealed the

apartheid laws, starting in the late

1970s. In 1994, South Africa held

its ﬁrst all-race election and elect-

ed as president Nelson Mandela, a

black anti-apartheid leader whom

the white government had impris-

oned for nearly 30 years.

A. Answer

Since the Court

ruled that segre-

gation was not

unconstitutional,

many states,

especially in the

South, passed

segregationist

Jim Crow laws.

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Page 2 of 8

A DEVELOPING CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT

In many ways, the events of

World War II set the stage for the civil rights movement. First, the demand for sol-

diers in the early 1940s created a shortage of white male laborers. That labor

shortage opened up new job opportunities for African Americans, Latinos, and

white women.

Second, nearly one million African Americans served in the armed forces,

which needed so many ﬁghting men that they had to end their discriminatory poli-

cies. Such policies had previously kept African Americans from serving in ﬁghting

units. Many African-American soldiers returned from the war determined to ﬁght

for their own freedom now that they had helped defeat fascist regimes overseas.

Third, during the war, civil rights organizations actively campaigned for

African-American voting rights and challenged Jim Crow laws. In response to

protests, President Roosevelt issued a presidential directive prohibiting racial dis-

crimination by federal agencies and all companies that were engaged in war work.

The groundwork was laid for more organized campaigns to end segregation

throughout the United States.

Challenging Segregation in Court

The desegregation campaign was led largely by the NAACP,

which had fought since 1909 to end segregation. One inﬂu-

ential ﬁgure in this campaign was Charles Hamilton Houston,

a brilliant Howard University law professor who also served as

chief legal counsel for the NAACP from 1934 to 1938.

THE NAACP LEGAL STRATEGY

In deciding the NAACP’s

legal strategy, Houston focused on the inequality between the

separate schools that many states provided. At that time, the

nation spent ten times as much money educating a white child

as an African-American child. Thus, Houston focused the orga-

nization’s limited resources on challenging the most glaring

inequalities of segregated public education.

In 1938, he placed a team of his best law students under

the direction of Thurgood Marshall. Over the next 23

years, Marshall and his NAACP lawyers would win 29 out of

32 cases argued before the Supreme Court.

Several of the cases became legal milestones, each chip-

ping away at the segregation platform of Plessy v. Ferguson. In

the 1946 case Morgan v. Virginia, the Supreme Court declared

unconstitutional those state laws mandating segregated seat-

ing on interstate buses. In 1950, the high court ruled in

Sweatt v. Painter that state law schools must admit black

applicants, even if separate black schools exist.

BROWN V. BOARD OF EDUCATION

Marshall’s most stun-

ning victory came on May 17, 1954, in the case known as

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. (See page 708).

In this case, the father of eight-year-old Linda Brown had

charged the board of education of Topeka, Kansas, with

violating Linda’s rights by denying her admission to an all-

white elementary school four blocks from her house. The

nearest all-black elementary school was 21 blocks away.

In a landmark verdict, the Supreme Court unanimously

struck down segregation in schooling as an unconstitutional

violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection

702 C

HAPTER 21

MAIN IDEA

Developing

Historical

Perspective

How did

events during

World War II lay

the groundwork for

African Americans

to ﬁght for civil

rights in the

1950s?

THURGOOD MARSHALL

1908–1993

Thurgood Marshall dedicated his

life to ﬁghting racism. His father

had labored as a steward at an

all-white country club, his mother

as a teacher at an all-black

school. Marshall himself was

denied admission to the University

of Maryland Law School because

of his race.

In 1961, President John F.

Kennedy nominated Marshall to

the U.S. Court of Appeals. Lyndon

Johnson picked Marshall for U.S.

solicitor general in 1965 and two

years later named him as the ﬁrst

African-American Supreme Court

justice. In that role, he remained

a strong advocate of civil rights

until he retired in 1991.

After Marshall died in 1993, a

copy of the Brown v. Board of

Education decision was placed

beside his casket. On it, an admir-

er wrote: “You shall always be

remembered.”

B. Answers

Blacks had

experienced

better job

opportunities;

many veterans

who had fought

racist Germans

wanted to resist

racist

Americans; civil

rights groups

had staged

some success-

ful protests.

700-707-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:50 PM Page 702

Page 3 of 8

Clause. Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote that, “[I]n the ﬁeld of public education,

the doctrine of separate but equal has no place.” The Brown decision was relevant

for some 12 million schoolchildren in 21 states.

Reaction to the Brown Decision

Ofﬁcial reaction to the ruling was mixed. In Kansas and Oklahoma, state ofﬁcials

said they expected segregation to end with little trouble. In Texas the governor

promised to comply but warned that plans might “take years” to work out. In

Mississippi and Georgia, ofﬁcials vowed total resistance. Governor Herman

Talmadge of Georgia said “The people of Georgia will not comply with the deci-

sion of the court. . . . We’re going to do whatever is necessary in Georgia to keep

white children in white schools and colored children in colored schools.”

RESISTANCE TO SCHOOL DESEGREGATION

Within a year, more than 500

school districts had desegregated their classrooms. In Baltimore, St. Louis, and

Washington, D.C., black and white students sat side by side for the ﬁrst time in his-

tory. However, in many areas where African Americans were a majority, whites

resisted desegregation. In some places, the Ku Klux Klan reappeared and White

Citizens Councils boycotted businesses that supported desegregation.

To speed things up, in 1955 the Supreme Court handed down a second rul-

ing, known as Brown II, that ordered school desegregation implemented “with all

deliberate speed.” Initially President Eisenhower refused to enforce compliance.

“The fellow who tries to tell me that you can do these things by force is just plain

nuts,” he said. Events in Little Rock, Arkansas, would soon force Eisenhower to go

against his personal beliefs.

CRISIS IN LITTLE ROCK

In 1948, Arkansas had become the ﬁrst Southern state

to admit African Americans to state universities without being required by a court

order. By the 1950s, some scout troops and labor unions in Arkansas had quietly

ended their Jim Crow practices. Little Rock citizens had elected two men to the

school board who publicly backed desegregation—and the school superintendent,

Virgil Blossom, began planning for desegregation soon after Brown.

However, Governor Orval

Faubus publicly showed support for

segregation. In September 1957, he

ordered the National Guard to turn

away the “Little Rock Nine”—nine

African-American students who had

volunteered to integrate Little

Rock’s Central High School as the

ﬁrst step in Blossom’s plan. A feder-

al judge ordered Faubus to let the

students into school.

NAACP members called eight

of the students and arranged to

drive them to school. They could

not reach the ninth student,

Elizabeth Eckford, who did not

have a phone, and she set out

alone. Outside Central High,

Eckford faced an abusive crowd.

Terriﬁed, the 15-year-old made it

to a bus stop where two friendly

whites stayed with her.

▼

As white students

jeer her and

Arkansas National

Guards look on,

Elizabeth Eckford

enters Little Rock

Central High

School in 1957.

C. Answer

Brown said that

segregation has

no place in pub-

lic education, so

all public

schools must

desegregate.

D. answer

Some Southern

whites and state

ofﬁcials resisted

segregation,

and neither the

president nor

Congress forced

them to act

quickly.

MAIN IDEA

Making

Inferences

How did the

Brown decision

affect schools

outside of Topeka?

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Causes

Why weren’t

schools in all

regions

desegregated

immediately after

the Brown II

decision?

700-707-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:50 PM Page 703

Page 4 of 8

The crisis in Little Rock forced Eisenhower to act. He placed the Arkansas

National Guard under federal control and ordered a thousand paratroopers into

Little Rock. The nation watched the televised coverage of the event. Under the

watch of soldiers, the nine African-American teenagers attended class.

But even these soldiers could not protect the students from troublemakers who

confronted them in stairways, in the halls, and in the cafeteria. Throughout the year

African-American students were regularly harassed by other students. At the end of

the year, Faubus shut down Central High rather than let integration continue.

On September 9, 1957, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957, the ﬁrst

civil rights law since Reconstruction. Shepherded by Senator Lyndon B. Johnson

of Texas, the law gave the attorney general greater power over school desegrega-

tion. It also gave the federal government jurisdiction—or authority—over viola-

tions of African-American voting rights.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott

The face-to-face confrontation at Central High School was

not the only showdown over segregation in the mid-1950s.

Impatient with the slow pace of change in the courts,

African-American activists had begun taking direct action to

win the rights promised to them by the Fourteenth and

Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution. Among those

on the frontline of change was Jo Ann Robinson.

BOYCOTTING SEGREGATION

Four days after the Brown

decision in May 1954, Robinson wrote a letter to the mayor of

Montgomery, Alabama, asking that bus drivers no longer be

allowed to force riders in the “colored” section to yield their

seats to whites. The mayor refused. Little did he know that in

less than a year another African-American woman from

Alabama would be at the center of this controversy, and that

her name and her words would far outlast segregation.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, a seamstress and an

NAACP ofﬁcer, took a seat in the front row of the “colored”

section of a Montgomery bus. As the bus ﬁlled up, the dri-

ver ordered Parks and three other African-American passen-

gers to empty the row they were occupying so that a white

man could sit down without having to sit next to any

African Americans. “It was time for someone to stand up—

or in my case, sit down,” recalled Parks. “I refused to move.”

As Parks stared out the window, the bus driver said, “If you

don’t stand up, I’m going to call the police and have you

arrested.” The soft-spoken Parks replied, “You may do that.”

News of Parks’s arrest spread rapidly. Jo Ann Robinson

and NAACP leader E. D. Nixon suggested a bus boycott.

The leaders of the African-American community, includ-

ing many ministers, formed the Montgomery

Improvement Association to organize the boycott. They

elected the pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church,

26-year-old Martin Luther King, Jr., to lead the group.

An ordained minister since 1948, King had just earned a

Ph.D. degree in theology from Boston University. “Well,

I’m not sure I’m the best person for the position,” King

conﬁded to Nixon, “but if no one else is going to serve,

I’d be glad to try.”

ROSA PARKS

1913–

Long before December 1955,

Rosa Parks (shown being ﬁnger

printed) had protested segrega-

tion through everyday acts. She

refused to use drinking fountains

labeled “Colored Only.” When pos-

sible, she shunned segregated

elevators and climbed stairs

instead.

Parks joined the Montgomery

chapter of the NAACP in 1943

and became the organization’s

secretary. A turning point came

for her in the summer of 1955,

when she attended a workshop

designed to promote integration

by giving the students the experi-

ence of interracial living.

Returning to Montgomery, Parks

was even more determined to

ﬁght segregation. As it happened,

her act of protest against injus-

tice on the buses inspired a

whole community to join her

cause.

E. Possible

Answer

Television

allowed people

to see the white

separatists’

cruel treatment

of the African-

American stu-

dents.

MAIN IDEA

Making

Inferences

What effect

do you think

television

coverage of the

Little Rock

incident had on

the nation?

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Page 5 of 8

WALKING FOR JUSTICE

On the night of December 5, 1955, Dr. King made the

following declaration to an estimated crowd of between 5,000 and 15,000 people.

A PERSONAL VOICE MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

“ There comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron

feet of oppression. . . . I want it to be known—that we’re going to work with grim

and bold determination—to gain justice on buses in this city. And we are not

wrong. . . . If we are wrong—the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are

wrong—God Almighty is wrong. . . . If we are wrong—justice is a lie.

”

—quoted in Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954–63

King’s passionate and eloquent speech brought people to their feet and ﬁlled the

audience with a sense of mission. African Americans ﬁled a lawsuit and for 381 days

refused to ride the buses in Montgomery. In most cases they had to ﬁnd other means

of transportation by organizing car pools or walking long distances. Support came

from within the black community-—workers donated one-ﬁfth of their weekly

salaries—as well as from outside groups like the NAACP, the United Auto Workers,

Montgomery’s Jewish community, and sympathetic white southerners. The boy-

cotters remained nonviolent even after a bomb ripped apart King’s home (no one

was injured). Finally, in 1956, the Supreme Court outlawed bus segregation.

Martin Luther King and the SCLC

The Montgomery bus boycott proved to the world that the African-American

community could unite and organize a successful protest movement. It also

proved the power of nonviolent resistance, the peaceful refusal to obey unjust

laws. Despite threats to his life and family, King urged his followers, “Don’t ever

let anyone pull you so low as to hate them.”

CHANGING THE WORLD WITH SOUL FORCE

King called his brand of non-

violent resistance “soul force.” He based his ideas on the teachings of several peo-

ple. From Jesus, he learned to love one’s enemies. From writer Henry David Thoreau

he took the concept of civil disobedience—the refusal to obey an unjust law. From

labor organizer A. Philip Randolph he learned to organize massive demonstrations.

From Mohandas Gandhi, the leader who helped India throw off British rule, he

learned to resist oppression without violence.

“We will not hate you,” King said to white racists, “but we cannot . . . obey

your unjust laws. . . . We will soon wear you down by our capacity to suffer. And

in winning our freedom, we will so appeal to your heart and conscience that we

will win you in the process.”

Civil Rights 705

During the bus

boycott,

Montgomery’s

black citizens

relied on an

efﬁcient car pool

system that

ferried people

between more

than forty pickup

stations like the

one shown.

▼

MAIN IDEA

Summarizing

What were the

central points of

Dr. King’s

philosophy?

G. answer

“Soul force,” or

nonviolent resis-

tance, which

included acts of

civil disobedi-

ence, demon-

strations, and

adherence to

nonviolence.

MAIN IDEA

Synthesizing

Why was Rosa

Parks’s action on

December 1,

1955, signiﬁcant?

F. P o s si bl e

Answers

Parks’s refusal

to yield her seat

to a white man

led to a citywide

bus boycott; it

also brought

Martin Luther

King, Jr., to

prominence.

700-707-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:50 PM Page 705

Page 6 of 8

706 C

HAPTER 21

King held steadfast to his philosophy, even when a wave of racial violence

swept through the South after the Brown decision. The violence included the 1955

murder of Emmett Till—a 14-year-old African-American boy who had allegedly

ﬂirted with a white woman. There were also shootings and beatings, some fatal,

of civil rights workers.

FROM THE GRASSROOTS UP

After the bus boycott ended, King joined with

ministers and civil rights leaders in 1957 to found the Southern Christian

Leadership Conference (SCLC). Its purpose was “to carry on nonviolent cru-

sades against the evils of second-class citizenship.” Using African-American

churches as a base, the SCLC planned to stage protests and demonstrations

throughout the South. The leaders hoped to build a movement from the grass-

roots up and to win the support of ordinary African Americans of all ages. King,

president of the SCLC, used the power of his voice and ideas to fuel the move-

ment’s momentum.

The nuts and bolts of organizing the SCLC was handled by its ﬁrst director,

Ella Baker, the granddaughter of slaves. While with the NAACP, Baker had served

as national ﬁeld secretary, traveling over 16,000 miles throughout the South. From

1957 to 1960, Baker used her contacts to set up branches of

the SCLC in Southern cities. In April 1960, Baker helped stu-

dents at Shaw University, an African-American university in

Raleigh, North Carolina, to organize a national protest

group, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee, or SNCC, pronounced “snick” for short.

It had been six years since the Brown decision, and many

college students viewed the pace of change as too slow.

Although these students risked a great deal—losing college

scholarships, being expelled from college, being physically

harmed—they were determined to challenge the system.

SNCC hoped to harness the energy of these student protest-

ers; it would soon create one of the most important student

activist movements in the nation’s history.

The Movement Spreads

Although SNCC adopted King’s ideas in part, its members

had ideas of their own. Many people called for a more con-

frontational strategy and set out to reshape the civil rights

movement.

DEMONSTRATING FOR FREEDOM

The founders of

SNCC had models to build on. In 1942 in Chicago, the

Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) had staged the ﬁrst

sit-ins, in which African-American protesters sat down at

segregated lunch counters and refused to leave until they

were served. In February 1960, African-American students

from North Carolina’s Agricultural and Technical College

staged a sit-in at a whites-only lunch counter at a

Woolworth’s store in Greensboro. This time, television

crews brought coverage of the protest into homes through-

out the United States. There was no denying the ugly face

of racism. Day after day, news reporters captured the scenes

of whites beating, jeering at, and pouring food over stu-

dents who refused to strike back. The coverage sparked

many other sit-ins across the South. Store managers called

MAIN IDEA

Evaluating

What was the

role of the SCLC?

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

1929–1968

Born Michael Luther King, Jr.,

King had to adjust to a new name

in 1934. In that year, his father—

Rev. Michael King, Sr.—returned

home from a trip to Europe,

where he had toured the site

where Martin Luther had begun

the Protestant Reformation. Upon

his return home, the elder King

changed his and his son’s names

to Martin.

Like Luther, the younger King

became a reformer. In 1964, he

won the Nobel peace prize. Yet

there was a side of King unknown

to most people—his inner battle

to overcome his hatred of the

white bigots. As a youth, he had

once vowed “to hate all white

people.” As leader of the civil

rights movement, King said all

Americans had to be freed:

“Negroes from the bonds of seg-

regation and shame, whites from

the bonds of bigotry and fear.”

H. Answer

It organized

protests and

demonstrations

to promote civil

rights.

700-707-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:50 PM Page 706

Page 7 of 8

in the police, raised the price of food, and removed counter seats. But the move-

ment continued and spread to the North. There, students formed picket lines

around national chain stores that maintained segregated lunch counters in

the South.

By late 1960, students had descended on and desegregated lunch counters in

some 48 cities in 11 states. They endured arrests, beatings, suspension from col-

lege, and tear gas and ﬁre hoses, but the army of nonviolent students refused to

back down. “My mother has always told me that I’m equal to other people,” said

Ezell Blair, Jr., one of the students who led the ﬁrst SNCC sit-in in 1960. For the

rest of the 1960s, many Americans worked to convince the rest of the country that

blacks and whites deserved equal treatment.

Civil Rights 707

MAIN IDEA

2. TAKING NOTES

Fill in a spider diagram like the one

below with examples of tactics,

organizations, leaders, and Supreme

Court decisions of the civil rights

movement up to 1960.

CRITICAL THINKING

3. EVALUATING

Do you think the nonviolence used

by civil rights activists was a good

tactic? Explain. Think About:

• the Montgomery bus boycott

• television coverage of events

• sit-ins

4. CONTRASTING

How did the tactics of the student

protesters from SNCC differ from

those of the boycotters in

Montgomery?

5. DRAWING CONCLUSIONS

After the Brown v. Board of

Education of Topeka ruling, what do

you think was the most signiﬁcant

event of the civil rights movement

prior to 1960? Why? Think About:

• the role of civil rights leaders

• the results of confrontations

and boycotts

• the role of grassroots organiza-

tions

Sit-in demon-

strators, such

as these at a

Jackson,

Mississippi, lunch

counter in 1963,

faced intimidation

and humiliation

from white

segregationists.

▼

Supreme

Court Decisions

Tactics

Organizations

Leaders

Challenging Segregation

•Thurgood Marshall

•Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka

•Rosa Parks

•Martin Luther King, Jr.

•Southern Christian Leadership

Conference (SCLC)

•Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee (SNCC)

•sit-in

1. TERMS & NAMES For each term or name, write a sentence explaining its signiﬁcance.

700-707-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:50 PM Page 707

Page 8 of 8

710 C

HAPTER 21

Terms & Names

MAIN IDEA

One American's Story

The Triumphs

of a Crusade

WHY IT MATTERS NOW

In 1961, James Peck, a white civil rights activist, joined other CORE

members on a historic bus trip across the South. The two-bus trip would

test the Supreme Court decisions banning segregated seating on interstate

bus routes and segregated facilities in bus terminals. Peck and other

freedom riders hoped to provoke a violent reaction that would

convince the Kennedy administration to enforce the law. The

violence was not long in coming.

At the Alabama state line, white racists got on Bus One car-

rying chains, brass knuckles, and pistols. They brutally beat

African-American riders and white activists who tried to

intervene. Still the riders managed to go on. Then on May 4,

1961—Mother’s Day—the bus pulled into the Birmingham

bus terminal. James Peck saw a hostile mob waiting, some

holding iron bars.

A PERSONAL VOICE JAMES PECK

“ I looked at them and then I looked at Charles Person, who

had been designated as my team mate. . . . When I looked at him, he

responded by saying simply, ‘Let’s go.’ As we entered the white waiting

room, . . . we were grabbed bodily and pushed toward the alleyway . . . and

out of sight of onlookers in the waiting room, six of them started swinging

at me with ﬁsts and pipes. Five others attacked Person a few feet ahead.

”

—Freedom Ride

The ride of Bus One had ended, but Bus Two continued southward on

a journey that would shock the Kennedy administration into action.

Riding for Freedom

In Anniston, Alabama, about 200 angry whites attacked Bus Two. The mob followed

the activists out of town. When one of the tires blew, they smashed a window and

tossed in a ﬁre bomb. The freedom riders spilled out just before the bus exploded.

•freedom riders

•James Meredith

•Civil Rights Act

of 1964

•Freedom Summer

•Fannie Lou Hamer

•Voting Rights Act

of 1965

Civil rights activists broke

through racial barriers. Their

activism prompted landmark

legislation.

Activism pushed the federal gov-

ernment to end segregation and

ensure voting rights for African

Americans.

▼

Three days after being

beaten unconscious in

Birmingham, freedom

rider James Peck demon-

strates in New York City

to pressure national bus

companies to support

desegregation.

710-716-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 710

Page 1 of 7

NEW VOLUNTEERS

The bus com-

panies refused to carry the CORE

freedom riders any farther. Even

though the determined volunteers

did not want to give up, they

ended their ride. However, CORE

director James Farmer announced

that a group of SNCC volunteers in

Nashville were ready to pick up

where the others had left off.

When a new band of freedom

riders rode into Birmingham,

policemen pulled them from the

bus, beat them, and drove them into Tennessee. Deﬁantly, they returned to the

Birmingham bus terminal. Their bus driver, however, feared for his life and refused

to transport them. In protest, they occupied the whites-only waiting room at the ter-

minal for eighteen hours until a solution was reached. After an angry phone call

from U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy, bus company ofﬁcials convinced the

driver to proceed. The riders set out for Montgomery on May 20.

ARRIVAL OF FEDERAL MARSHALS

Although Alabama ofﬁcials had promised

Kennedy that the riders would be protected, a mob of whites—many carrying bats

and lead pipes—fell upon the riders when they arrived in Montgomery. John

Doer, a Justice Department ofﬁcial on the scene, called the attorney general to

report what was happening. “A bunch of men led by a guy with a bleeding face

are beating [the passengers]. There are no cops. It’s terrible. There’s

not a cop in sight. People are yelling. ‘Get ‘em, get ‘em.’ It’s awful.”

The violence provoked exactly the response the freedom riders

wanted. Newspapers throughout the nation and abroad denounced

the beatings.

President Kennedy arranged to give the freedom riders direct sup-

port. The Justice Department sent 400 U.S. marshals to protect the rid-

ers on the last part of their journey to Jackson, Mississippi. In addition, the attorney

general and the Interstate Commerce Commission banned segregation in all inter-

state travel facilities, including waiting rooms, restrooms, and lunch counters.

Standing Firm

With the integration of interstate travel facilities under way, some civil rights

workers turned their attention to integrating some Southern schools and pushing

the movement into additional Southern towns. At each turn they encountered

opposition and often violence.

INTEGRATING OLE MISS

In September 1962, Air Force veteran James Meredith

won a federal court case that allowed him to enroll in the all-white University of

Mississippi, nicknamed Ole Miss. But when Meredith arrived on campus, he faced

Governor Ross Barnett, who refused to let him register as a student.

President Kennedy ordered federal marshals to escort Meredith to the regis-

trar’s ofﬁce. Barnett responded with a heated radio appeal: “I call on every

Mississippian to keep his faith and courage. We will never surrender.” The broad-

cast turned out white demonstrators by the thousands.

On the night of September 30, riots broke out on campus, resulting in two

deaths. It took thousands of soldiers, 200 arrests, and 15 hours to stop the rioters.

In the months that followed, federal ofﬁcials accompanied Meredith to class and

protected his parents from nightriders who shot up their house.

Civil Rights 711

▼

In May 1967, a

mob ﬁrebombed

this bus of free-

dom riders out-

side Anniston,

Alabama, and

attacked passen-

gers as they tried

to escape.

“ We will continue

our journey one way

or another. . . . We

are prepared to die.”

JIM ZWERG, FREEDOM RIDER

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Issues

What did the

freedom riders

hope to achieve?

A. Answer

They hoped to

call attention to

the South’s

refusal to aban-

don segregation

so as to pres-

sure the federal

government to

enforce the

Supreme Court’s

desegregation

rulings.

710-716-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 711

Page 2 of 7

HEADING INTO BIRMINGHAM

The trouble continued in Alabama. Birmingham, a

city known for its strict enforcement of total segregation in public life, also had a

reputation for racial violence, including 18 bombings from 1957 to 1963.

Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, head of the Alabama Christian Movement for

Human Rights and secretary of the SCLC, decided something had to be done

about Birmingham and that it would be the ideal place to test the power of non-

violence. He invited Martin Luther King, Jr., and the SCLC to help desegregate

the city. On April 3, 1963, King ﬂew into Birmingham to hold a planning meet-

ing with members of the African-American community. “This is the most segre-

gated city in America,” he said. “We have to stick together if we ever want to

change its ways.”

After days of demonstrations led by Shuttlesworth and others, King and a

small band of marchers were ﬁnally arrested during a demonstration on Good

Friday, April 12th. While in jail, King wrote an open letter to white religious lead-

ers who felt he was pushing too fast.

A P

ERSONAL VOICE MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

“ I guess it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation

to say, ‘Wait.’ But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and

fathers at whim; when you have seen hate-ﬁlled policemen curse, kick, brutalize

and even kill your black brothers and sisters; . . . when you see the vast majority

of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in the air-tight cage of poverty;

. . . when you have to concoct an answer for a ﬁve-year-old son asking: . . .

‘Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?’ . . . then you will

understand why we ﬁnd it difﬁcult to wait.

”

—“Letter from a Birmingham Jail”

On April 20, King posted bail and began planning more demonstrations. On

May 2, more than a thousand African-American children marched in Birmingham;

Police commissioner Eugene “Bull” Connor’s men arrested 959 of them. On May 3, a

second “children’s crusade” came face to face with a helmeted police force. Police

swept the marchers off their feet with high-pressure ﬁre hoses, set attack dogs on

them, and clubbed those who fell. TV cameras captured all of it, and millions of

viewers heard the children screaming.

Continued protests, an economic boycott, and negative media coverage ﬁnally

convinced Birmingham ofﬁcials to end segregation. This stunning civil rights vic-

tory inspired African Americans across the nation. It also convinced President

Kennedy that only a new civil rights act could end racial violence and satisfy the

demands of African Americans—and many whites—for racial justice.

712 C

HAPTER 21

▼

News photos and

television cover-

age of police dogs

in Birmingham

attacking African

Americans

shocked the

nation.

B. Answer

Days of demon-

strations; arrest

of King and oth-

ers; King’s

“Letter from a

Birmingham

Jail”; more

demonstrations

met by arrests

and police vio-

lence; economic

boycott.

MAIN IDEA

Chronological

Order

What events

led to desegrega-

tion in

Birmingham?

710-716-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 712

Page 3 of 7

History Through

Civil Rights 713

SKILLBUILDER

Interpreting Visual Sources

What do the signs tell you about African Americans’ struggle

for civil rights?

What kind of treatment do you suppose these men had

experienced? Why do you think so?

SEE SKILLBUILDER HANDBOOK, PAGE R23.

Withers had to be careful about his involvement in groups like the NAACP and COME

(Community On the Move for Equality), for he had a wife and children to support. He

went to several meetings a night, sometimes taking pictures, other times offering a

suggestion. “I always had FBI agents looking over my shoulder and wanting to question

me. I never tried to learn any high-powered secrets.”

Withers in 1992

Withers in 1950

▼

ERNEST WITHERS

Born in Memphis in 1922, photographer Ernest Withers believed

that if the struggle for equality could be shown to people, things

would change. Armed with only a camera, he braved violent

crowds to capture the heated racism during the Montgomery

bus boycott, the desegregation of Central High in Little Rock,

and the 1968 Memphis sanitation workers strike (below) led by

Martin Luther King, Jr. The night before the Memphis march,

Withers had helped make some of the signs he photographed.

“ G. C. Brown printed those ‘I AM A MAN’ signs right

over there. . . . I had a car and it was snowing, so we

went and rented the saw and came back that night and

cut the sticks.

”

▼

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Page 4 of 7

KENNEDY TAKES A STAND

On June 11, 1963, the president sent

troops to force Governor George Wallace to honor a court order

desegregating the University of Alabama. That evening, Kennedy

asked the nation: “Are we to say to the world—and much more

importantly, to each other—that this is the land of the free, except

for the Negroes?” He demanded that Congress pass a civil rights bill.

A tragic event just hours after Kennedy’s speech highlighted the racial tension

in much of the South. Shortly after midnight, a sniper murdered Medgar Evers,

NAACP ﬁeld secretary and World War II veteran. Police soon arrested a white

supremacist, Byron de la Beckwith, but he was released after two trials resulted in

hung juries. His release brought a new militancy to African Americans. Many

demanded, “Freedom now!”

Marching to Washington

The civil rights bill that President Kennedy sent to Congress guaranteed equal access

to all public accommodations and gave the U.S. attorney general the power to ﬁle

school desegregation suits. To persuade Congress to pass the bill, two veteran orga-

nizers—labor leader A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin of the SCLC—summoned

Americans to a march on Washington, D.C.

THE DREAM OF EQUALITY

On August 28, 1963, more than

250,000 people—including about 75,000 whites—converged on

the nation’s capital. They assembled on the grassy lawn of the

Washington Monument and marched to the Lincoln Memorial.

There, people listened to speakers demand the immediate pas-

sage of the civil rights bill.

When Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., appeared, the crowd

exploded in applause. In his now famous speech, “I Have a

Dream,” he appealed for peace and racial harmony.

A PERSONAL

VOICE MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

“ I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live

out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be

self-evident; that all men are created equal.’ . . . I have a dream

that my four little children will one day live in a nation where

they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the con-

tent of their character. . . . I have a dream that one day the

state of Alabama . . . will be transformed into a situation where

little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with

little white boys and white girls and walk together as sisters

and brothers.

”

—“I Have a Dream”

MORE VIOLENCE

Two weeks after King’s historic speech, four

young Birmingham girls were killed when a rider in a car hurled a

bomb through their church window. Two more African Americans

died in the unrest that followed.

Two months later, an assassin shot and killed John F.

Kennedy. His successor, President Lyndon B. Johnson, pledged to

carry on Kennedy’s work. On July 2, 1964, Johnson signed the

Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited discrimination

because of race, religion, national origin, and gender. It gave all cit-

izens the right to enter libraries, parks, washrooms, restaurants,

theaters, and other public accommodations.

714 C

HAPTER 21

Background

Beckwith was ﬁnal-

ly convicted in

1994, after the

case was

reopened based

on new evidence.

“ I say, Segregation now!

Segregation tomorrow!

Segregation forever!”

GEORGE WALLACE,

ALABAMA GOVERNOR, 1963

C. Answer

To spu r pass age

of the civil rights

bill.

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Events

Why did civil

rights organizers

ask their support-

ers to march on

Washington?

Civll Rights Acts of

the 1950s and 1960s

CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1957

• Established federal Commission on

Civil Rights

• Established a Civil Rights Division in

the Justice Department to enforce

civil rights laws

• Enlarged federal power to protect

voting rights

CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1964

• Banned most discrimination in

employment and in public accommo-

dations

• Enlarged federal power to protect

voting rights and speed up school

desegregation

• Established Equal Employment

Opportunity Commission to ensure

fair treatment in employment

VOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 1965

• Eliminated voter literacy tests

• Enabled federal examiners to

CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1968

• Prohibited discrimination in the sale

or rental of most housing

• Strengthened antilynching laws

• Made it a crime to harm civil rights

workers

SKILLBUILDER

Interpreting Charts

Which law do you think beneﬁted the

most people? Explain your choice.

710-716-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 714

Page 5 of 7

Civil Rights 715

Fighting for Voting Rights

Meanwhile, the right of all African Americans to vote remained elusive. In 1964,

CORE and SNCC workers in the South began registering as many African

Americans as they could to vote. They hoped their campaign would receive nation-

al publicity, which would in turn inﬂuence Congress to pass a voting rights act.

Focused in Mississippi, the project became known as Freedom Summer.

FREEDOM SUMMER

To fortify the project, civil rights groups recruited college

students and trained them in nonviolent resistance. Thousands of student volun-

teers—mostly white, about one-third female—went into Mississippi to help register

voters. For some, the job proved deadly. In June of 1964, three civil rights workers

disappeared in Neshoba County, Mississippi. Investigators later learned that

Klansmen and local police had murdered the men, two of whom were white.

Through the summer the racial beatings and murders continued, along with the

burning of businesses, homes, and churches.

A NEW POLITICAL PARTY

African Americans needed a voice in the political

arena if sweeping change was to occur. In order to gain a seat in Mississippi’s all-

white Democratic Party, SNCC organized the Mississippi Freedom Democratic

Party (MFDP). Fannie Lou Hamer, the daughter of Mississippi sharecroppers,

would be their voice at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. In a televised

speech that shocked the convention and viewers nationwide, Hamer described

how she was jailed for registering to vote in 1962, and how police forced other

prisoners to beat her.

A P

ERSONAL VOICE FANNIE LOU HAMER

“ The ﬁrst [prisoner] began to beat [me], and I was beat by the ﬁrst until he was

exhausted. . . . The second [prisoner] began to beat. . . . I began to scream and

one white man got up and began to beat me in my head and tell me to ‘hush.’ . . .

All of this on account we want to register, to become ﬁrst-class citizens, and if the

Freedom Democratic Par ty is not seated now, I question America.

”

—quoted in The Civil Rights Movement: An Eyewitness History

In response to Hamer’s speech, telegrams and telephone calls poured in to the

convention in support of seating the MFDP delegates. President Johnson feared

losing the Southern white vote if the Democrats sided with the MFDP, so his

administration pressured civil rights leaders to convince the MFDP to accept a

compromise. The Democrats would give 2 of Mississippi’s 68 seats to the MFDP,

with a promise to ban discrimination at the 1968 convention.

When Hamer learned of the compromise, she said, “We didn’t come all this way

for no two seats.” The MFDP and supporters in SNCC felt that the leaders had

betrayed them.

In the summer

of 1964, college

students volun-

teered to go to

Mississippi to

help register that

state’s African-

American voters.

▼

D. Answer

They hoped to

call attention to

the lack of vot-

ing rights in seg-

regationist

strongholds and

to promote pas-

sage of a feder-

al voting rights

act.

MAIN IDEA

Developing

Historical

Perspective

Why did young

people in SNCC

and the MFDP feel

betrayed by some

civil rights lead-

ers?

E. Answer

Because the

leaders agreed

to a compromise

with the

Johnson admin-

istration that

kept most MFDP

delegates from

the Democratic

convention.

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Motives

Why did civil

rights groups orga-

nize Freedom

Summer?

710-716-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 715

Page 6 of 7

716 C

HAPTER 21

MAIN IDEA

2. TAKING NOTES

In a graphic like the one shown, list

the steps that African Americans

took to desegregate buses and

schools from 1962 to 1965.

CRITICAL THINKING

3. ANALYZING ISSUES

What assumptions and beliefs do you

think guided the ﬁerce opposition to

the civil rights movement in the

South? Support your answer with

evidence from the text. Think About:

• the social and political structure

of the South

• Mississippi governor Ross

Barnett’s comment during his

radio address

• the actions of police and some

white Southerners

4. ANALYZING PRIMARY SOURCES

Just after the Civil Rights Act of

1964 was passed, white Alabama

governor George Wallace said,

“ It is ironical that this event

occurs as we approach the cele-

bration of Independence Day. On

that day we won our freedom. On

this day we have largely lost it.

”

What do you think Wallace meant by

his statement?

MAIN IDEA

Comparing

In what ways

was the civil rights

campaign in

Selma similar to

the one in

Birmingham?

F. A n s we r

In Both cam-

paigns, civil

rights workers

encountered a

violent

response, and in

both cases, TV

coverage of that

violence helped

force the federal

government to

intervene.

1962

1963

1964

1965

•freedom riders

•James Meredith

•Civil Rights Act of 1964

•Freedom Summer

•Fannie Lou Hamer

•Voting Rights Act of 1965

1. TERMS & NAMES For each term or name, write a sentence explaining its signiﬁcance.

THE SELMA CAMPAIGN

At the start of 1965, the SCLC

conducted a major voting rights campaign in Selma, Alabama,

where SNCC had been working for two years to register voters.

By the end of 1965, more than 2,000 African Americans had

been arrested in SCLC demonstrations. After a demonstrator

named Jimmy Lee Jackson was shot and killed, King respond-

ed by announcing a 50-mile protest march from Selma to

Montgomery, the state capital. On March 7, 1965, about 600

protesters set out for Montgomery.

That night, mayhem broke out. Television cameras cap-

tured the scene. The rest of the nation watched in horror as

police swung whips and clubs, and clouds of tear gas swirled

around fallen marchers. Demonstrators poured into Selma by

the hundreds. Ten days later, President Johnson presented

Congress with a new voting rights act and asked for its swift

passage.

On March 21, 3,000 marchers again set out for

Montgomery, this time with federal protection. Soon the

number grew to an army of 25,000.

VOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 1965

That summer, Congress

ﬁnally passed Johnson’s Voting Rights Act of 1965. The

act eliminated the so-called literacy tests that had disquali-

ﬁed many voters. It also stated that federal examiners could

enroll voters who had been denied suffrage by local ofﬁcials.

In Selma, the proportion of African Americans registered to

vote rose from 10 percent in 1964 to 60 percent in 1968.

Overall the percentage of registered African-American voters

in the South tripled.

Although the Voting Rights Act marked a major civil

rights victory, some felt that the law did not go far enough.

Centuries of discrimination had produced social and eco-

nomic inequalities. Anger over these inequalities led to a

series of violent disturbances in the cities of the North.

HISTORICAL

TWENTY-FOURTH

AMENDMENT—BARRING

POLL TAXES

On January 24, 1964, South

Dakota became the 38th state

to ratify the Twenty-fourth

Amendment to the Constitution.

The key clause in the amendment

reads: “The right of citizens of

the United States to vote in any

primary or other election . . .

shall not be denied or abridged

by the United States or any State

by reason of failure to pay any

poll tax or other tax.”

Poll taxes were often used to

keep poor African Americans from

voting. Although most states had

already abolished their poll taxes

by 1964, ﬁve Southern states—

Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi,

Tex a s , a n d V irg i n ia— s t ill had suc h

laws on the books. By making

these laws unconstitutional, the

Twent y -fou r t h Am e n dme n t g av e

the vote to millions who had been

disqualiﬁed because of poverty.

710-716-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 716

Page 7 of 7

Civil Rights 717

Terms & Names

MAIN IDEA

One American's Story

Challenges and Changes

in the Movement

WHY IT MATTERS NOW

Disagreements among civil

rights groups and the rise of

black nationalism created a

violent period in the ﬁght for

civil rights.

From the ﬁght for equality came

a resurgence of racial pride for

African Americans, a legacy that

inﬂuences today’s generations.

Alice Walker, the prize-winning novelist, became aware of the civil

rights movement in 1960, when she was 16. Her mother had

recently scraped together enough money to purchase a television.

A PERSONAL VOICE ALICE WALKER

“ Like a good omen for the future, the face of Dr. Martin Luther

King, Jr., was the ﬁrst black face I saw on our new television

screen. And, as in a fairy tale, my soul was stirred by the meaning

for me of his mission—at the time he was being rather ignomin-

iously dumped into a police van for having led a protest march in

Alabama—and I fell in love with the sober and determined face of

the Movement.

”

—In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens

The next year, Walker attended the all-black Spelman College.

In 1963, Walker took part in the March on Washington and then

traveled to Africa to discover her spiritual roots. After returning

home in 1964, she worked on voter registration, taught African

American history and writing, and wrote poetry and ﬁction.

Walker’s interest in her heritage was part of a growing trend among African

Americans in the mid-1960s. But millions of African Americans were still living

in poverty. Angry and frustrated over the difﬁculty in ﬁnding jobs and decent

housing, some participated in riots that broke out between 1964 and 1966.

African Americans Seek Greater Equality

What civil rights groups had in common in the early 1960s were their calls for a

newfound pride in black identity and a commitment to change the social and

economic structures that kept people in a life of poverty. However, by 1965, the

•de facto

segregation

•de jure

segregation

•Malcolm X

•Nation of Islam

•Stokely

Carmichael

•Black Power

•Black Panthers

•Kerner

Commission

•Civil Rights Act

of 1968

•afﬁrmative action

▼

Alice Walker during

an interview in New

York’s Central Park

in August 1970

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 717

Page 1 of 7

leading civil rights groups began to drift apart. New leaders emerged as the move-

ment turned its attention to the North, where African Americans faced not legal

segregation but deeply entrenched and oppressive racial prejudice.

NORTHERN SEGREGATION

The problem facing African Americans in the North

was de facto segregation—segregation that exists by practice and custom. De

facto segregation can be harder to ﬁght than de jure (dC jMrPC) segregation, or

segregation by law, because eliminating it requires changing people’s attitudes

rather than repealing laws. Activists in the mid-1960s would ﬁnd it much more dif-

ﬁcult to convince whites to share economic and social power with African

Americans than to convince them to share lunch counters and bus seats.

De facto segregation intensiﬁed after African Americans migrated to Northern

cities during and after World War II. This began a “white ﬂight,” in which great

numbers of whites moved out of the cities to the nearby suburbs. By the mid-

1960s, most urban African Americans lived in decaying slums, paying rent to land-

lords who didn’t comply with housing and health ordinances. The schools for

African-American children deteriorated along with their neighborhoods.

Unemployment rates were more than twice as high as those among whites.

In addition, many blacks were angry at the sometimes brutal treatment they

received from the mostly white police forces in their communities. In 1966, King

spearheaded a campaign in Chicago to end de facto segre-

gation there and create an “open city.” On July 10, he led

about 30,000 African Americans in a march on City Hall.

In late July, when King led demonstrators through a

Chicago neighborhood, angry whites threw rocks and

bottles. On August 5, hostile whites stoned King as he led

600 marchers. King left Chicago without accomplishing

what he wanted, yet pledging to return.

URBAN VIOLENCE ERUPTS

In the mid 1960s, clashes

between white authority and black civilians spread like

wildﬁre. In New York City in July 1964, an encounter

between white police and African-American teenagers

ended in the death of a 15-year-old student. This sparked

a race riot in central Harlem. On August 11, 1965, only

ﬁve days after President Johnson signed the Voting

Between 1964 and

1968, more than 100

race riots erupted in

major American

cities. The worst

included Watts in Los

Angeles in 1965

(top) and Detroit in

1967 (right). In

Detroit, 43 people

were killed and

property damage

topped $40 million.

718 C

HAPTER 21

MAIN IDEA

Comparing

How were civil

rights problems in

Northern cities

similar to those in

the South?

A. Answer

Both Northern

and Southern

blacks experi-

enced poverty

and inferior

schools, and

their civil rights

demands were

met with white

anger and vio-

lence and police

brutality.

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 718

Page 2 of 7

Rights Act into law, one of the worst race riots in the nation’s

history raged through the streets of Watts, a predominantly

African-American neighborhood in Los Angeles. Thirty-four

people were killed, and hundreds of millions of dollars worth

of property was destroyed. The next year, 1966, saw even

more racial disturbances, and in 1967 alone, riots and violent

clashes took place in more than 100 cities.

The African-American rage bafﬂed many whites. “Why

would blacks turn to violence after winning so many victories

in the South?” they wondered. Some realized that what

African Americans wanted and needed was economic equali-

ty of opportunity in jobs, housing, and education.

Even before the riots in 1964, President Johnson had

announced his War on Poverty, a program to help impover-

ished Americans. But the ﬂow of money needed to fund

Johnson’s Great Society was soon redirected to fund the war

in Vietnam. In 1967, Dr. King proclaimed, “The Great Society

has been shot down on the battleﬁelds of Vietnam.”

New Leaders Voice Discontent

The anger that sent rioters into the streets stemmed in part

from African-American leaders who urged their followers to

take complete control of their communities, livelihoods, and

culture. One such leader, Malcolm X, declared to a Harlem

audience, “If you think we are here to tell you to love the

white man, you have come to the wrong place.”

AFRICAN-AMERICAN SOLIDARITY

Malcolm X, born

Malcolm Little, went to jail at age 20 for burglary. While in

prison, he studied the teachings of Elijah Muhammad, the

head of the Nation of Islam, or the Black Muslims. Malcolm

changed his name to Malcolm X (dropping what he called his

“slave name”) and, after his release from prison in 1952,

became an Islamic minister. As he gained a following, the bril-

liant thinker and engaging speaker openly preached Elijah

Muhammad’s views that whites were the cause of the black

condition and that blacks should separate from white society.

Malcolm’s message appealed to many African Americans

and their growing racial pride. At a New York press conference

in March 1964, he also advocated armed self-defense.

A PERSONAL VOICE MALCOLM X

“ Concerning nonviolence: it is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself

when he is the constant victim of brutal attacks. It is legal and lawful to own a

shotgun or a riﬂe. We believe in obeying the law. . . . [T]he time has come for the

American Negro to ﬁght back in self-defense whenever and wherever he is being

unjustly and unlawfully attacked.

”

—quoted in Eyewitness: The Negro in American History

The press gave a great deal of publicity to Malcolm X because his controver-

sial statements made dramatic news stories. This had two effects. First, his call for

armed self-defense frightened most whites and many moderate African

Americans. Second, reports of the attention Malcolm received awakened resent-

ment in some other members of the Nation of Islam.

Civil Rights 719

MALCOLM X

1925–1965

Malcolm X’s early life left him

alienated from white society. His

father was allegedly killed by

white racists, and his mother had

an emotional collapse, leaving

Malcolm and his siblings in the

care of the state. At the end of

eighth grade, Malcolm quit school

and was later jailed for criminal

behavior. In 1946, while in prison,

Malcolm joined the Nation of

Islam. He developed a philosophy

of black superiority and separa-

tism from whites.

In the later years of his life, he

urged African Americans to iden-

tify with Africa and to work with

world organizations and even pro-

gressive whites to attain equality.

Although silenced by gunmen,

Malcolm X is a continuing inspira-

tion for many Americans.

Background

See “Islam” on

page 9.

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Causes

What were

some of the

causes of urban

rioting in the

1960s?

B. Answers

De facto segre-

gation, police

brutality, run-

down communi-

ties and schools,

and high unem-

ployment.

MAIN IDEA

Synthesizing

Why did some

Americans ﬁnd

Malcolm X’s views

alarming?

C. Answer

He blamed black

poverty and

social inferiority

on whites and

advocated

armed resis-

tance to white

oppression.

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 719

Page 3 of 7

Stokely

Carmichael

(1968).

The slogan “Black

Power” became

the battle-cry of

militant civil

rights activists.

▼

BALLOTS OR BULLETS?

In March 1964, Malcolm broke with Elijah Muhammad

over differences in strategy and doctrine and formed another Muslim organiza-

tion. One month later, he embarked on a pilgrimage to Mecca, in Saudi Arabia, a

trip required of followers of orthodox Islam. In Mecca, he learned that orthodox

Islam preached racial equality, and he worshiped alongside people from many

countries. Wrote Malcolm, “I have [prayed] . . . with fellow Muslims whose eyes

were the bluest of blue, whose hair was the blondest of blond, and whose skin was

the whitest of white.” When he returned to the United States, his attitude toward

whites had changed radically. He explained his new slogan, “Ballots or bullets,”

to a follower: “Well, if you and I don’t use the ballot, we’re going to be forced to

use the bullet. So let us try the ballot.”

Because of his split with the Black Muslims, Malcolm believed his life might be

in danger. “No one can get out without trouble,” he conﬁded. On February 21, 1965,

while giving a speech in Harlem, the 39-year-old Malcolm X was shot and killed.

BLACK POWER

In early June of 1966, tensions that had been building between

SNCC and the other civil rights groups ﬁnally erupted in Mississippi. Here, James

Meredith, the man who had integrated the University of Mississippi, set out on a

225-mile “walk against fear.” Meredith planned to walk all the way from the

Tennessee border to Jackson, but he was shot by a white racist and was too injured

to continue.

Martin Luther King, Jr., of the SCLC, Floyd McKissick of CORE, and Stokely

Carmichael of SNCC decided to lead their followers in a march to ﬁnish what

Meredith had started. But it soon became apparent that SNCC and CORE members

were quite militant, as they began to shout slogans similar to those of the black sep-

aratists who had followed Malcolm X. When King tried to rally the marchers with

the refrain of “We Shall Overcome,” many SNCC workers—bitter over the violence

they’d suffered during Freedom Summer—began singing, “We shall overrun.”

Police in Greenwood, Mississippi, arrested Carmichael for setting up a tent on

the grounds of an all-black high school. When Carmichael showed up at a rally

later, his face swollen from a beating, he electriﬁed the crowd.

A P

ERSONAL VOICE STOKELY CARMICHAEL

“ This is the twenty-seventh time I have been arrested—and I ain’t going

to jail no more! . . . We been saying freedom for six years—and we ain’t

got nothin’. What we’re gonna start saying now is BLACK POWER.

”

—quoted in The Civil Rights Movement: An Eyewitness History

Black Power, Carmichael said, was a “call for black people to begin to

deﬁne their own goals . . . [and] to lead their own organizations.” King

urged him to stop using the phrase because he believed it would provoke

African Americans to violence and antagonize whites. Carmichael

refused and urged SNCC to stop recruiting whites and to

focus on developing African-American pride.

BLACK PANTHERS

Later that year, another development

demonstrated the growing radicalism of some segments of

the African-American community. In Oakland, California,

in October 1966, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded

a political party known as the Black Panthers to ﬁght

police brutality in the ghetto. The party advocated self-

sufﬁciency for African-American communities, as well as

full employment and decent housing. Members main-

tained that African Americans should be exempt from mili-

tary service because an unfair number of black youths had

been drafted to serve in Vietnam.

720

D. Answer

SNCC leaders

worried that

calls for Black

Power would

provoke black

violence and

alienate whites.

MAIN IDEA

Analyzing

Motives

Why did some

leaders of SNCC

disagree with

SCLC tactics?

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 720

Page 4 of 7

Dressed in black leather jackets, black berets, and sunglasses, the Panthers

preached self-defense and sold copies of the writings of Mao Zedong, leader of the

Chinese Communist revolution. Several police shootouts occurred between the

Panthers and police, and the FBI conducted numerous investigations of group mem-

bers (sometimes using illegal tactics). Even so, many of the Panthers’ activities—the

establishment of daycare centers, free breakfast programs, free medical clinics, assis-

tance to the homeless, and other services—won support in the ghettos.

1968—A Turning Point

in Civil Rights

Martin Luther King, Jr., objected to the Black Power

movement. He believed that preaching violence could

only end in grief. King was planning to lead a Poor

People’s March on Washington, D.C. However, this

time the people would have to march without him.

KING’S DEATH

Dr. King seemed to sense that

death was near. On April 3, 1968, he addressed a

crowd in Memphis, where he had gone to support

the city’s striking garbage workers. “I may not get

there with you but . . . we as a people will get to the

Promised Land.” He added, “I’m not fearing any

man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming

of the Lord.” The next day as King stood on his

hotel balcony, James Earl Ray thrust a high-powered

riﬂe out of a window and squeezed the trigger. King

crumpled to the ﬂoor.

REACTIONS TO KING’S DEATH

The night King

died, Robert F. Kennedy was campaigning for the

Democratic presidential nomination. Fearful that

King’s death would spark riots, Kennedy’s advisers

told him to cancel his appearance in an African-

American neighborhood in Indianapolis. However,

Kennedy attended anyway, making an impassioned

plea for nonviolence.

A PERSONAL VOICE ROBERT F. KENNEDY

“ For those of you who are black—considering the evidence

. . . that there were white people who were responsible—you

can be ﬁlled with bitterness, with hatred, and a desire for re-

venge. We can move in that direction as a country, in great

polarization—black people amongst black, white people

amongst white, ﬁlled with hatred toward one another.

Or we can make an effort, as Martin Luther King did, to

understand and comprehend, and to replace that violence,

that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with

an effort to understand [with] compassion and love.

”

—“A Eulogy for Dr. Mar tin Luther King, Jr.”

Despite Kennedy’s plea, rage over King’s death led to the worst urban rioting

in United States history. Over 100 cities exploded in ﬂames. The hardest-hit cities

included Baltimore, Chicago, Kansas City, and Washington, D.C. Then in June

1968, Robert Kennedy himself was assassinated by a Jordanian immigrant who

was angry over Kennedy’s support of Israel.

Civil Rights 721

(above) Coretta Scott King mourns

her husband at his funeral service.

(below) Robert F. Kennedy

Vocabular y

polarization:

separation into

opposite camps

E. Answer

Americans

feared the Black

Panther’s

rhetoric and

their involve-

ment in vio-

lence; some

poor African

Americans ben-

eﬁted from their

community pro-

grams.

MAIN IDEA

Making

Inferences

Why was the

public reaction to

the Black Panthers

mixed?

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 721

Page 5 of 7

Legacy of the Civil Rights Movement

On March 1, 1968, the Kerner Commission, which President Johnson had

appointed to study the causes of urban violence, issued its 200,000-word report. In

it, the panel named one main cause: white racism. Said the report: “This is our basic

conclusion: Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—sepa-

rate and unequal.” The report called for the nation to create new jobs, construct new

housing, and end de facto segregation in order to wipe out the destructive ghetto

environment. However, the Johnson administration ignored many of the recom-

mendations because of white opposition to such sweeping changes. So what had the

civil rights movement accomplished?

CIVIL RIGHTS GAINS

The civil rights movement ended de jure segregation by

bringing about legal protection for the civil rights of all Americans. Congress

passed the most important civil rights legislation since Reconstruction, including

the Civil Rights Act of 1968, which ended discrimination in housing. After

school segregation ended, the numbers of African Americans

who ﬁnished high school and who went to college increased

signiﬁcantly. This in turn led to better jobs and business

opportunities.

Another accomplishment of the civil rights movement

was to give African Americans greater pride in their racial

identity. Many African Americans adopted African-inﬂuenced

styles and proudly displayed symbols of African history and

culture. College students demanded new Black Studies pro-

grams so they could study African-American history and liter-

ature. In the entertainment world, the “color bar” was lowered

as African Americans began to appear more frequently in

movies and on television shows and commercials.

In addition, African Americans made substantial political

gains. By 1970, an estimated two-thirds of eligible African

Americans were registered to vote, and a signiﬁcant increase

in African-American elected ofﬁcials resulted. The number of

African Americans holding elected ofﬁce grew from fewer

than 100 in 1965 to more than 7,000 in 1992. Many civil

rights activists went on to become political leaders, among

them Reverend Jesse Jackson, who sought the Democratic

nomination for president in 1984 and 1988; Vernon Jordan,

who led voter-registration drives that enrolled about 2 million

African Americans; and Andrew Young, who has served as UN

ambassador and Atlanta’s mayor.

UNFINISHED WORK

The civil rights movement was suc-

cessful in changing many discriminatory laws. Yet as the

1960s turned to the 1970s, the challenges for the movement

changed. The issues it confronted—housing and job discrim-

ination, educational inequality, poverty, and racism—

involved the difﬁcult task of changing people’s attitudes and

behavior. Some of the proposed solutions, such as more tax

monies spent in the inner cities and the forced busing of

schoolchildren, angered some whites, who resisted further

changes. Public support for the civil rights movement

declined because some whites were frightened by the urban

riots and the Black Panthers.

By 1990, the trend of whites ﬂeeing the cities for the

suburbs had reversed much of the progress toward school

722 C

HAPTER 21

MAIN IDEA

Evaluating

What were

some accomplish-

ments of the civil

rights movement?

SHIRLEY CHISHOLM

African-American women such as

Shirley Chisholm exempliﬁed the

advances won in the civil rights

movement. In 1968, Chisholm

became the ﬁrst African-American

woman in the United States

House of Representatives.

In the mid-1960s, Chisholm

served in the New York state

assembly, representing a district

in New York City. While there, she

supported programs to establish

public day-care centers and pro-

vide unemployment insurance to

domestic workers.

In 1972, Chisholm gained

national prominence by running

for the Democratic presidential

nomination. Despite the fact that

she never won more than 10% of

the vote in the primaries, she

controlled 152 delegates at the

Democratic convention in Miami.

HISTORICAL

F. A n s we r

End of legalized

segregation;

constitutional

and legal pro-

tection of civil

rights and voting

rights;

increased pride

in racial identity;

more African

American vot-

ers, elected ofﬁ-

cials, and high

school and col-

lege graduates.

They were

secured through

the civil rights

movement,

which helped

change national

opinion, and

through result-

ing federal inter-

vention and pas-

sage of federal

laws like the

Voting Rights

Act of 1965,

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 722

Page 6 of 7

Civil Rights 723

MAIN IDEA

2. TAKING NOTES

Create a timeline of key events of

the civil rights movement.

In your opinion, which event was

most signiﬁcant? Why?

CRITICAL THINKING

3. ANALYZING ISSUES

What factors contributed to the

outbreak of violence in the ﬁght for

civil rights? Think About:

• different leaders’ approach to

civil rights issues

• living conditions in urban areas

• de facto and de jure segregation

4. COMPARING AND CONTRASTING

Compare and contrast the civil

rights strategies of Malcolm X and

Martin Luther King, Jr. Whose

strategies do you think were more

effective? Explain and support your

response.

Vocabular y

quota:

requirement that a

certain number of

positions are ﬁlled

by minorities

•de facto segregation

•de jure segregation

•Malcolm X

•Nation of Islam

•Stokely Carmichael

•Black Power

•Black Panthers

•Kerner Commission

•Civil Rights Act of 1968

•afﬁrmative action

1. TERMS & NAMES For each term or name, write a sentence explaining its signiﬁcance.

integration. In 1996–1997, 28 per-

cent of blacks in the South and

50 percent of blacks in the

Northeast were attending schools

with fewer than 10 percent whites.

Lack of jobs also remained a serious

problem for African Americans, who

had a poverty rate three times that

of whites.

To help equalize education and

job opportunities, the government

in the 1960s began to promote

afﬁrmative action. Afﬁrmative-

action programs involve making spe-

cial efforts to hire or enroll groups

that have suffered discrimination.

Many colleges and almost all compa-

nies that do business with the feder-

al government adopted such pro-

grams. But in the late 1970s, some

people began to criticize afﬁrmative-

action programs as “reverse discrimi-

nation” that set minority hiring or

enrollment quotas and deprived

whites of opportunities. In the

1980s, Republican administrations

eased affirmative-action require-

ments for some government con-

tractors. The fate of affirmative

action is still to be decided.

Today, African Americans and whites interact in ways that could have only

been imagined before the civil rights movement. In many respects, Dr. King’s

dream has been realized—yet much remains to be done.

July

1964

April

1968

August

1965

October

1966

February

1965

Changes in Poverty and Education

Poverty Status

African Americans Whites

College Education

African Americans

Whites

1959 1999 1959 1999

Source: U.S. Bureau of Census

56% 22.7% 16.5% 8.1%

3.3% 15.4% 8.6% 25.9%

Persons with four or more years of college All other persons

Persons 25 years of age or older

Persons in families

Persons living in poverty Persons not living in pover ty

Source: U.S. Bureau of Census

SKILLBUILDER

Interpreting Graphs

Did the economic situation for African Americans get

better or worse between 1959 and 1999?

About how much greater was the percentage of whites

completing four or more years of college in 1999 than

the percentage of African Americans?

717-723-Chapter 21 10/21/02 5:51 PM Page 723

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