The civil rights movement portal The 1963March on Washington participants and leaders marching from theWashington Monument to theLincoln Memorial Thecivil rights movement social movement in theUnited States from 1954 to 1968 which aimed to abolish legalizedracial segregation ,discrimination , anddisenfranchisement in the country, which most commonly affectedAfrican Americans . The movement had origins in theReconstruction era in the late 19th century, and modern roots in the 1940s. After years ofnonviolent protests andcivil disobedience campaigns, the civil rights movement achieved many of its legislative goals in the 1960s, during which it secured new protections infederal law for thecivil rights of all Americans, including theCivil Rights Act of 1964 and theVoting Rights Act of 1965 .
Following theAmerican Civil War (1861–1865), the threeReconstruction Amendments to theU.S. Constitution abolished slavery and granted citizenship to all African Americans, the majority of whom had recently been enslaved in the southern states. During Reconstruction, African-American men in the South voted and held political office, but after 1877 they were increasingly deprived of civil rights under racistJim Crow laws (which for examplebanned interracial marriage , introducedliteracy tests for voters , andsegregated schools ) and were subjected to violence fromwhite supremacists during thenadir of American race relations . African Americans who moved to the North in order to improve their prospects in theGreat Migration also faced barriers in employment and housing. Legal racial discrimination was upheld by theSupreme Court in its 1896 decision inPlessy v. Ferguson separate but equal ". The movement for civil rights, led by figures such asW. E. B. Du Bois andBooker T. Washington , achieved few gains until afterWorld War II . In 1948, PresidentHarry S. Truman issuedan executive order abolishing discrimination in the armed forces.
In 1954, the Supreme Court struck down state laws establishingracial segregation in public schools inBrown v. Board of Education Martin Luther King Jr. and others, began a campaign ofnonviolent protests andcivil disobedience including theMontgomery bus boycott in 1955–1956, "sit-ins " inGreensboro andNashville in 1960, theBirmingham campaign in 1963, and a march fromSelma to Montgomery in 1965. Press coverage of events such as the lynching ofEmmett Till in 1955 and the use of fire hoses and dogs against protesters in Birmingham increased public support for the civil rights movement. In 1963, about 250,000 people participated in theMarch on Washington , after which PresidentJohn F. Kennedy asked Congress to pass civil rights legislation. Kennedy's successor,Lyndon B. Johnson , overcame the opposition of southern politicians to pass three major laws: theCivil Rights Act of 1964 , which prohibited discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin inpublic accommodations , employment, and federally assisted programs; theVoting Rights Act of 1965 , which outlawed discriminatory voting laws and authorized federal oversight of election law in areas with a history of voter suppression; and theFair Housing Act of 1968 , which banned housing discrimination. The Supreme Court made further pro–civil rights rulings in cases includingBrowder v. Gayle Loving v. Virginia Full article...
TheWhite Citizens' Councils white supremacist ,segregationist organizations in the United States, concentrated in theSouth and created as part of awhite backlash against theUS Supreme Court 'slandmark Brown v. Board of Education Citizens' Councils of America in 1956. With about 60,000 members across theSouthern United States , the groups were founded primarily to opposeracial integration of public schools: the logical conclusion of theBrown v. Board of Education ruling.
The Councils also worked to oppose voter registration efforts in the South (where most African Americans had beendisenfranchised since the late 19th century) and integration of public facilities in general during the 1950s and 1960s. Members employed tactics such as economic boycotts, unjustified termination of employment, propaganda, and outright violence. By the 1970s the influence of the Councils had waned considerably due to the passage of federal civil rights legislation. The councils' mailing lists and some of their board members found their way to theSt. Louis –basedCouncil of Conservative Citizens , founded in 1985. (Full article...
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The following are images from various civil rights movement-related articles on Wikipedia.
Image 1 A diagram showing where Rosa Parks sat in the unreserved section at the time of her arrest (from
Montgomery bus boycott )
Image 7 A plaque commemorating a sit-in that took place in February 1960 in Chattanooga, Tennessee (from
Sit-in movement )
Image 10 50th Anniversary of the Civil Rights March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (from
March on Washington )
Image 16 Leaders arrived late and linked arms in front of marchers on Constitution Avenue. (from
March on Washington )
Image 18 Kennedy meets with march leaders. Left to Right – Willard Wirtz, Matthew Ahmann, Martin Luther King Jr., John Lewis, Rabbi Joachin Prinz, Eugene Carson Blake, A. Philip Randolph, President John F. Kennedy, Vice President Lyndon Johnson, Walter Reuther, Whitney Young, Floyd McKissick, Roy Wilkins (not in order) (from
March on Washington )
Image 21 Leaders of the March on Washington speak to the news media after meeting with President Kennedy at the White House. (from
March on Washington )
Image 22 Image of workers guarding an entrance to the Fischer Body Plant in Flint, Michigan (1937) (from
Sit-in movement )
Image 27 Close up of some leaders of the March on Washington walking along Constitution Avenue. (from
March on Washington )
Image 31 Rosa Parks being fingerprinted by Deputy Sheriff D.H. Lackey after her arrest for boycotting public transportation (from
Montgomery bus boycott )
Image 33 One of the many churches involved in aiding members of the sit-movement (from
Sit-in movement )
John Warren Davis West Virginia State University inInstitute, West Virginia , a position he held from 1919 to 1953. Born inMilledgeville, Georgia , Davis relocated toAtlanta in 1903 to attend high school at Atlanta Baptist College (later known asMorehouse College ). He worked his way through high school and college at Morehouse and graduated with aBachelor of Arts degree in 1911. At Morehouse, Davis formed associations withJohn Hope ,Mordecai Wyatt Johnson ,Samuel Archer ,Benjamin Griffith Brawley ,Booker T. Washington , andW. E. B. Du Bois . He completedgraduate studies in chemistry and physics at theUniversity of Chicago from 1911 to 1913 and served on the faculty of Morehouse as theregistrar and as a professor in chemistry and physics. While in Atlanta, Davis helped to found one of the city's first chapters of theNational Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Davis served as the executive secretary of theTwelfth Street YMCA inWashington, D.C. , from 1917 to 1919 when he was elected as the president ofWest Virginia Collegiate Institute . Under his leadership the school, (later renamed West Virginia State College), became one of the leadinghistorically black colleges and universities andland-grant universities in the United States, in both academics and athletics. Through Davis' efforts, West Virginia Collegiate Institute became the first African American college to beaccredited by theNorth Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA) in 1927. Under his leadership, the college became home to the West Virginia Schools for the Colored Deaf and Blind and to West Virginia'sExtension Service for African Americans. Davis also secured aCivilian Pilot Training Program (CPTP) andArmy Specialized Training Program (ASTP) unit for the college duringWorld War II . Through his efforts and educational statesmanship, Davis laid the groundwork for West Virginia State's transition into an integrated institution, and white students began enrolling in large numbers toward the end of his presidency. (Full article...
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During the Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. — Leaders marching from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial, (August 28, 1963).
Eventstimeline )
Prior to 1954 1954–1959 1960–1963 1964–1968
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