NAACP-African Americans had to regain the right to vote in the South. The Black Power Movement was started in the 60's and continued the work of the previous generations. The women's movement was often called feminism, and feminists wanted equal pay as men, the same rights in law situations and control over their families. Latin americans had the Chicano Movement in the 1960s. Latin Americans wanted the same things women did and more, examples being equal pay and not being discriminated against.
Martin Luther King Jr.-Originally born Michael, he served as a priest for a good long while, following his dad and granddad. He destroyed everything he attempted, graduated high school at 15 and got like 3 degrees in 3 different colleges. He arranged the boycott of buses for over a year until segregation on buses was removed, and the whole while he was arrested, his house was bombed, and he was assault several times, but he still came through as a fantastic leader. Between 1957 and 1968 he traveled over six million miles to make over 2500 speeches wherever injustice was found. In his whole life he was arrested over 20 times. At 35 he was the youngest man to achieve a Nobel Peace Prize, and he turned over the prize money of almost 55 grand to the cause.
Martin Luther King Jr.
Malcolm X-The Black Legion forced his family to move twice before Malcolm was four. He did very very well in school until his dream job was shot down by his teacher, who said "That is no realistic goal for a n****r." He moved and lived on petty crimes, but was soon coordinating prostitution and gambling rings, along with narcotics. He was arrested on burglary, and spent 7 years in prison. He learned more there and converted to the Muslim religion. He considered his last name, "Little", a "slave name", kinda dumb, it's just your last name and so he replaced it with an X for his lost tribal name. He moved up in the Nation of Islam, and was soon in charge. He built new mosques in Detroit and Harlem, and got members up from 500 to 30,000. As the nation grew, the FBI infiltrated it and even had an agent act as one of Malcolm's body guards. He soon was tested by faith, however, as his mentor Elijah Muhammad was found to be an adulterer, having relations with as many as 6 women from the Nation of Islam. He ditched the organization to found his own, and was threatened by Muhammad and assassination attempts were attempted. However him and his family escaped all physical harm.
Jackie Robinson-Jackie Robinson was the first African American baseball player. Born to sharecroppers, he was good at all sports and lettered in four in college, football, track, baseball, and basketball. He had to leave college cause he was poor, and he enlisted in the army. He was court martialed due to racial incidents and eventually left with an honorable discharge. He played one season in the Negro Baseball League, and then was approached by the Dodgers, who accepted him onto their team. At the end of the first season he had incredible stats, and was the MVP of the year in 1949. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962, but his better accomplishments were breaking the racial barrier of sports.
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka-The supreme court ruled in favor of segregating schools being unconstitutional. This was a hugely massive intense decision, and it had a lot of effect on society. It forced whites to accept blacks into their schools, and it made the road to equality much easier for blacks.
De-segregating the US Military-Eisenhower allowed blacks to step in and fight with his all white units in the Battle of the Bulge in WWII, the first time since the War of 1812 that blacks fought along whites. Harry Truman's Executive Order 9981 ordered the integration of military units soon after this, going around Congress. Then the Korean War started, and the still segregated Eighth Army was sent over. Soon, due to the huge white losses, blacks were allowed in to replace them, integrating the armies. The integration went very well and the higher-ups saw this and soon the armies were integrated back home.
Little Rock 9- Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka happens, and the schools have to be integrated. Soon the schools are being integrated, and a six year plan is proposed to start with high school first and work the way down. Soon many students are being turned down to white schools anyway, and the NAACP files a lawsuit on behalf of 33 students turned down. A federal judge simply turned it down. The buses of Little Rock are desegregated just fine. 17 Black students are selected to join all white Central High. Soon it's just down to 11. Then some people wanted to slow it down even further to prevent violence, and it is green lighted. But then a judge says it is starting the next day, and so the Little Rock Nine try to go to school, but are stopped by the National Guard. They go in a side door, the mobs gets mad, so they come back out. Then President Eisenhower federalizes the 10,000 state Guard troops and send 1000 of an elite unit to help the integration. The rest of the school year was almost normal.
The Little Rock Nine
Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott-Thursday December 1st, 1955, in downtown Montgomery Rosa Parks boarded a bus to go home after a long day at work. She sat in the very first seat in the black section in the back of the bus. As the bus kept going along its route all of the white seats filled up, but more got on. The bus driver went back and moved the "Colored" sign back, demanding that four blacks move back so that the whites could sit. The other three moved except her, and when told to move again she moved to the window. The conductor asked her why she didn't stand up, and she replied "I don't think I should have to stand up. She was then arrested, but continued on to work with other civil rights leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr.
Rosa Parks
Greensboro sit-ins-Up until this time, African Americans accepted segregation. Four students at a A&T college, a.k.a. the Greensboro Four, "sat in" a diner of some sort, and refused to leave even when told to. They defied the rules of segregation, "With their very bodies they obstructed the wheels of injustice". They were put in jail, and they got out, and did it again and again, gaining supporters by the hour and started a movement that spread all across the South.
Freedom Rides-Both blacks and whites that protested discrimination and segregation. The very first was in May 1961. They protested segregated buses. One bus was burned on the way, and they were attacked by many whites. Many of them were arrested on charges of trespassing and were arrested in Missouri, though they still had the support they had, and it influenced the people to make changes.
Birmingham, Alabama—1963- Civil leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr. met at a church, including The Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Congress of Racial Equality. The main idea of the meeting was to achieve suffrage for African Americans. September of 1963, a member of the Ku Klux Klan put a bomb on the church steps. It was detonated, and killed four girls, injuring numerous others. He was tried, and eventually spent the rest of his life in jail.
Mississippi Summer Project( Freedom Summer project)-1964 the United States wanted to get a lot of Mississippi black voters, and so they tried to get a lot. They also set up houses and schools and such in small towns to help out.
Selma, Alabama—1965-The March of Fear was 600 activists that got tear gassed and clubbed while trying to march on Montgomery. The second and third times Martin Luther King Jr led them, but the third time by the end they had 25,000 people. Kennedy signed the act they wanted three months later.
Voting Rights Act of 1965-President Johnson signed this act to prevent discriminatory voting disallowances in the South, such as literacy tests.
Civil Rights Act of 1964-This completely outlawed segregation everywhere and anywhere. Buses, schools, drinking fountains, everything was open to everyone. Discrimination against sex or race is now illegal.
Stokely Carmichael-In 1961, he was a Freedom Rider. He then worked for the Freedom Summer Project to become chairman of the Soviet Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and he led the March Against Fear when the leader of that was shot, and he was arrested his 27th time. Upon his release he delivered a powerful Black Power speech, suggesting Black Pride, developing Black cultural symbols such as the afro. He criticized Martin Luther King Jr's non violence.
Black Panthers-These guys started up in 1966, becoming a famous Black political power.
Affirmative action-A failing attempt at ending discrimination, really doesn't work most of the time. The idea is to prove that a company or such is not racist by hiring minorities, who are sometime not qualified enough so a white man wrongly loses his job. Good idea, bad use of the idea.
Jesse Jackson-This was another Civil Rights leader. He was a Baptist minister, like everyone else, and was even with Martin Luther King Junior when he got shot. He was also accused of abusing his position and suspended from his organizations. He founded the People United to Save Humanity.
http://www.centralhigh57.org/1957-58.htm
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