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Civil Rights in the 1940s
Double Victory
 Victory at home and abroad!
“This is a particularly good time to campaign against the evils of
bigotry, prejudice, and race hatred because we have witnessed the
defeat of enemies who tried to found a mastery of the world upon such
cruel and fallacious policy.” –New York Times
 Fall ‘46- assessment of civil rights by Truman
 Segregation + communist threat
 Reality of segregation & lynching  Committee on Civil Rights
 Fair Employment Practices Committee, revocation of fed. aid /schools
 July ‘48- END OF. .. racial discrimination in hiring of federal
employees, in military (air force, navy)
Jackie Robinson
 Public effort at defeating segregation
 April ‘47- NL Brooklyn Dodgers + JR
 Born GA, raised CA
 Negro league star, army vet
 Struggle for acceptance from whites, on and off field
 Public showing that racism- NOT INFERIORITY- held back black
advancement
The Early Civil Rights
Movement
Origins
 1947- Jackie Robinson debuts with the Brooklyn Dodgers
 1948- Truman integrates the military
 1950s- South still entrenched in segregation
 Literacy tests, poll taxes, grandfather clauses, intimidation, segregation in
schools & public facilities, economic discrimination
 By 1940s – 1950s, blacks a major factor in politics of Democratic
party (voting in North)
 US reputation for freedom, democracy on the line vs. communism
Ike’s Stance
 Committed to CR in principle

Desegregation of public services in DC, navy yards, veterans’ hospitals
 Problems?

Prefer state/local action of federal involvement

Doubt that laws could change racial attitudes
 Leadership for change from judicial branch, not exec or legis.

“I don’t believe you can change the hearts of men with laws or decisions.” -DDE
 1930s NAACP to test “separate but equal”

Plessy = segregation upheld in 1896

Charles H. Houston (Howard U.) + Thurgood Marshall (NAACP)

 Sweatt v. Painter- SC rule separate black law school in TX failed to “measure up”
 Isolation from future lawyers whom graduates would interact
The Brown Decision
 Early 1950s- challenges to state laws mandating segregation in public
schools to Supreme Court by NAACP in 1952

KS, DE, SC, VA, DC
 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, 1952

Claim? Violation of 14th Amend- no equal protection of the laws

Chief Justice Earl Warren- May 17, 1954

Unanimous court declares that. . . “in the field of public education the doctrine of
‘separate but equal’ has no place.”
 Support?

Sociological, psychological findings
 Even if S/E, fact of separating people by race  feelings of inferiority

Into 1955- SC directed “a prompt and reasonable start toward full compliance” so
integration can move “with deliberate speed.”
 Much resistance to decision
 Temporary closing of schools
 VA resistance struck down when state/federal courts struck down laws to cut funds
from integrated schools in 1959
 Little Rock, AR- 1956: Gov. Orval Faubus use National Guard to stop 9
students from entering LRHS (ordered by Fed. Cort).
  Ike intervention
 Responsibility to uphold federal authority 1,000 federal troops stand guard,
protect students as walked to schools for whole year
 Nat’l Guard on federal service
 1st since Recon. to use federal troops to protect rights of blacks
 Ike avoid force in moving white southerners to compliance
 Privately- “the SC decision set back progress in the South at least fifteen years.
The fellow who tries to tell me you can do these things by force is just plain
nuts.”
 Did not actively support desegregation, reservations on Brown
 Integration begins by ‘54 in border states, hostility in Deep South
& VA
 Led by Citizens’ Councils
 = middle-upper class versions of KKK (250k+ members)
 No physical violence or intimidation use economic coercion
 If defy white supremacy, lose job, insurance policy canceled, denied loans/mortgages
 By end of ‘55, much hostility towards integration of schools
 VA Senator Harry Byrd- rallying cry = “massive resistance”
 1956- 101 southern members of Congress sign “Southern
Manifesto”
 Denounced Brown decision as “clear abuse of judicial power.”
Montgomery Bus Boycott
 NAACP + courts give legal level to CR movement
 Individuals risk lives to help movement progress
 Montgomery, AL- Dec. 1, 1955
 Local ordinance for blacks to give up bus/train seats to whites when asked
 Rosa Parks  meeting @ Dexter Ave. Baptist Church  bus boycott under
Montgomery Improvement Assoc.
MLK
 Martin Luther King, Jr.
 26-year old pastor of Dexter Ave.
 Born in ATL, grandson of slave, son of pastor
 Intelligence + courage + eloquence
 Morehouse College in ATL, seminary degree, Ph.D. in philosophy from Boston
U.
 Message?
 Nonviolent disobedience (Gospel message, Thoreau, Gandhi)
 “We must use the weapon of love. We must realize so many people are taught
to hate us that they are not totally responsible for their hate.”
 “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.”
 People of Montgomery form carpools, hitchhiked, walked
 White leaders hold out vs. boycott, bus company
 1956- Boycotters won federal case vs. bus segregation  SC letting
stand opinion of lesser court
 “the separate but equal doctrine can no longer be safely followed as a correct
statement of the law.”
  end of boycott
 Southern Xn Leadership Conf. (SCLC)
 To keep alive spirit of boycott
 MLK- unexploded dynamite bomb on front porch
The Civil Rights Act
 Ike support of black right to vote
 1956- know division in Dem. Party b/t north & south, need reclaim
black vote for Repub.
 Proposed legislation = Civil Rights Act of 1957
 Established Civil Rights Commission & Civil Rights Division in Justice Dept.
 Seek rulings to prevent interference with right to vote
 1st CR law since Recon.
 Supported by Senate Maj. Leader Lyndon B. Johnson (TX Dem)
 Successful?
 By ’59, no more black voters than in ’57
 NO TEETH & need of presidential enforcement
 1960- CRA
 Federal court referees register blacks anywhere there was a “pattern &
practice” of discrimination
Nonviolent Protest
 Feb. 1960- college students in Greensboro, NC begin “sit-in”
movement
 Refused service at segregated Woolworth’s lunch counter
 Students invite arrest by sitting in areas for whites only
 Use to call attention to racial injustice
 Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee formed in spring
1960
 Sit-ins used in 1960s: restaurants, hotels, libraries, pools, transportation
Civil Rights in the 60s
The Warren Court
 1960s SC under Chief Justice Earl Warren
 Civil Liberties
 Mapp v. Ohio (‘61)
 Illegally seized evidence can’t be used in court against accused
 Gideon v. Wainwright (‘63)
 Every felony defendant be provided a lawyer regardless of ability to pay
 Escobedo v. Illinois (’64)
 Person accused of crime must be allowed to consult lawyer before interrogation
 Miranda v. Arizona (‘66)
 Any accused person in police custody must be informed of basic rights (remain silent,
know anything said can be used against you in court, to a defense attorney during
interrogation), rules for police in informing suspects of rights
Freedoms of . . .
 Extended rights of First Amend. to protect radical actions of
demonstrators, students; freedom of press; ban religious activities
from schools; guarantee adults’ rights to use contraceptives
 Yates v. United States (‘57)
 Protects radical/revoluntionary speech (Comm. Included) unless a “clear and present
danger” to safety
 Engel v. Vitale (‘62)
 State laws requiring prayer/Bible in public schools violate separation of church &
state (First Amend)
 Griswold v. Connecticut (‘65)
 State can’t prohibit use of contraceptives (right to privacy)
 Much defense of unpopular groups, rights of “accused criminals”  call for
impeachment of Warren
Civil Rights Expansion
JFK & Civil Rights
 At first, reluctant to challenge southern Dems, not personally
committed (Robert)
 Conscience moved by grassroots movement led by MLK
Sit-ins & Freedom Riders
 MLK & “militant non-violence” spread to other states to challenge
Jim Crow through direct action
 Lawsuits to desegregate schools
 Momentum  Greensboro/Woolworth, 2/1/60  mass movement in
54 cities, 9 states
 Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) + SCLC spread sit-ins
 “Kneel-ins” at churches, “wade-ins” at pools
 Music- “We Shall Overcome”
 1960-1961
 3,600 black & white activists in jail, beaten w/ clubs, cattle prods, hit with
rocks, cigarette burns, verbal abuse
 1961
 Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) sent “freedom riders” to test federal ruling
to ban segregation on buses/trains
 AL- mobs attack travelers, burned bus, assault on observers
 Demonstrators persist  nat’l attention, support for cause
 Work to integrate public places, register blacks to vote
Federal Intervention
 1962
 MS- Gov. Ross Barnett refuse James Meredith enrollment @ Univ. of MS
 God made “the Negro different to punish him.”
 Robert Kennedy- federal marshals sent to enforce law, met by violent white mob
 Federal troops intervene, Meredith registered after 2 deaths, injuries
 1963
 MLK demonstrations in B’ham met by Police Comm. Eugene “Bull” Connor
 Connor sends police w/ dogs, tear gas, electric cattle prods, fire hoses
 Seen by millions on TV
 MLK arrest, jailed for “illegal demonstrations”
  Letter from a Birmingham Jail
 Defense of nonviolent strategy
 “One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a
willingness to accept the penalty.”
 Shift in strategy
 Before- emphasis on need to educate southern whites about injustices of segregation
 Now- gain federal enforcement & new laws by provoking racists to display violent
hatred
 J. Edgar Hoover outraged- saw MLK as “the most dangerous Negro of the future in
this nation.”  order agents to follow MLK, wiretaps, rumors circulated to discredit
MLK
 Much opposition to integration
 1963- AL Gov. George Wallace
 Stands in doorway to Univ. of AL to block enrollment of black students
 Federal marshalls  step aside
 Same night, NAACP official Medgar Evers shot to death in Jackson, MS
 August 28, 1963
 200k blacks, whites marched down Mall in DC to Lincoln Memorial
 “We Shall Overcome”
 Largest civil rights dem. in US history
 MLK address in front of Lincoln’s statue
“Even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. . .one
day. . . The sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to
sit together at the table of brotherhood.”
 September, 1963
 Bomb in B’ham church kills 4 young black girls
 Value of MLK
 Converts won across nation- whites forced to confront myth of virtue and
innocent vs. brutal reality of racial hatred
 JFK persuaded by Robert to seek new legislation on civil rights
 Robert greater conviction, compassion, vision
 1963- racial discrimination “has no place in American life or law”
 Endorse civil rights bill to end discrimination in public facilities, desegregate
public schools, protect black voters
 Bill blocked by southern Dems
From Civil Rights to Black
Power
Civil Rights Acts
 1964 Segregation illegal in all public facilities (Hotels, restaurants, etc.)
 Gov. has power to enforce integration (via lawsuits)
 Equal Opportunity Commission- ban on job discrimination (race, sex, religion)
 “. . . The day we gave the South to the Republican party for the rest of our
lifetime.” –LBJ
 24th Amend brings end to poll tax
 1965 Voter-registration drive in the South (3 mil. unregistered)
 March 7- 25: protestors march for voting rights (Selma  Montgomery) met by
state troopers fed. judge Oks march  LBJ sends troops
 Voting Rights Act of ’65
 End of literacy tests, federal registrars in any area blacks kept from voting
 Less than 50% of adults voting in ‘64
 = start of four “long hot summers” of race conflict
 Chicago, Cleveland, Newark, Detroit (tanks in streets), LA
 CR shift to urban blacks
 Mid 60’s, 70% of blacks in urban areas, most in central-city slums
& ghettos, poverty high
 Nonviolent tactics of South not effective in North
 N issues from segregated residential patterns (not laws), no
similar cultural heritage b/t whites & blacks in N
 Riots differ from previous because “. . . Initiated by blacks
themselves in an effort to destroy what they could not stomach and
what civil rights legislation seemed unable to change.” –
Commission on Civil Disorders
Malcolm X & Militant Resistance
 By ‘66, black nat’lism, separatism, self-improvement taught by
Elijah Muhammad (Black Muslim)
 Malcolm X (Malcolm X) converts while in prison (‘52)
 Critical of MLK as “an Uncle Tom”, advocated self-defense (black violence to
counter white violence) , advanced to Org. of Afro-American Unity by ‘64
 Assassinated in ‘65, Harlem
 Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee dominated by “black
power” in late 60s  separation from nonviolent SCLC
 No whites involved, violence advocated
 ‘66- Stokely Carmichael, ‘67- H. Rap Brown
 Black Panther Party emerges out of Oakland
 Urban black revolutionaries led by Huey P. Newton, Eldridge Cleaver
 Militant, armed, used terror
 “black power” movement only small group (15%)
 Most align w/ MLK, SCLC, NAACP
 MLK sees as “nihilistic” and holds view that “we can’t win violently.”
 Effects?
 Helped blacks take pride in racial heritage (African-American)
 Forced MLK & others to start new stage of movement- focus on poor inner-city
blacks (jobs, housing along with legal rights)
Assassinations
 Pressure as peaceful marches in North had little success,
disagreement w/ LBJ on Vietnam issues
 War in Vietnam vs. War on poverty, $ for social programs
 April 4, 1968- Memphis, TN
 Shot by James Earl Ray while standing on balcony of Memphis hotel
 June 6, 1968 Shot by Palestinian Arab nat’list (vs. support of Israel)