The 1950s Civil Rights Movement

Since the end of the Civil War, African Americans had been waging a movement to finally gain equality in America – civil rights. In 1950s America, African Americans still faced discrimination and segregation. African American children were not allowed to attend school with white children. African Americans had to sit in the back of buses while white Americans were able to sit in the front. African Americans were not allowed to eat at the same lunch counter as white Americans.

The 1950s Civil Rights Movement

The movement for racial equality started in the the American South – the birthplace of slavery, segregation, terrorism, and discrimination. African Americans challenged segregation and discrimination using the law (challenging local, state, and federal laws in court). The NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) led the movement to challenge the constitutionality of the 1896 Supreme Court ruling (Plessy v. Ferguson) that established the policy of “separate but equal” – legal segregation. Thurgood Marshall, the NAACP ’s chief staff lawyer took the lead in challenging the legal basis of segregation in America.

Thurgood Marshall

The 1950s Civil Rights Movement In 1953, President Eisenhower appointed Earl Warren as Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Chief Justice Warren wanted the U.S. Supreme Court to take the lead in establishing civil rights in America. The first major case: Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954) Thurgood Marshall argued before the Supreme Court that segregation “made equal education impossible and did serious psychological damage to both black and white children.” Chief Justice Warren ruled that “In the field of public education, the doctrine of ‘separate but equal,’ has no place.” In 1955, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered all states to end segregation “with all deliberate speed.”

Chief Justice Earl Warren

The 1950s Civil Rights Movement However, many southern states refused to desegregate their schools. By September 1956, only 700 of the 10,000 schools in the South ended the policy of segregation. White Americans in the South were infuriated by the Court’s rulings. White Americans threatened to use violence, and did, in order to prevent desegregation of public schools in the South. In 1957, President Eisenhower took action to help desegregate pubic schools in the South. In 1957, the Board of Education in Little Rock, Arkansas, allowed African American students to enroll in Little Rock Central High School. The Governor of Arkansas, Orval M. Faubus, sent the state national guard to Little Rock to prevent the African American students from entering the school. White southerners also assembled outside the school to yell racial slurs at the students and protest their admittance to a former “whites only” high school. President Eisenhower responded by sending 1,000 U.S. Army paratroopers to Little Rock, and federalizing Faubus’s national guard soldiers (10,000 soldiers). President Eisenhower’s actions allowed the students to attend Little Rock Central High School, and forced Southern states to acknowledge the Supreme Court’s ruling regarding segregation in public schools.

The 1950s Civil Rights Movement

The Montgomery Bus Boycott: On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, an African American women named Rosa Parks boarded a public bus on her way home from work. Parks, being an African American, had to sit in the back of the bus. Many white passengers came on board the bus, and the driver ordered Parks to give up her seat to a white patron. Parks refused to give up her seat. “I would have to know once and for all what rights I had as a human being and a citizen.” Parks was arrested and fined for refusing to give her seat up to a white passenger on a public bus.

Rosa Parks

The Bus

The 1950s Civil Rights Movement The Montgomery Bus Boycott: In response, African American leaders in Montgomery, Alabama, organized a bus boycott. They asked all African Americans in Montgomery to stop using public buses until African Americans were given equal rights in public transportation. In February 1956, 115 leaders of the boycott were indicted by Montgomery authorities for conspiracy, and turned themselves in, facing fines and prison time. In response to the events occurring in Montgomery, public opinion throughout the nation turned in their favor. Americans from all over the country gave moral and financial support to the boycott movement. The boycott lasted for over one year, and ended when the U.S. Supreme Court declared the segregation of public transportation services in Montgomery unconstitutional. From the boycott emerged an important leader in the struggle for civil rights, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

A successful decade, but there was still more work to be done

Summary Who: _____________________________________________ What: ____________________________________________ When: _______________ Why: _______________________________________________ ______________________________________________________ How: ______________________________________________ ______________________________________________________