1. Birmingham, Alabama
Blacks in Birmingham wanted to integrate public places, get better jobs and better housing; considered by King as the most segregated city in the South
Protests during the profitable Easter holiday, April King was arrested and jailed (he wrote his famous “A Letter From A Birmingham Jail”)
SCLC leaders proposed recruiting local students & King finally agreed
Thousands of college and high school students showed up from cities all around Birmingham
Eugene “Bull” Connor resorted to violence when police could not contain them
Orders to use dogs & firehoses on the students
The students just sat down with their backs to the water

2. Results of Birmingham Protests
People watched what was happening on television and were horrified
Soon Birmingham leaders desegregated lunch counters, removed segregation signs and hired more black workers

3. March on Washington
Wanted to put pressure on Congress to pass the new Civil Rights bill
August 28, 1963; drew more than 250,000 people
MLK – famous “I have a dream speech”
One of the longest political demonstrations
A model for peaceful protests
United many civil rights groups & convinced Kennedy to do something but was assassinated before he could keep his promise
Kennedy assassinated & Johnson strongly urged the passage of the bill to honor Kennedy’s memory

4. Freedom Summer
SNCC workers organized the Mississippi Freedom Summer Project
Recruited Northern college students to help register African Americans to vote to draw national attention to the state’s racism
Did receive national attention especially after three participants (two who were white) disappeared and later found murdered and buried in Philadelphia, Mississippi

5. Selma, Alabama
1965 SCLC members participated in a voting-rights protest
When protests were unsuccessful, members began a march Selma to Montgomery, Alabama
Marchers leaving for Montgomery met with violence as mounted police beat and tear-gassed them
Televised scenes of the violence, called Bloody Sunday, shocked many Americans; the resulting outrage led to King and SCLC members to continue the march to Montgomery; a five-day, fifty-mile march