1. Civil Rights Movement

2. Federal Government orders the end of Segregation
Fourteenth Amendment—all citizens are entitled to “equal protection under the law”
What does this mean?

3. Executive Order 9981
Mandated “equality of treatment and opportunity to all persons in the Armed Services without regards to race”
Signed by President Truman
Integrated the armed forces

4. NAACP
The organization challenged segregation in the courts.

5. Brown v Board of Education
May 17, 1954
Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal
Segregation is illegal and unconstitutional
De-segregation must proceed with “all deliberate speed”
Case argued by NAACP, lawyer, Thurgood Marshall
Oliver Hill, NAACP legal defense team

6. Virginia’s response Massive Resistance: Closing some schools
Establishment of private academies -Public schools in some Virginia counties were closed to prevent integration
White flight from urban school systems
Ku Klux Klan became active again

7. Ending Segregation: Montgomery Bus Boycott
December 1, 1955—Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama for refusing to giver her bus seat up to a white person
African American community in Montgomery launched a boycott of the buses (later expanded to downtown businesses that discriminated)

8. Ending Segregation: Montgomery Bus Boycott
New leader emerged: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist preacher in Montgomery, advocated civil disobedience and a non-violent approach
December 21, 1956

9. Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC)
Formed in 1957 to unify African-Americans to fight segregation
Martin Luther King, Jr. is the president
Two strategies
Civil disobedience—refusing to obey an unjust law
Non-violence

10. Central High School: Little Rock, Ark.
1957: nine African-American students are selected to integrate Central High School
September 2, 1957: Governor Faubus calls in the National Guard to prevent the students from entering the school
September 23, 1957: President Eisenhower sends in Federal troops to protect the students. Each student is assigned two soldiers to protect them for the rest of the school year

11. The Sit-ins
February 1960: Woolworth in Greensboro, NC—site of 1st “sit-in”, movement quickly spreads across nation
SNCC: Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee—a group of college students who organized to protest segregation
African-Americans sit at “white-only” lunch counters until they are served

12. Freedom Rides
1961—the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) organized groups of white and black people to ride buses all over the South
Southerners reacted with violence

13. Birmingham
1963: King and other ministers arrested for demonstrating in Birmingham, AL.
King wrote “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”

14. 1963 March on Washington
Participants were inspired by the “I have a dream” speech given by Martin Luther King, Jr.
The march helped influence public opinion to support civil rights legislation.
The march demonstrated the power of non-violent, mass protest.