2.  Student will be able to name the major civil rights legislation of the late 1940s and 1950s.

3.  The 1950s marked a new beginning in civil rights.  During WW2, whites and blacks worked together to defeat the Germans and Japanese.  On the battlefront and now at home, there was a more tolerant attitude in the United States.  Now that the war was over, Blacks began to organize and demand their civil rights.

4.  The Truman administration took steps to end racial discrimination in the United States.  In 1946, Truman appointed a Commission on Civil Rights. The commission stated that the government should enforce civil rights and end segregation in all areas of American life.  Although Congress failed to act on the commission report, Truman then ordered desegregation in the armed forces.  This was the start of desegregation on the federal level.

5.  When did desegregation begin?

6.  On the private level, there were signs that Blacks were slowly gaining civil rights.  Black athletes like Josh Gibson and Satchel Paige were interested in playing in the white only major leagues, but were unable to due to segregation.  In 1947, Jackie Robinson became the first Black to break Major League Baseball’s color line. Two years later, Robinson won the MVP Satchel Paige Josh Gibson

7. The first African-American to break Major League Baseball’s color barrier. Robinson broke the color barrier on April 15, 1947. Enduring harsh racial discrimination, Robinson built himself into a solid baseball player on and off the field. In 1997, to honor the 50 th anniversary of Robinson’s achievement, Major League Baseball retired the number 42.

8.  During the administration of Dwight Eisenhower, some headway was made in regards to civil rights.  Eisenhower, at first, tried to stay away from addressing the issue because he was not a strong supporter of civil rights.  Eisenhower also believed that the job of government was to not change people’s mind about civil rights.  However, he was in charge of the US just as things became interesting.

9.  In 1954, the United States Supreme Court ruled on the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.  In this ruling, the United States Supreme Court overturned the “separate but equal” principle of the Plessy v. Ferguson case (1896).  The Court held that segregation in the public schools denied Black students equal protection under the 14 th Amendment.

10.  What did the United States say about segregation in the American public school system?

11. The US Supreme Court integrates the American public school system in 1954.

12. Chief Justice Earl Warren, a strong supporter of civil rights, was appointed by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1953. He wrote the majority decision in the case. Thurgood Marshall was the lawyer that defended Brown in her case. He would go on and become the first African- American to be appointed to the United States Supreme Court.

13.  In 1955, the Supreme Court ordered the desegregation of the public schools.  In the south, this decision was not welcomed by many leaders because the schools in the south were segregated by law. Many leaders did whatever they could to prevent this from occurring.  In 1957, Governor Orval E. Faubus of Arkansas used the National Guard to keep Black students from entering Little Rock’s Central High School.  President Eisenhower used the military to allow Blacks to enter Central High School.  By the end of his first term in office, Eisenhower backed the decision of the Supreme Court and enforced the decision to desegregate the American public school system.

14.  How did Southern leaders try to prevent desegregation in their schools? What did Eisenhower do to prevent this from happening?

15. Governor Orval Faubus. His actions led Eisenhower to bring the military into Little Rock. The Little Rock Nine, the First Black students who entered Central High School in 1957.

16.  Congress also acted to secure equal rights for Blacks during this period of time.  To end restrictions on voting, the US Congress passed the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960.  The Civil Rights Act of 1957 allowed the Attorney General to bring suit for Blacks who were denied their right to vote.  The Civil Rights Act of 1960 allowed Federal judges to appoint an officer to supervise voter registration.  The Civil Rights Act of 1960 also set punishments for bombings and bomb threats against Blacks.

17.  What did the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960 permit?

18.  Some Blacks turned to more direct action in the hopes of achieving civil rights during the 1950s.  On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white male. She was arrested soon after.  In protest, Montgomery African-American leaders E.D. Nixon and Martin Luther King boycotted the bus system for a year.  The United States Supreme Court soon declared the seating system in the Montgomery bus lines were unconstitutional.