SSUSH22 The student will identify dimensions of the Civil Rights Movement, 1945-1970

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a. Explain the importance of President Truman’s order to integrate the U.S. military and the federal government. b. Identify Jackie Robinson and the integration of baseball. c. Explain Brown v. Board of Education and efforts to resist the decision. d. Describe the significance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail and his I Have a Dream Speech. e. Describe the causes and consequences of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Introduction• The Civil Rights movement was a decades long struggle to secure voting rights, equality

before the law, and an end to the systematic segregation and oppression endured by minorities in the US.

• Recall that following the Civil War, civil and voting rights for freedmen were extended under protection of federal bayonets, but the promise of the 14th and 15th amendments were allowed to go mostly ignored after Reconstruction ended and troops were withdrawn in 1877.

• The Supreme Court’s decision in Plessy v. Ferguson (1893) gave constitutional sanction to segregation by establishing the “separate but equal” doctrine. And even as Progressive-era reformers emphasized social and democratic reforms, African-American issues were almost completely ignored.

• It was not until WWII exposed the paradox of American racism that the modern Civil Rights began to gain significant traction. In 1941, at the outset of US involvement, Black labor leader A. Philip Randolph helped convince FDR to issue an executive order that prevented discrimination in hiring for war jobs. Randolph and other civil rights leaders promoted what they called the “Double V” campaign- urging the effort to defeat fascism abroad, and racial discrimination at home. The hypocrisy of American racism was becoming more clear as a result of WWII: How could the US claim to be defending democracy against the ideologies of the Nazi regime while also denying even basic rights to a large portion of its own citizens?

a. Explain the importance of President Truman’s order to integrate the U.S. military and the federal government

• The paradox and hypocrisy of American segregation began to gain the president’s attention following WWII. Truman established a Commission on Civil Rights in 1947, and the following year adopted one of its recommendations by issuing an executive order to end segregation in the armed forces.

• Although controversial at the time, this executive action to address institutional racism was a very important step. It recognized and attempted to correct the injustice and indignation of segregating Black servicemen as second class citizens, and it was the first and most substantial civil rights reform undertaken by the federal government following WWII. Increasingly it would become clear that it would be the federal government that would need to lead the way toward establishing equality and civil rights for all Americans.

b. Identify Jackie Robinson and the integration of baseball

• At the same time the federal government was taking steps to integrate its institutions, Major League Baseball also began the process of integration. In 1949 Jackie Robinson became the first black baseball player to play in the majors when he was signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers.

• Although it might seem trivial today, allowing Robinson to participate as an equal in “America’s Pastime” helped to begin the process of eroding the social institutions that supported racism. The fact that Robinson was able to overcome enormous obstacles and prove that black ballplayers could (and should) be able to compete in the Big Leagues helped some Americans overcome long-held assumptions about the supremacism that propped up ideas about race.

c. Explain Brown v. Board of Education and efforts to resist the decision.

• In 1954, the Supreme Court heard a case challenging the segregation of public schools. The Court ruled that the “separate but equal” concept that had legally propped up segregation since the Plessy v. Ferguson case in the 1890s, was unconstitutional.

• The central argument of the Court was that separate schools for black and white students created an inherent inequality- schools could never be “equal” because segregation imposed a psychological and emotional burden of inferiority on black students.

• Needless to say, the decision was very controversial, and despite the Court’s order to integrate schools “with all deliberate speed,” leaders in several deep south states promised to resist the forced integration of schools by whatever means necessary.

• One famous challenge to integration occurred in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957. The governor had deployed the National Guard to prevent the enrollment of nine black students at Little Rock’s Central High School. President Eisenhower upped the ante by sending the US Army to Little Rock to enforce the Court’s order to integrate and to protect the “Little Rock Nine.” Other examples of widespread resistance to school integration abound the era. In some areas, integration was not realized until the 1970s.

d. Describe the significance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail and his I Have a Dream Speech.

• Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was arguably the single most important leader of the Civil Rights movement. Born in Atlanta in 1925, he went on to became a minister, and first became well known for his leadership in the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955-6.

• Inspired by the philosophy and tactics of Mohandas Gandhi, King advocated for non-violence in the attempts to inspire civil rights reforms in the US. He founded the SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Conference) in 1957, and had great success in organizing civil rights efforts through black churches. He helped to organize boycotts, marches and rallies, and his impassioned and eloquent oratory helped to change the mindset of many Americans by highlighting the immorality and injustice of racism and segregation.

• Two of MLK’s most famous works are his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” and his “I Have a Dream Speech”

d. Describe the significance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail and his I Have a Dream Speech.

• King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” was written in April, 1963, after King was arrested for participating in civil rights protests in Birmingham, Alabama. The immediate context of King’s open letter was as a response to a group of white clergymen, who published an editorial criticizing King as an “outsider” who was unnecessarily stirring up trouble in Birmingham. While acknowledging the injustice facing blacks in Birmingham, they felt King and the civil rights movement should use the political and legal processes to achieve civil rights reform, rather than “take to the streets” and risk social disorder.

• King’s response was a powerful defense and justification of his non-violent tactics. He argued that the civil rights movement could not wait on the political process, and that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” King’s letter was widely reprinted and its major points became a rally cry for civil rights leaders all over the country.

• Later that same year, King participated in one of the largest public gatherings in US history, the March for Jobs and Freedom, intended to highlight the glaring economic and social inequality facing African Americans and other minorities in the US.

• Gathered on the National Mall, with the Lincoln Memorial as a backdrop, King delivered an especially powerful message. The central theme was his “dream”, that one day, throughout the Deep South and beyond, Americans would move past racial hatred and that all Americans would enjoy the blessings of liberty and justice promised by our founders. King’s dream was a future where his children, and all men would “not be judged by the color of their skin, but by content of their character.”

e. Describe the causes and consequences of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

• The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was the most sweeping civil rights legislation since Reconstruction, and in many respects, was one of the key goals of the Civil Rights Movement.

• The law was first championed by President John F. Kennedy, who urged Congress and the American people to take action toward guaranteeing equal treatment of every American regardless of race. Following Kennedy’s assassination in November of 1963, the civil rights law was undertaken by President Lyndon Johnson, who signed it into law in July 1964.

• The act outlawed segregation in businesses such as theaters, restaurants, and hotels. It banned discriminatory practices in employment and ended segregation in public places such as swimming pools, libraries, and public schools. It also added legislative structure to the ongoing desegregation of schools and addressed discrimination in hiring practices.

e. Describe the causes and consequences of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

• The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was signed into law on August 6, by President Lyndon Johnson. It outlawed the discriminatory voting practices adopted in many southern states after the Civil War, including literacy tests as a prerequisite to voting.

• This “act to enforce the fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution” was signed into law 95 years after the amendment was ratified. In those years, African Americans in the South faced tremendous obstacles to voting, including poll taxes, literacy tests, and other bureaucratic restrictions to deny them the right to vote. They also risked harassment, intimidation, economic reprisals, and physical violence when they tried to register or vote. As a result, very few African Americans were registered voters, and they had very little, if any, political power, either locally or nationally.

• In 1964, numerous demonstrations were held, and the considerable violence that erupted brought renewed attention to the issue of voting rights. The murder of voting-rights activists in Mississippi and the attack by state troopers on peaceful marchers in Selma, AL, gained national attention and persuaded President Johnson and Congress to initiate meaningful and effective national voting rights legislation. The combination of public revulsion to the violence and Johnson's political skills stimulated Congress to pass the voting rights bill on August 5, 1965.

• The legislation outlawed literacy tests and provided for the appointment of Federal examiners (with the power to register qualified citizens to vote) in those jurisdictions that were "covered" according to a formula provided in the statute. In addition, Section 5 of the act required covered jurisdictions to obtain "preclearance" from either the District Court for the District of Columbia or the U.S. Attorney General for any new voting practices and procedures. Section 2, which closely followed the language of the 15th amendment, applied a nationwide prohibition of the denial or abridgment of the right to vote on account of race or color. The use of poll taxes in national elections had been abolished by the 24th amendment (1964) to the Constitution; the Voting Rights Act directed the Attorney General to challenge the use of poll taxes in state and local elections.

• The law had an immediate impact. By the end of 1965, a quarter of a million new black voters had been registered, one-third by Federal examiners. By the end of 1966, only 4 out of the 13 southern states had fewer than 50 percent of African Americans registered to vote. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was readopted and strengthened in 1970, 1975, and 1982.