Civil Rights: Non-Violent
Sweatt v. Painter
In 1950, the most significant challenge yet to Plessy v. Ferguson emerged. The NAACP chose to begin its challenge to end school segregation at the college level. Activists felt that they would be more successful at this level because the individuals involved were adults rather than children. Therefore they filed the Sweatt v. Painter case. NAACP attorney, Thurgood Marshall, argued the case on behalf of Herman Sweatt, an African-American applicant to the University of Texas Law School. Since there was no separate law school at the university for African Americans, one was quickly established for Mr. Sweatt in downtown Austin. The Supreme Court ruled that while the school was separate, it definitely was not equal. The University of Texas Law School was now required to admit African Americans. It served as a major step forward in the struggle to end segregation in public education.
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
With the goal of redeeming ''the soul of America'' through nonviolent resistance, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) was established in 1957, to coordinate the action of local protest groups throughout the South. Under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr., the organization drew on the power and independence of black churches to support its activities. The catalyst for the formation of SCLC was the Montgomery bus boycott. Following the success of the boycott in 1956, Bayard Rustin wrote a series of working papers to address the possibility of expanding the efforts in Montgomery to other cities throughout the South. In these papers, he asked whether an organization was needed to coordinate these activities. After much discussion with his advisors, King invited southern black ministers to the Southern Negro Leaders Conference on Transportation and Nonviolent Integration (later to be renamed the Southern Christian Leadership Conference) at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. The ministers who attended released a manifesto calling upon white southerners to recognize their treatment of blacks was a 'spiritual problem', encouraged black Americans seek justice & reject injustice, and to dedicate themselves to the principle of non-violence ''no matter how great the provocation'' SCLC differed from organizations such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the NAACP, in that it operated as an umbrella organization of affiliates. Rather than seek individual members, it coordinated with the activities of local organizations like the Montgomery Improvement Association and the Nashville Christian Leadership Council. Through its affiliation with churches and its advocacy of nonviolence, SCLC sought to frame the struggle for civil rights in moral terms.
Civil Rights Act of 1957
After the ratification of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution, Congress attempted several times to pass legislation that would prevent discrimination which still continued. Unfortunately, these often proved ineffective. In 1948, following World War II, President Truman issued Executive Order 9981 ordering the desegregation of the military. In 1957, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957, and President Eisenhower signed the first meaningful piece of civil rights legislation since Reconstruction. This law attempted to increase the number of African Americans voting by removing the barriers put in place to keep them from registering to vote. Barriers had included requiring a poll tax and passage of a literacy tests before being allowed to register. While this law was largely ineffective, it set the stage for a constitutional amendment abolishing the poll tax. Finally, the sweeping 1964 Civil Rights Act passed while Lyndon Johnson was President.
Little Rock Nine
Despite the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision that declared segregation or "separate but equal" schools unconstitutional, there was still resistance. This did not clear up with the second Brown Supreme Court decision, which ordered the states to end segregation with "all deliberate speed." Governors in the Southern states argued that the federal government had no business trying to end segregation in public schools because education was a state power. Several Southern governors, including Governor Orval Faubus of Arkansas, drug their feet in ending the practice. In 1957, when nine African-American students, known as the "Little Rock Nine," planned to enroll in the all-white Little Rock Central High School, Faubus ordered the Arkansas National Guard to surround the school to prevent them from entering. He argued it was necessary to keep the peace and defuse the volatile situation. President Eisenhower then ordered federal troops into the state to protect the students and allow them to enter the high school. This action showed Faubus and other Southern states that the federal government intended to enforce the Brown decision.
Congress of Racial Equality
Founded in 1942 by an interracial group of students in Chicago, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) pioneered the use of nonviolent direct action in America's civil rights struggle. Along with its parent organization, the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR), CORE members provided advice and support to Martin Luther King during the Montgomery bus boycott. King worked with CORE throughout the late 1950s and into the mid-1960s, when CORE abandoned its dedication to nonviolence and adopted black separatist policies. Early CORE activists had been affiliated with FOR, an international peace and justice organization. Influenced by Gandhi, in the 1940s CORE used sit-ins and other nonviolent direct actions to integrate Chicago restaurants and businesses. In 1947 CORE organized the Journey of Reconciliation, a multi-state integrated bus ride through the upper South in order to test the previous year's Supreme Court ruling against segregation in interstate travel. This precursor to the 1961 Freedom Rides was met with minimal violence, although several of the riders were arrested, and two were sentenced to work on a chain gang in North Carolina. During the Montgomery bus boycott, CORE publicized King's work in its pamphlets. In October 1957 King agreed to serve on CORE's Advisory Committee. In the following years, King's organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), worked with CORE on several projects. CORE supported southern blacks during the sit-in movement of 1960; CORE field secretaries traveled through the South, advising student activists on nonviolent methods. CORE organized the Freedom Rides in the spring of 1961. Modeled after the earlier Journey of Reconciliation, the rides took an integrated group through the Deep South. Although King supported the rides, he considered them too dangerous to participate in himself. In Anniston, Alabama, one bus was firebombed, and its fleeing passengers were forced into an angry white mob. As the violence against the Freedom Rides increased, CORE considered halting the project.
Rosa Parks
In 1955 Rosa Parks, an African-American woman, took a stand against discrimination by refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a public bus and move to the rear. Fifteen-year-old Claudette Colvin had previously been arrested for refusing to give up her seat in the same bus system nine months before. Rosa Park's planned action led to a bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama. By using this non-violent stance against discrimination, Parks brought attention to the problems of segregation and the plight of African Americans in the South. She continued to work with other civil rights leaders in the movement to end segregation and is often referred to as the "Mother of the Civil Rights Movement."
Selma March
In 1961 organizer Bob Moses moved to Jackson, Mississippi, and began organizing young Mississippi residents. Moses, who was firmly committed to non-hierarchical grassroots organizing, joined the SNCC staff, and became voter registration director of Mississippi's Council of Federated Organizations the following year. He encountered considerable resistance to civil rights reform efforts, but the Mississippi voter registration effort created conditions for racial reform by bringing together three crucial groups: dynamic and determined SNCC field secretaries, influential regional and local civil rights leaders from Mississippi, and white student volunteers who participated in the ''Freedom Vote'' mock election of October 1963 and the Freedom Summer (1964). Early in 1964, SNCC supported the formation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party in an effort to challenge the legitimacy of the state's all-white Democratic Party. On March 7, 1965 a protest march from Montgomery to Selma (Alabama) was organized to advocate for a Voting Rights Act. This resulted in a nationally televised confrontation between protesters and the local police known as "Bloody Sunday"
24th Amendment
In 1964, the states ratified the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished the use of a poll tax required to register to vote. This amendment removed a large economic barrier to voting. In the era after the Civil War, southern states had used the poll tax to discourage African Americans from voting without violating the 15th Amendment. There had been earlier legislative attempts to end the use of the poll tax, but each time senators from southern states filibustered and blocked passage. Efforts in the courts also proved useless when the Supreme Court upheld the states' use of poll taxes. As the Civil Rights Movement increased, many states abolished the use of the poll tax on their own. However five states, Virginia, Alabama, Texas, Arkansas, and Mississippi still required their use to some degree. The passage of the 24th Amendment clarified that poll taxes could not be used in federal elections. In 1966, the Supreme Court ruled that the amendment also applied to state elections.
26th Amendment
In 1971, Congress proposed the 26th Amendment. This amendment stated, "The rights of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State on account of age." The movement to lower the voting age from 21 to 18 began in earnest after World War II, and it gained momentum during the conflict in Vietnam. The argument was that if a person is old enough to fight and possibly die in war, he or she should be old enough to vote. After World War II, several states lowered their voting age. Due to the unpopularity of the Vietnam War, especially among young people, the movement to change it across the nation gained momentum. Some believed that a constitutional amendment would be the easiest and most efficient way to accomplish this rather than leaving it up to each state. When a state challenged the addition of the provision to the 1965 Voting Rights Act, the Supreme Court ruled that only Congress had the power to lower the age in national elections and not states. It then became apparent that the Constitution had to be amended. Congress proposed the 26th Amendment in March of 1971 and the required three-fourths of the states ratified it by July of 1971. This is the quickest ratification of any amendment to the Constitution.
White v. Regester
In 1973, the Supreme Court decided another important civil rights case from Texas, White v. Regester. Dallas and Bexar counties are two of Texas's largest counties with large African-American and Mexican-American minorities. Members of the Texas House of Representatives were chosen from multi-member districts. In this historic voting rights case, the Supreme Court ruled these multi-member districts were unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment because they systematically diluted the voting strength of minority citizens. For example, in Bexar County, only five Mexican Americans had served in the Texas legislature since 1880. Only two of the five came from the San Antonio Barrio, even though Mexican Americans made up a sizable proportion of the population of the county. White v. Regester resulted in the creation of minority-controlled election districts, not only in Texas, but in other states as well.
Edgewood ISD v. Kirby
In the 1989 case, Edgewood v. Kirby, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that the method the state was using to finance its public schools had caused great disparities among public school districts. Therefore, the practice violated the part of the Texas Constitution that requires the state to support and maintain "an efficient system of public free schools." This decision resulted in the Texas Legislature adopting a new method for financing Texas' public schools known as the "Robin Hood" plan. In this plan, property-rich school districts were required to share a portion of their revenue with property-poor school districts. This ruling has remained controversial, as opponents argue it still does not solve the issue of the state not supporting and maintaining "an efficient system of public free schools."
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist minister from Georgia, became a leading figure in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. He was elected President of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957. This organization took its ideals from Christianity and the non-violent techniques used by Gandhi in his fight against inequality in India. Dr. King's writings had a significant impact on the movement. His "Letter from Birmingham Jail," written while jailed for leading a protest march in Birmingham, Alabama, outlined why non-violent civil disobedience was the best method for achieving civil rights. His "I Have a Dream" speech, given in 1963 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., provided a national stage for the struggle. Media coverage of the speech showed Dr. King's eloquence as a spokesperson and leader of the movement. It also allowed the nation to see that people of all races and religions supported this struggle.
March on Washington
On August 28, 1963, more than 250,000 demonstrators descended upon the nation's capital to participate in the "March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom." Not only was it the largest demonstration for human rights in United States history, but it also occasioned a rare display of unity among the various civil rights organizations. The event began with a rally at the Washington Monument featuring several celebrities and musicians. Participants then marched the mile-long National Mall to the Memorial. The three-hour long program at the Lincoln Memorial included speeches from prominent civil rights and religious leaders, most prominently known is MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech.. The day ended with a meeting between the march leaders and President John F. Kennedy at the White House. The idea for the 1963 March on Washington was envisioned by A. Philip Randolph, a long-time civil rights activist dedicated to improving the economic condition of black Americans. When Randolph first proposed the march in late 1962, he received little response from other civil rights leaders. He knew that cooperation would be difficult because each had his own agenda for the civil rights movement, and the leaders competed for funding and press coverage. Success of the March on Washington would depend on the involvement of the so-called "Big Six"—Randolph and the heads of the five major civil rights organizations: Roy Wilkins of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP); Whitney Young, Jr., of the National Urban League; Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC); James Farmer of the Conference of Racial Equality (CORE); and John Lewis of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). The details and organization of the march were handled by Bayard Rustin, Randolph's trusted associate. Rustin was a veteran activist with extensive experience in putting together mass protest. With only two months to plan, Rustin established his headquarters in Harlem, NY, with a smaller office in Washington. He and his core staff of 200 volunteers quickly put together the largest peaceful demonstration in U.S. history.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
President Johnson pushed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 through Congress after President Kennedy's assassination. It proved to be the most effective legislative effort to eliminate discrimination based on race. This legislation prohibited discrimination in all public facilities and places of employment doing business with the government or engaged in interstate commerce. As a result, this act effectively ended segregation for any business involved in interstate commerce. The law also established the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to ensure fairness in employment practices.
Affirmative Action
The 1964 Civil Rights barred racial discrimination by any educational institution that received federal funds. As a result, many admission offices attempted to prevent discrimination based on race by following an affirmative action policy. Affirmative action refers to a policy that attempts to improve employment or job opportunities of disadvantaged minority groups. An example of this is when college admission directors use race as a factor in their final admissions decision. In 1978, Allan Bakke applied to the medical school at the University of California. At that time, the university had set aside 16 of 100 positions for members of a minority race. When Bakke was denied admission even though his scores were higher than some who were admitted, he sued the university. He claimed he was discriminated against because of his race and was not provided "equal protection of the laws." The Supreme Court ruled his rights had been violated and he was to be admitted. The Court went on to say that ethnic origins or race could only be one factor used in the admissions decisions. As a result of this decision, there have been further challenges to admissions policies. In these challenges, the Court has continued to rule that race or ethnic origin can be considered, but there can be no quotas used in admission policies.
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was founded in April 1960, by young people who had emerged as leaders of the sit-in protest movement initiated on February 1 of that year by four black college students in Greensboro, North Carolina. Although Martin Luther King, Jr. and others had hoped that SNCC would serve as the youth wing of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the students remained fiercely independent of King and SCLC, generating their own projects and strategies. Although ideological differences eventually caused SNCC and SCLC to be at odds, the two organizations worked side by side throughout the early years of the civil rights movement.
Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was the final major piece of civil rights legislation President Johnson pushed through Congress. It effectively ended barriers such as literacy tests used to prevent African Americans from voting. This piece of legislation increased the number of minorities registering and voting. Consequently, this increased minority voting and eventually led to more minorities holding public office. In 2013 the Supreme Court struck down a portion of the Voting Rights Act, which included the map that determines which states must get federal permission before they change their voting laws. At the time, nine states were required to get federal permission to change voting laws due to previous discriminatory practices.
Freedom Summer
The voting rights demonstrations that began in 1965 in Selma, Alabama, sparked increasingly bitter ideological debates within SNCC, as some workers openly challenged the group's previous commitment to nonviolent tactics and its willingness to allow the participation of white activists. Distracted by such divisive issues, the day-to-day needs of the group's ongoing projects suffered. In many Deep South communities, where SNCC had once attracted considerable black support, the group's influence waned. Nevertheless, after the Selma to Montgomery March, Stokely Carmichael and other SNCC organizers entered the rural area between Selma and Montgomery and helped black residents launch the all-black Lowndes County Freedom Organization, later known as the Black Panther Party. Meanwhile, several SNCC workers established incipient organizing efforts in volatile urban black ghettos.
Brown v. Board
Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP decided to challenge segregation in the nation's public schools. Five cases from Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, Delaware, and the District of Columbia were argued before the Supreme Court in 1952. The five cases were jointly argued together under the lead case, Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. When the Court was unable to arrive at a decision, the cases had to be reargued in 1953. Before the second hearing, Chief Justice Fred Vinson died, and President Eisenhower appointed Earl Warren as the new Chief Justice. Warren had supported the integration of Mexican-American children in California after the ruling in Mendez v. Westminster. This led Marshall and his legal team to think optimistically that Warren, as Chief Justice, would lead the Court in finally overruling Plessy v. Ferguson. They were not disappointed. In 1954, speaking through Chief Justice Warren, the Court unanimously ruled that "in the field of public education the doctrine of 'separate but equal' has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." However, in 1954, the Court did not give the states directions for implementing the ruling. Consequently, in 1955, in a case known as Brown II, the Court heard arguments again. This time the Court attempted to clarify the decision by unanimously directing desegregation to proceed "with all deliberate speed." Southern states differed greatly in determining what was meant by "all deliberate speed."
Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall, a leading attorney for the NAACP in the early years of the civil rights movement, argued and won the 1954 Supreme Court case, Brown v. Board of Education. He later became the first African American to serve as a Supreme Court justice when President Johnson appointed him in 1967.