QUIZ
World War II
First, the demand for soldiers in the early 1940s created a shortage of white male laborers. Second, nearly one million African Americans served in the armed forces, which needed so many fighting men that they had to end their discriminatory policies. Third, during the war, civil rights organizations actively campaigned for African-American voting rights and challenged Jim Crow laws.
Who was Governor Ross Barnett?
Governor of Mississippi who refused goalie James Meredith to enroll at Ole Miss
President Eisenhower
He placed the Arkansas National Guard under federal control and ordered a thousand paratroopers into Little Rock. Under the watch of soldiers, the nine African-American teenagers attended class.
James Earl Ray
Hired by unidentified people to assassinate Martin Luther King, Jr. He shot and killed King on the balcony of his hotel in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968. He was captured two months later in London
NAACP Legal Strategy
Houston focused the organization's limited resources on challenging the most glaring inequalities of segregated public education. In 1938, he placed a team of his best law students under the direction of Thurgood Marshall.
Morgan v. Virginia (1946)
In 1946 the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional those state laws mandating segregated seating on interstate buses.
Delgado v. Bastrop I.S.D. (1948)
In 1948, this Supreme Court case made the segregation of children of Mexican descent illegal in the state of Texas.
Sweatt v. Painter (1950)
In 1950, the Supreme Court ruled that state law schools must admit black applicants, even if separate black schools exist.
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
In April 1960, Ella Baker, the granddaughter of slaves,helped students at Shaw University, an African-American university in Raleigh, North Carolina, to organize a national protest group
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896)
In the Plessy v. Ferguson case of 1896, the Supreme Court ruled that this "separate but equal" law did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees all Americans equal treatment under the law.
What major event happened on August 28, 1963 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC?
Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream Speech"where he appealed for peace and racial harmony
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954)
May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court unanimously struck down segregation in schooling as an unconstitutional violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote that, "[I]n the field of public education, the doctrine of separate but equal has no place."
What was the MFDP?
Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party organized by the SNCC in order to gain a seat in Mississippi's all-white Democratic Party
Who was Medgar Evers and describe what happened to him?
NAACP field secretary and World War II veteran who was murdered by a white sniper named Byron de la Beckwith
reverse discrimination
The assertion that affirmative action programs that require preferential treatment for minorities discriminate against those who have no minority status
Who was Ernest Withers?
believed that if the struggle for equality could be shown to people, things would change. Armed with only a camera, he braved violent crowds to capture the heated racism during the Montgomery bus boycott, the desegregation of Central High in Little Rock,and the 1968 Memphis sanitation workers strike led byMartin Luther King, Jr.
freedom riders
civil rights activists who rode buses through the south in the early 1960's to challenge segregation
What two things did the civil rights bill President Kennedy sent to Congress set out to do?
guaranteed equal accessto all public accommodations and gave the U.S. attorney general the power to fileschool desegregation suits
Robert F. Kennedy
the night King was assassinated he was campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination. Fearful that King's death would spark riots, his advisers told him to cancel his appearance in an African-American neighborhood in Indianapolis. However, Kennedy attended anyway, making an impassioned pea for nonviolence
What did labor leader A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin of the SCLC do to persuade Congress to pass Kennedy's civil rights bill?
the organized the march on Washington, D.C.
Edgewood I.S.D. v. Kirby (1984)
the plaintiffs charged that the state's methods of funding public schools discriminated against poor districts and violated the Texas state constitution. The Texas Supreme Court unanimously sided with Edgewood in favor of equity.
What was the result of the Voting Rights Act of 1965?
the proportion of African Americans registered to vote rose from 10 percent in 1964 to 60 percent in 1968. Overall the percentage of registered African-American voters in the South tripled.
What did CORE and SNCC hope would happen by registering African-American voters in Mississippi during "Freedom Summer"?
they hoped their campaign would receive nation-al publicity, which would in turn influence Congress to pass a voting rights act
Civil Rights Act of 1968
this law banned discrimination in housing, the segregation of education, transportation, and employment, it helped African Americans gain their full voting rights
What was the purpose of the two-bus freedom riders trip?
to test the Supreme Court decisions banning segregated seating on interstatebus routes and segregated facilities in bus terminals
white flight
working and middle-class white people move away from racial-minority suburbs or inner-city neighborhoods to white suburbs and exurbs
MLK/SCLC
"walk against fear" continued by Martin Luther King, Jr. of the SCLC, Floyd McKissick of CORE, and Stokely Carmichael of SNCC. Complication between SNCC and CORE members, who were militant and King and the SCLC, who practiced civil disobedience. SNCC and CORE members began to shout slogans similar to those of the black separatists who had followed Malcolm X. When King tried to rally the marchers with the refrain "We Shall Overcome," bitter over the violence they'd suffered during Freedom Summer SNCC members began to sing "We she overrun."
Bobby Seale
(with Huey Newton) begin the Black Panther Party -demanded the government rebuild ghettos - "black is beautiful" 1960's. different because didnt believe in nonviolence, change from usual civil rights method
Fifteenth Amendment
1870 constitutional amendment that guaranteed voting rights regardless of race or previous condition of servitude
Malcolm X
1952; renamed himself X to signify the loss of his African heritage; converted to Nation of Islam in jail in the 50s, became Black Muslims' most dynamic street orator and recruiter; his beliefs were the basis of a lot of the Black Power movement built on seperationist and nationalist impulsesto achieve true independence and equality
Shirley Chisholm
1st African American woman elected to Congress (NY) and later made a bid for the Democratic nomination in the 1972 presidential campaign
Freedom Summer
A 1964 project to registers African American voters in Mississippi by CORE and SNCC workers
Floyd McKissick
Became the first black student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Law School. In 1966 he became leader of CORE, the Congress of Racial Equality, taking over from James Farmer. A supporter of Black Power, he turned CORE into a more radical movement
Nation of Islam/ Black Muslims
A black supremacist group founded in 1930 by Elijah Muhammad, who believed that Allah would create a Black Nation of people unified against the white man. This group convinced itself that there was no purpose to work with the white man, and it is important to build the black people up and become economically self-sufficient, but exemplifying the importance of not interacting with white people whenever possible and becoming a believer in black nationalism
Fourteenth Amendment
A constitutional amendment giving full rights of citizenship to all people born or naturalized in the United States, except for American Indians.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
A law that banned discrimination on the basis of race, sex, national origin, or religion in public places and most work places
Voting Rights Act of 1965
A law that made it easier for African Americans to register to vote by eliminating discriminatory literacy tests and authorizing federal examiners to enroll voters denied at local level
What was the "children's crusade"?
African-American children marched in Birmingham; Police commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor's men arrested 959 of them. On May 3, asecond "children's crusade" came face to face with a helmeted police force. Police swept the marchers off their feet with high-pressure fire hoses, set attack dogs on them, and clubbed those who fell. TV cameras captured all of it, and millions ofviewers heard the children screaming.
sit-in
African-American protesters sat down at segregated lunch counters and refused to leave until they were served.
James Meredith
Air Force veteran who won a federal court case that allowed him to enroll in the all-white University of Mississippi
Thurgood Marshall
American civil rights lawyer, over the next 23 years, Marshall and his NAACP lawyers would win 29 out of 32 cases argued before the Supreme Court. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy nominated Marshall to the U.S. Court of Appeals. Lyndon Johnson picked Marshall for U.S. solicitor general in 1965 and two years later named him as the first African-American Supreme Court Justice.
Huey Newton
An American political and urban activist who founded the Black Panther Party for Self Defense. The Black Panther Party worked for the right of self-defense for African-Americans in the United States
race riot
An outbreak of violent civil unrest in which race is a key factor. The term had entered the English language in the United States by the 1890s. Early use of the term in the United States referred to race riots which were often a dominant culture mob action against individuals or groups of people from other races. Much later, the term came to describe violence and property destruction by racial minority groups often directed at neighborhood business, government representatives and law enforcement agencies perceived as unfairly targeting racial groups
What was the main demographic of students who volunteered to register African-Americans to vote in Mississippi?
College students; mostly white, about one-third female
What convinced Birmingham officials to end segregation?
Continued protests, an economic boycott, and negative media
What were the effects of desegregating Birmingham?
It inspired African Americans across the nation. It also convinced President Kennedy that only a new civil rights act could end racial violence and satisfy the demands of African Americans—and many whites—for racial justice.
Black Panthers
Led by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton, they believed that racism was an inherent part of the U.S. capitalist society and were militant, self-styled revolutionaries for Black Power
Governor Lester Maddox
Lester Maddox was the governor of Georgia from 1967 to 1971. He was a segregationist who stood up for states' rights. As governor, Maddox was one of several Southern Democrats who sought to maintain the status quo by blocking desegregation efforts.
Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)
MLK Jr. led this group as president. Its purpose was "to carry on nonviolent crusades against the evils of second-class citizenship." Using African-American churches as a base, the SCLC planned to stage protests and demonstrations throughout the South.
Ballots or bullets
Malcolm X's philosophy that if change could not be achieved through voting, violence may be necessary
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, in Montgomery, Alabama. First led the Montgomery Bus Boycott. King called his brand of nonviolent resistance "soul force". From the teachings of Jesus, he learned to love one's enemies. From writer Henry David Thoreau he took the concept of civil disobedience—the refusal to obey an unjust law. From labor organizer A. Philip Randolph he learned to organize massive demonstrations. From Mohandas Gandhi, the leader who helped India throw off British rule, he learned to resist oppression without violence.
de jure segregation
Racial segregation that occurs because of laws or administrative decisions by public agencies
de facto segregation
Racial segregation that occurs because of past social and economic conditions and residential racial patterns
McLaurin v. Oklahoma State (1950)
Ruled that Oklahoma State University violated the Constitution by keeping its one "Negro" student in the back of the class and the cafeteria.
Montgomery Bus Boycott
Started with Rosa Parks arrest. African Americans filed a lawsuit and for 381 days refused to ride the buses in Montgomery
Civil Rights Act of 1957
The first civil rights law since Reconstruction. Shepherded by Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas, the law gave the attorney general greater power over school desegregation. It also gave the federal government jurisdiction—or authority—over violations of African-American voting rights.
Watts Riot
The first large race riot since the end of World War II. In 1965, in the Watts secion of Los Angeles, a riot broke out. This was the result of a white police officer striking a black bystander during a protest. This triggers a week of violence and anger revealing the resentment blacks felt toward treatment toward them
Governor Orval Faubus
The governor of Arkansas who sent the national guard to keep black students out of a school in Little Rock, Arkansas
Stokely Carmichael
a black civil rights activist in the 1960's. Leader of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee. He did a lot of work with Martin Luther King Jr.but later changed his attitude. Carmichael urged giving up peaceful demonstrations and pursuing black power. He was known for saying,"black power will smash everything Western civilization has created."
Nation of Islam
a group of militant Black Americans who profess Islamic religious beliefs and advocate independence for Black Americans
Jim Crow laws
These laws forbade marriage between blacks and whites and established many other restrictions on social and religious contact between the races. There were separate schools as well as separate streetcars, waiting rooms, railroad coaches, elevators, witness stands, and public restrooms. The facilities provided for blacks were always inferior to those for whites.
Civil Rights Act of 1875
This act outlawed segregation in public facilities by decreeing that "all persons . . . shall be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the accommodations . . . of inns, public conveyances on land or water, theaters, and other places of public amusement." In 1883, however, the all-white Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional.
affirmative action
a policy designed to redress past discrimination against women and minority groups through measures to improve their economic and educational opportunities
Charles Hamilton Houston
a prominent African American lawyer, Dean of Howard University Law School, and NAACP Litigation Director who played a significant role in dismantling the Jim Crow laws, which earned him the title The Man Who Killed Jim Crow. He is also well known for having trained future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.
Rosa Parks
a seamstress and an NAACP officer, took a seat in the front row of the "colored" section of a Montgomery bus. She was arrested for not moving out of her seat.
What was the "Letter from Birmingham Jail"?
an open letter to white religious leaders from Martin Luther King, Jr. who felt he was pushing too fast for desegregation
What was the response to the murder of Jimmy Lee Jackson?
a 50 mile March from Selma to Montgomery lead my Martin Luther King, Jr.
Why did President Johnson pressure civil rights leaders to convince the MFDP to accept a compromise when seating their delegates at the 1964 Democratic National Convention?
he feared losing the Southern white vote if the Democrats sided with the MFDP
What was President Johnson's response to the violence in Selma?
he presented Congress with a new voting rights act and asked for its swift passage.
What did Kennedy do to honor a court order to desegregate the University of Alabama?
he sent troops to force Alabama Governor George Wallace to honor the court order. He demanded that Congress pass a civil rights bill.
What happened to Martin Luther King, Jr. in Birmingham? What famous document was written by King at that time?
he was arrested during a demonstration on Good Friday; while in jail he wrote an open letter to white religious leaders who felt he was pushing too fast called "Letter from Birmingham Jail"
Who was Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth?
head of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights and secretary of the SCLC who decided something had to be done about Birmingham and that it would be the ideal place to test the power of non-violence. He invited Martin Luther King, Jr., and the SCLC to help desegregate the city.
Brown II (1955)
in 1955 the Supreme Court handed down a second ruling that ordered school desegregation implemented "with all deliberate speed." Initially President Eisenhower refused to enforce compliance.
Mendez v. Westminster (1946)
in the 1946 case the U.S. Court of Appeals determined that schools segregating Mexican and Mexican American students in Orange County, California, were unconstitutional.
What did the 24th Amendment accomplish?
it outlawed the Poll Tax
Elijah Muhammad
leader of the Black Muslims and the Nation of Islam from 1934 until his death in 1975. He also was an early important teacher and mentor to Malcolm X
Poor People's March on Washington
march King was planning on leading, but was unable to do because of his assassination
What happened on the first night of the Selma Campaign?
mayhem broke out. Television cameras captured the scene. The rest of the nation watched in horror as police swung whips and clubs, and clouds of tear gas swirled around fallen marchers
Kerner Commission
nickname for the Nation Advisory Commission on civil Disorders, which blames the riots on an "explosive mixture" of poverty, slum housing, poor education, and police brutality caused by "white racism" and advised federal spending to create new jobs for urban blacks, construct additional public housing, and end de facto school segregation in the North
"Little Rock Nine"
nine African American students who had volunteered to integrate Little Rock's Central High School. Governor tried to block their arrival at the school with National guard troops.
What did President Kennedy order federal marshals to do at Ole Miss?
ordered federal marshals to escort Meredith to the registrar's office so that he could enroll at Ole Miss
plaintiffs
persons filling a lawsuit
polarization
separation into opposite camps. This was unadvised by Robert F. Kennedy in his plea for nonviolence after King's death
quota
set by affirmative action initiatives, which set minority hiring and enrollment numbers, which deprived whites of opportunities
What was the compromise made with regards to the MFDP at the 1964 Democratic National Convention?
the Democrats would give 2 of Mississippi's 68 seats to the MFDP with a promise to ban discrimination at the 1968 convention
What was the result of the compromise between Johnson and civil rights leaders at the 1964 Democratic National Convention?
the MFDP and supporters in SNCC felt that their leaders had betrayed them, which set the stage for the Selma Campaign
What was the result of the freedom riders bus trip?
the attorney general and the Interstate Commerce Commission banned segregation in all interstate travel facilities, including waiting rooms, restrooms, and lunch counters.
Black Power
the belief that blacks should fight back if attacked. it urged blacks to achieve economic independence by starting and supporting their own business
Fannie Lou Hamer
the daughter of Mississippi sharecroppers who was the voice for the MFDP at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. In a televised speech that shocked the convention and viewers nationwide, she described how she was jailed for registering to vote in 1962, and how police forced other prisoners to beat her.
