Does a problem arise when the federal government uses force to promote civil rights for a certain group of citizens?

1791-U.S. of America-first nation to acknowledge its citizens have God-given individual rights and to protect them from government intrusion-Bill of Rights

1868-Fourteenth Amendment-”states cannot deny anyone equal protection of the laws” …all citizens, including African Americans, have the same individual rights (except for Native Americans)

1896- Plessy vs. Ferguson-Supreme Court ruled that “separate but equal” facilities separating blacks and whites did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment

Result: Jim Crow Laws passed (especially in the South) keeping races separate-schools, restaurants, public restrooms, streetcars, railroad coaches, etc.

Secondary result: facilities for blacks were often inferior

WW II events set stage:1. Demand for soldiers created

shortage of white workers opening jobs for minorities

2. One million African-Americans fought for U.S. freedom abroad, came home to fight for their own freedom

3. President Roosevelt issued presidential directive prohibiting racial discrimination by all federal agencies and companies engaged in war effort as a result of active African Americans challenging Jim Crow Laws.

From 1938-1961, NAACP under Thurgood Marshall’s direction, won 29 out of 32 cases against school segregation

1954-Biggest Case:Brown vs. Board of Ed. Of Topeka (Kansas) Supreme Court unanimously struck down segregation in schooling as unconstitutional.

1955-Brown II-schools ordered to desegregate

“with all deliberate speed”.

School superintendent implements desegregation by inviting five black students to Central High School in Little Rock

Governor Orval Faubus (pro-segregationist) sends in National Guard to stop it

President Eisenhower places National Guard under federal control to protect black students

At year’s end, Faubus closes down high school to prevent further integration

Attorney General Rogers given greater power over school desegregation

Gave federal government jurisidiction over violations of black voting rights

Rosa Parks refuses to sit in the back of the bus, and is arrested

Martin Luther King, Jr. was asked to lead the bus boycott; his speeches filled black citizens with a sense of mission

1956- Supreme Court outlawed bus segregation

Ministers and civil rights leaders, including Martin Luther King, Jr. create SCLC

Purpose: “Carry on nonviolent crusades against the evils of second-class citizenship.”

King used his voice and ideas to build the organization from the grassroots up and bring in ordinary African-Americans.

• Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee

• Founded by Ella Baker, first director of SCLC

• 1960-held first sit-in at a whites ’only lunch counter in a Woolworth’s store in Greenboro,NC.

White and African American members of CORE(Congress for Racial Equality)

Purpose: provoke violent reactions among segregationists in the South to force the Kennedy Administration to enforce the law

Success: Justice Department sent 400 U.S. marshals to

protect them Attorney General and ICC banned segregation in all

interstate travel facilities

September 1962, Air Force veteran James Meredith escorted by federal marshalls to enroll at Ole Miss after being turned away

Riots broke out All year, Meredith

protected by federal officials as he attended

April 3rd-May 3rd SCLC under Martin Luther King, Jrs.s leadership led demonstrations

Protests, economic boycott and negative media coverage finally convinced Birmingham officials to end segregation

President Kennedy sent federal troops into University of Alabama to force Governor George Wallace to integrate the university

Hours before, Medgar Evers, NAACP field secretary and WWII veteran, shot by a white supremacist

March on Washington, D.C. (250,000 people, 75,000 whites)

In front of Lincoln Memorial, Martin Luther King gave “I had a dream….” speech

(two months later, President Kennedy assassinated)

President Lyndon Johnson signed it

Prohibited discrimination because of race, religion, national origin and gender

Gave citizens the right to enter all public accommodations

Freedom Summer (1964)-CORE and SNCC workers tried to register as many African Americans as they could to vote

Riots, demonstrations, marches resulted in passage

Act eliminated all literacy tests that disqualified many voters

Percentage of African American voters tripled

De facto segregation-exists through practice and custom Harder to fight because it

demands a change in attitudes rather than repealing laws

(de jure segregation-segregation by law)

Intensified in the North during the African-American migration during WWII

White flight to the suburbs mixed with poor treatment from police ignited urban violence

Watts-worst of the riots during this time, August 11, 196535 people killedHundreds of millions of

dollars in property destroyed

1967-riots and violent clashes took place in over 100 cities in the U.S.

WHY the violence?

Dissention between SCLC (King) and SNCC (Carmichael) and CORE who were more militant

Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little) while in jail for burglary joined the Nation of Islam

Nation of Islam (Black Muslims) called for black separation from white society and growth of racial pride

Separated from Black Muslim movement and wanted to work with white society,

Killed February 21, 1965

Stokeley Carmichael-stop recruiting whites, focus on developing “Black Power”

Black Panthers-radical political party advocating self-sufficiency in the black ghettos; started many social programs for blacks in the ghetto areas but also committed crimes worthy of FBI attention (double edged sword)

April 3, 1968 100 cities exploded into

flames June , 1968 Robert

Kennedy (campaigning for Democratic presidential nomination) assassinated

Results of study of effects of urban violence in the United States,

“This is our basic conclusion: Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white-separate and unequal.”

1. ended de jure segregation, bringing legal protection for civil rights of all Americans

2.Greater African-American pride3.African Americans made huge political gains;From 100 holding office in 1965 to 7,000 by 1992Affirmative action- forcing employers and

educational institutions to give preferential treatment to groups who had been discriminated against in the past; setting up quotas (ruled unconstitutional)

Downside to AA:-growing opposition,”reverse

discrimination” (color of skin only reason for promotion,

-promotes mediocrity (unqualified people being hired just because of skin color)

Forty Plus Years later…

Where are we now?