Dbq Civil Rights Movement Essay

In the mid twentieth century a movement exploded, a movement that had begun near one-hundred years prior, that now would have great leaders that would help reshape the American life, economy, and society as we know it. This change was good and much needed. The goals of this movement was the desegregation of African Americans from whites, in other words the integration of the two races, and the ability for African Americans to vote. These goals were complete, the goals of the civil rights movement, but the major goal of the movement, the goal of true equality was still not achieved. The Civil RIghts act of 1964 was passed and the voting rights of 1965 was achieved, the movement brought to light to all the American people and the world the horrors …show more content…
One such downright refusal to allow the African Americans to vote is shown by Fannie Lou Hammer’s story of after going to register to vote, and in turn being arrested, she was forced to leave her plantation for fear of her life and “Ten days later they fired into Mrs.Tucker’s house where I was staying. They also shot two girls at Mr. Sissel’s”(Doc 4). The violence and opposition the African Americans faced in order to vote caught the attention of the civil rights movement. Because of this MLK and SNCC decided to march from Selma to montgomery in a protest on voter registration for African Americans. The march was halted by local authorities at the Edmund Pettus Bridge and were brutally attacked and four protesters died. But the movement and doctor King would not be intimidated and with the help of federal troops by order of LBJ they marched through the most dangerous area in the south and went to its capital, montgomery, Alabama. This success led to the cause of various other marches and eventually LBJ was able to successfully push through the voting rights act of 1965. This act prohibits racial discrimination in voting and with it MLK accomplished two of his goals. With the act passing it became a major success and showed immensely two years later when they saw how the massive increase in voter registration in blacks as German Lopez states in his article on voting rights “ ...black voter registration rates in Mississippi increased from a mere 6.7 percent in 1965 to 59.8 percent in 1967…”(German Lopez, 2015). This left the biggest goal of the movement left to accomplish, true equality, and it would be a goal that would take MLK until his death to fight for and even then he could