QUESTION NUMBER 1: The civil rights movement of 1960’s was a set of movements in the United States to end racial discrimination against the black Americans and to get them a legal recognition. The movement also attempted to gain federal protection of the rights of citizenship as explained in the constitution. In the late 19th century, black Americans were stripped of their rights by numerous discriminatory laws in the South. Unlawful violence became a normal scenario for the blacks of South.…
The 1960s saw a rapid increase in African-American political and social activism as well as a shift in the goals, focuses, and methods of the Civil Rights Movement. First characterized by its peaceful protests, Christian philosophies of solidarity and inclusion in the face of injustice, and willingness to seek a compromise with local, state, and federal legislatures, the Civil Rights Movement during the early 1960s had both tremendous support and opposition. Nevertheless, through the patient and charismatic arguments for peace and equality made by men such as Martin Luther King Jr. of the SCLC and President John F. Kennedy, many Americans found themselves open to the idea of equal rights and opportunities for all. Over time, however, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s underwent a defining shift of goals. The movement turned from a peaceful, non-violent approach…
The American Civil Rights Movement of the 1960’s was perhaps the most important stepping stone towards social equality this country has ever had. The Civil Rights Movement called into question the country’s morality. Dr. King’s bold actions were different than many other attempts made throughout American history in that it stood on the foundation of peaceful protest. Dr. King’s most well-known speech “I Have a Dream” is perhaps this crowning achievement.…
This book serves as a reminder that the common person doesn’t know nearly enough about the movement and that there are many important, yet untold, stories that will open the reader’s eye to all that really happened in this time period. This book will leave its audience hungering to learn more and give them an understanding of the trials of the Civil Rights…
How important was the Double V Campaign and WW2 in the growing demand for Civil Rights between 1945 and 1968? Before WW2 not much had changed in the Civil Rights Campaign: People still had the view of ‘separate but equal’ and the Jim Crow laws were still in place. However in the mid 60’s the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Acts made significant changes towards Civil Rights. The Double V Campaign and WW2 were important in the growing demand for Civil Rights between 1945 and 1968 to a certain extent.…
Both the reconstruction and the civil rights movement periods are important in the history of the united states because they try to explain how different races, sexes, religious groups, and people from different countries came about to acquire their rights. The reconstruction period specifically focuses on the period after the civil war whereby both the southern and the northern states were looking forward to being united once more. The reconstruction period lasted between 1861 to 1867 (Horton and Blight). On the other hand, Civil Rights Movement era is the period through which some grievances were being addressed either through violence or nonviolence means after the reconstruction period. It is believed that some grievances were not satisfactorily addressed during the reconstruction period and thereby giving birth to the civil rights movement.…
Leaders of the movement such as Martin Luther King Jr., as well as “major organizations involved with the Civil Rights movement came to insist that the lessons of the postwar period had been well-learnt and that there would be no return to the violence of form or spirit that characterized radicalism in the late Depression years,” (Stears 150). Civil Rights activists did not want to drastically change laws, they simply wanted to hold the government to its word and make sure that everyone was equal. Unlike movements in the past, the methods of protest the leaders called for (such as sit-in protests and peaceful rallies) sought to speak to society’s morals. This peaceful protest strategy largely reconstructed America because it, along with the contrasting strategies of the Black Power movement, helped to enable outlawing racial segregation and create voting equality. “The argument was reinforced by the fact that many of the struggles that the movement was engaged in were in pursuit not of now laws based on abstract ideals but of effective enforcement of already existing federal legislation and judicially recognized constitutional rights,” (Stears…
Beginning in the 1950’s and continuing through the 1960’s, was the civil rights movement. This movement was a result of the African Americans recognition to the injustice in the way they were being treated. They took part in varying types of protests (some peaceful and some not peaceful) and were often met with violence, whether it was from the police or southern white Americans. Authors Alan Brinkley, who wrote The Unfinished Nation, and Howard Zinn, who wrote A People’s History of the United States, both speak about the events of the civil rights movement, but both give different perspectives. Although both arguments are compelling, Howard Zinn’s perspective is more persuasive.…
Reconstruction is a time marked by many positive reforms in the favor of the African American community as well as one met by strong resistance from the people of the South. This document from The Encyclopedia of Race and Racism by various authors details the progress made by freedmen and how they went about achieving this. This excerpt discusses many events in which African Americans protested for their rights, such as sit-ins and strikes, demonstrating to the reader that they had to use various means to achieve higher levels of social, political, and economic equality due to resistance primarily from the South. In this reading, a civil rights march is also discussed. This march took place in New Orleans and was met with strong and violent…
The Civil Rights movement was spearheaded by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at the end of the Jim Crow era, resulting in the successful passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Despite these progressive changes in favor of African Americans, the struggles have never fully disappeared. Alexander contends that the caste system of slavery and post-slavery and the days of Jim Crow have simply been revamped for our modern day through the criminal justice…
In the introduction to his book, Why We Can’t Wait, Martin Luther King, Jr., a civil rights activist and minister, explains to all Americans why blacks can no longer put off the fight for their civil rights. He uses a narrative structure to achieve this purpose, setting two black children in opposite ends of the country in similar circumstances. Employing imagery, King explains the lack of opportunity and poverty of these children, representative of all African Americans. Additionally, he uses these children to describe the impact of black people in building America, contrasting it with the injustices they are facing. King concludes with a strong call for action, with hopes to further mobilize Americans in the Civil Rights Movement.…
The time of modification after the Civil War, has been named the Era of Reconstruction. Amid this period, the government should have attempted to rebuild the South and fortify the Union. The government however, neglected to enable the South to finish its conversion into existence without bondage. The government ignored the treatment of African Americans and allowed the South to continue treating them inhumanely. The government additionally, neglected to help stabilize the economy in the South, as well as the political climate which was loaded with distrust and corruption.…
1945 through 1968 was a prominent period of time in United States history as it saw the rise of civil rights movements and an era of more progressive presidents. The federal government was partly in sync with the ideals of civil rights activists as both sides wanted the discriminated, which mostly included African Americans and women, to be officially recognized as equal and eliminate any segregation acts. While the government acted with a plan to gradually do so, activists wanted immediate change and took it upon themselves to do so through boycotts which some may or may not have been nonviolent protests. Documents 1, 5, and 7 relate to the roles the federal government has taken in the civil rights movement. Since President Harry S. Truman,…
Many “revolutionary” movements have come and gone in America’s history, and one of them was the period of Reconstruction following the Civil War. The Reconstruction began in 1865 and marked its end in 1877. Known to bring the Union back together, the Reconstruction also had an outlook on ending the long-going war between the North and South. Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation not only tried to give the blacks their rights, but it also meant a “new light” for slaves trying to end the war’s effects. The Reconstruction wanted to create a Union, and it was indeed a success in doing so, at the most part.…
The civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s is often referred to as the “Second Reconstruction.” Like the first Reconstruction, however, the Second Reconstruction failed to dismantle the economic inequalities that developed during slavery. They were reinforced by the decades of segregation. The Civil Rights Act of 1957 was the first federal civil right law since Reconstruction which established the Civil Rights Commission and the Civil Rights division of the department of justice. (Foner)…