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Emancipation Proclamation
This was issued by President Lincoln freed slaves in the Confederacy -
14th Amendment
This Amendment granted due process and equal protection under the law to African Americans. -
15th Amendment
The 15th Amendment granted blacks the right to vote, including former slaves -
Plessy vs: Ferguson
The U.S. Supreme Court decision in Plessy v. Ferguson upheld an 1890 Louisiana statute mandating racially segregated but equal railroad cars. The ruling stated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution dealt with political and not social equality. Plessy v. Ferguson gave a broad interpretation of "equal but separate" accommodations with reference to "white and colored people" legitimizing "Jim Crow" practices throughout the South. -
Brown Vs: Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
The U.S. Supreme Court's unanimously ruled in the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas that public school segregation was unconstitutional and paved the way for desegregation. The decision overturned the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson ruling that said "separate educational facilities were inherently unequal." It was a victory for NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall, who argued the case and later returned to the Supreme Court as the nation's first African-American Suprem -
Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat at the front of the "colored section" of a bus in Montgomery, Ala., to a white passenger, defying a southern custom of the time. In response to her arrest, the Montgomery black community launched a bus boycott that lasted over a year until the buses desegregated on Dec. 21, 1956. Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., the newly elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), was instrumental in leading the boycott. -
Little Rock Nine
SEPT. 2, 1957
Integration was easier said than done at the formerly all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Ark. Nine black students, who became known as the "Little Rock Nine," were blocked from entering the school on the orders of Arkansas Governor Orval Fabus. President Eisenhower sent federal troops and the National Guard to intervene on behalf of the students, but a federal judge granted an injunction against the governor's use of National Guard troops to prevent integration. They wer -
Little Rock Nine Cont.
On Monday, Sept. 23, when school resumed, Little Rock policemen surrounded Central High where more than 1,000 people gathered in front of the school. The police escorted the nine black students to a side door where they quietly entered the building to begin classes. When the mob learned the blacks were inside, they began to challenge the police with shouts and threats. Fearful the police would be unable to control the crowd, the school administration moved the black students out a side door befo -
Discrimination in Federal Government Hiring
President Kennedy issued Executive Order 10925, prohibiting discrimination in federal government hiring on the basis of race, religion or national origin and establishing The President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity , the EEOC. They were immediately directed to scrutinize and study employment practices of the United States government and to consider and recommend additional affirmative steps for executive departments and agencies -
James Meredith
James Meredith became the first black student to enroll at the University of Mississippi. President Kennedy sent 5,000 federal troops to contain the violence and riots surrounding the incident. -
I have a Dream
More than 250,000 people join in the March on Washington. Congregating at the Lincoln Memorial, participants listened as Martin Luther King delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. -
Sixteenth Street Baptist Church
Four young girls, Denise McNair, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Addie Mae Collins, attending Sunday school were killed when a bomb exploded at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, a popular location for civil rights meetings. Riots erupted in Birmingham, Ala., leading to the deaths of two more black youth. -
24th Amendment
The 24th Amendment abolished the poll tax, which had originally been instituted in 11 southern states. The poll tax made it difficult for blacks to vote. -
Freedom Summer
The Council of Federated Organizations (COFO) launched a massive effort to register black voters during what becomes known as the Freedom Summer -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The most sweeping civil rights legislation since Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination of all kinds based on race, color, religion or national origin and transform American society -
MALCOLM X Assasinated
MALCOLM X Assassinated, he was born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Neb., on May 19, 1925, this world-renowned black nationalist leader was assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in Manhattan on the first day of National Brotherhood Week. A Black Muslim Minister, revolutionary black freedom fighter, civil rights activist and for a time the national spokesperson for the Nation of Islam, he famously spoke of the need for black freedom "by any means necessary." -
Selma to Montgomery Marches
Selma to Montgomery Marches
The Selma to Montgomery marches, which included Bloody Sunday, were actually three marches that marked the political and emotional peak of the American civil rights movement -
Bloody Sunday
Bloody Sunday
Blacks began a march to Montgomery in support of voting rights, but were stopped at the Edmund Pettus Bridge by a police blockade in Selma, Ala. State troopers and the Dallas County Sheriff's Department, some mounted on horseback, awaited them. In the presence of the news media, the lawmen attacked the peaceful demonstrators with billy clubs, tear gas and bull whips, driving them back into Selma.
The incident was dubbed "Bloody Sunday" by the national media, with ea -
Ceremonial Action
Ceremonial Action within 48 hours, demonstrations in support of the marchers, were held in 80 cities and thousands of religious and lay leaders, including Dr. Martin Luther King, flew to Selma. He called for people across the country to join him. Hundreds responded to his call, shocked by what they had seen on television.
However, to prevent another outbreak of violence, marchers attempted to gain a court order that would prohibit the police from interfering. Instead of issuing th -
Selma to Montgomery March
MARCH 21-25 1965 (Selma to Montgomery March)
Under protection of a federalized National Guard, voting rights advocates left Selma on March 21, and stood 25,000 strong on March 25 before the state capitol in Montgomery. As a direct consequence of these events, the U.S. Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, guaranteeing every American 21 years old and over the right to register to vote. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, making it easier for Southern blacks to register to vote. Literacy tests, poll taxes and other such requirements that were used to restrict black voting were made illegal. -
Executive Order 11245
President Lyndon Johnson issued Executive Order 11246 to enforce affirmative action for the first time because he believed asserting civil rights laws were not enough to remedy discrimination. It required government contractors to "take affirmative action" toward prospective minority employees in all aspects of hiring and employment. This represented the first time "affirmative action" entered the federal contracting lexicon and sought to ensure equality of employment. (Presidenti -
Loving vs: Virginia
In Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court ruled that prohibiting interracial marriage was unconstitutional. Sixteen states that still banned interracial marriage at the time were forced to revise their laws. -
Thurgood Marshall
Senate confirmed President Lyndon Johnson's appointment of Thurgood Marshall as the first African American Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court after he served for two years as a Solicitor General of the United States -
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Assasinated
Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., at age 39, was shot as he was standing on the balcony outside his hotel room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn. Escaped convict and committed racist James Earl Ray was convicted of the crime. The networks then broadcast President Johnson's statement in which he called for Americans to "reject the blind violence," yet cities were ignited from coast to coast. -
Civil Rights Ast of 1968
President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968, prohibiting discrimination in the sale, rental and financing of housing. -
Busing
The Supreme Court, in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education upheld busing as a legitimate means for achieving integration of public schools. Although largely unwelcome (and sometimes violently opposed) in local school districts, court-ordered busing plans in cities such as Charlotte, Boston, and Denver continued until the late 1990s. -
The Civil Rights Restoration Act
Overriding President Ronald Reagan's veto, Congress passed the Civil Rights Restoration Act, which expanded the reach of nondiscrimination laws within private institutions receiving federal funds. -
Affirmatiive Action Decision
In the most important affirmative action decision since the 1978 Bakke case, the Supreme Court (5?4) upheld the University of Michigan Law School's policy, which ruled race could be one of factors colleges consider when selecting students because it furthered "a compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body."
