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Brown vs Board of Education
This was a Supreme Court case that helped convince the nine justices that separating children in school because of their race was unconstitutional. Brown was a group of five lawsuits against school districts in several states. This was a unanimous vote. -
Emmitt Till
14 year old boy from Chicago visits family in Mississippi. He was accused of whistling at a white woman. He was kidnapped, beat, shot, and killed. He was thrown into a lake with a weight. His mother had an open casket funeral. Even though his killers admitted to it, they were found not guilty. -
Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks, a black woman, gets on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. She refused to give up her seat on a crowded bus to a white passenger. After her refusal to move, she was fined and arrested. This seemingly small effort changed the effort to end segregation. -
Founding Of Southern Christian Leadership Confrence
The Southern Christian Leadeship Conference (SCLC) is an organization founded in 1957, and it successfully staged a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery Alabama’s segregated bus system. Martin Luther King, Jr., Bayard Rustin, Ralph Abernathy, Fred Shuttlesworth, and others, founded the organization to have a regional organizational that could more effectively coordinated civil rights protest activities in the South. The SCLC was founded in Atlanta, Georgia; most of their leaders were ministers. -
Little Rock Nine
Little Rock Nine made it inside for their first full day of school. The 101st Airborne left in October and the federalized Arkansas National Guard troops remained throughout the year. The Little Rock Nine had assigned guards to walk them from class to class. As the nine teens came to be known, they were the first African American students to enter Little Rock's Central High School. -
Greensboro Sit In
This sit in was a civil rights protest in North Carolina. Young African American students sat at a segregated lunch counter and refused to leave because they were denied service. The movement spread to the South and forced establishments to change their segregation policies. -
Freedom Riders
This was a movement made up of both white and black people. One of their buses was attacked and burned in Anniston, Alabama. Another bus was was attacked by a white mob that same day. -
Martin Luther King Jr. (SCLC)
The SCLC was founded in 1957. It successfully organized a 381 day boycott of the segregated bus system. Martin Luther King Jr., along with other leaders, coordinated civil rights protest activities. -
March on Washington
over 260,000 people from across the nation participated in the historic March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. They gathered at the Lincoln Memorial. Over 3,000 members of the press covered this March. This is where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.President president -
Civil Rights Act
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. This act ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination. It’s considered one of the crowing achievements of the civil rights movement. It was signed in by Lyndon B. Johnson. -
Student Nonviolent coordinating Committee
During Freedom Summer, African Americans from Mississippi and volunteers faced extreme violence. This project was designed to draw attention to oppression experienced in Mississippi by blacks who tried to exercise their constitutional rights. This created political momentum for the Voting Rights Act of 1965. -
Selma to Montgomery Marches
In Selma, Alabama, activists protested the denial of voting rights to African Americans as well as the murder of Jimmie Lee Jackson. State troopers and county possemen attacked the marchers with billy clubs and tear gas after they passed the county line. Multiple were later hospitalized with serious injuries. -
Voting rights act
This act was signed into law on August 6, 1965, by President Lyndon Johnson. It completely outlawed discriminatory voting practices. This act had an immediate impact. In fact, by the end of the year, a quarter of a million new Black voters had been registered.