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The Supreme Court Decision of Plessy v. Ferguson
upheld a Louisiana state law that allowed for "equal but separate accommodations for the white and colored races" -
The Tuskegee Airmen
the first African American soldiers to successfully complete their training and enter the Army Air Corps -
The Integration of Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball unofficially banned African-Americans from their ranks. That all changed when Jackie Robinson stepped onto the field for the Brooklyn Dodgers on April 15, 1947. -
The Integration of the Armed Forces
President Harry Truman signed Executive Order 9981, creating the President's Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services. The order mandated the desegregation of the U.S. military -
The Supreme Court Decision of Sweatt v. Painter
The Court held that the Equal Protection Clause required that Sweatt be admitted to the university. -
The Supreme Court Decision of Brown v. Board of Education
The Supreme Court ruled that separating children in public schools on the basis of race was unconstitutional. It signaled the end of legalized racial segregation in the schools of the United States, overruling the "separate but equal" principle set forth in the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case -
The Death of Emmitt Till
14-year-old African American boy who was abducted, tortured, and lynched in Mississippi in 1955, after being accused of offending a white woman, Carolyn Bryant, in her family's grocery store -
The Montgomery Bus Boycott
a civil rights protest during which African Americans refused to ride city buses in Montgomery, Alabama -
The Integration of Little Rock High School
Gained national attention on September 4, 1957, when Governor Orval Faubus mobilized the Arkansas National Guard in an effort to prevent nine African American students from integrating into the high school. -
The Civil Rights Act of 1957
Established the Civil Rights Section of the Justice Department and empowered federal prosecutors to obtain court injunctions against interference with the right to vote. -
The Greensboro Four Lunch Counter Sit-in
Young African American students staged a sit-in at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, and refused to leave after being denied service. -
The Freedom Rides by Freedom Riders of 1961
Groups of white and African American civil rights activists participated in Freedom Rides, and bus trips through the American South in 1961 to protest segregated bus terminals. -
The Twenty-Fourth Amendment
Prohibited the federal and state governments from imposing poll taxes before a citizen could participate in a federal election. -
The Integration of the University of Mississippi
On September 30, 1962, riots erupted on the campus of the University of Mississippi in Oxford where locals, students, and committed segregationists had gathered to protest the enrollment of James Meredith, a black Air Force veteran attempting to integrate the all-white school. -
The Integration of the University of Alabama
President John F. Kennedy federalized National Guard troops and deployed them to the University of Alabama to force its desegregation -
The March on Washington & "I Have a Dream" Speech by MLK
I Have a Dream, a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., that was delivered on August 28, 1963, during the March on Washington. A call for equality and freedom, it became one of the defining moments of the civil rights movement and one of the most iconic speeches in American history. Location: Washington, D.C. -
The Assassination in John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Tx
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, is assassinated in 1963 while traveling through Dallas, Texas, in an open-top convertible. -
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 signed by President Johnson
Prohibited discrimination in public places, provided for the integration of schools and other public facilities, and made employment discrimination illegal. It was the most sweeping civil rights legislation since Reconstruction -
The Assassination of Malcolm X
American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figure during the civil rights movement. A spokesman for the Nation of Islam until 1964, he was a vocal advocate for Black empowerment and the promotion of Islam within the Black community. -
the Selma to Montgomery March: "Bloody Sunday"
March 7, 1965, an estimated 525 to 600 civil rights marchers headed southeast out of Selma on U.S. Highway 80. -
The Voting Rights Act of 1965
Signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African Americans from exercising their right to vote as guaranteed under the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. -
The Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis, Tennessee
On April 4, 1968, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated here at the Lorraine Motel, just a day after delivering his prophetic "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech at the Mason Temple Church of God in Christ. -
The Voting Rights Act of 1968
The 1968 act expanded on previous acts and prohibited discrimination concerning the sale, rental, and financing of housing based on race, religion, national origin, and since 1974, sex. Since 1988, the act protects people with disabilities and families with children.