Civil Rights Movement Important Facts

  • Jim Crow Laws

    Jim Crow Laws
    The Jim Crow Laws were part of a system that segregated almost everything between blacks and whites. They are the main reason the civil rights movement occurred.
  • Plessy Vs Fergeson

    Plessy Vs Fergeson
    The U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld the racist policy of segregation by legalizing “separate but equal”
  • NAACP

    NAACP
    The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP, was founded in response to lynchings and riots in 1909. It worked against lynching and segregation in the 20th century and is still together today.
  • CORE

    CORE
    The Congress of Racial Equality, or CORE, was founded in 1942. It was a leading civil rights organization. CORE helped the SNCC create the Freedom Rides, which tried to desegregate public facilities. Also similar to the SNCC, it started as a nonviolent organization but slowly shifted away from that.
  • Jackie Robinson

    Jackie Robinson
    Robinson was the first African-American to play in major league baseball.
  • Brown vs Board of Education

    Brown vs Board of Education
    The U.S. Supreme Court unanimous decision that overturned the “separate but equal” doctrine in public schools
  • Emmet Till

    Emmet Till
    Emmett Till was murdered in Money, Mississippi.
  • Rosa Parks

    Rosa Parks
    Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery City Bus and was arrested.
  • Bus Boycott

    Bus Boycott
    The Montgomery Bus Boycott begins.
  • SCLC

    SCLC
    The Southern Christian Leadership Conference dates back to the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Leaders of the civil rights movement met to organize specific movements.
  • Little Rock 9

    Little Rock 9
    The Little Rock 9 enter Central High School as federal troops oversee the situation sent by President Eisenhower
  • Woolworths Store Protest

    4 black college students sat at an all-white lunch counter and started a sit-in protest at a Woolworth’s store.
  • SNCC

    SNCC
    The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, or SNCC, was formed in 1960 to help students take part in nonviolent acts to stop segregation. The organization helped hold many of these events until a new leader led to its destruction.
  • Freedom Riders

    Freedom Riders
    Freedom riders begin a bus ride through the South to protest segregation.
  • James Meredith

    James Meredith
    Enrolled at the University of Mississippi
  • MLK's Arrest in Birmingham

    MLK's Arrest in Birmingham
    Martin Luther King Jr. was arrested in Birmingham protesting in the “most segregated city in America.”
  • "I Have A Dream"

    "I Have A Dream"
    More than 250,000 people, march on Washington to demand immediate passage of the civil rights bill.
  • LBJ Civil Rights Act

    LBJ Civil Rights Act
    President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the premier legislation for Civil Rights into law.
  • Malcolm X

    Malcolm X
    African American nationalist and religious leader, is assassinated by rival Black Muslims while addressing his Organization of Afro-American Unity at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights.
  • Selma to Montgomery

    Selma to Montgomery
    A march from Selma to Montgomery to fight for voting rights begins.
  • LBJ Voting Rights Act

    President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law outlawing literacy tests.
  • Black Panthers

    Black Panthers
    Huey Newton & Bobby Seale founded the “Black Power” political group known as the Black Panthers.
  • Kerner Commission

    Kerner Commission
    The Kerner Commission report stated that white racism was to blame for increasing riots. It also said that unless large precautions were taken, the riots would continue. The Commission was appointed by president Johnson to try to stop riots.
  • MLK Assassination

    MLK Assassination
    Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated by James Earl Ray in Memphis.