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The U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld the racist policy of segregation by legalizing “separate but equal” facilities for blacks and whites.
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A diverse group of people, white, blacks and Jews founded the NAACP. The goal of the group was to fight for civil rights in the United States.
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The U.S. Supreme Court unanimous decision that overturned the “separate but equal” doctrine in public schools.
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Emmett Till was murdered in Money, Mississippi.
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Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery City Bus and was arrested.
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The Montgomery Bus Boycott begins.
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The Southern Christian Leadership Conference, comprised of Martin Luther King, Jr., Charles K. Steele and Fred L. Shuttlesworth, was established. King was the organization's first president.
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Eisenhower signs the Civil Rights Act of 1957 into law to help protect voter rights. The law allows federal prosecution of those who suppress another’s right to vote.
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The Little Rock 9 enter Central High School as federal troops oversee the situation sent by President Eisenhower.
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The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was founded at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina, providing young blacks with a more prominent place in the civil rights movement.
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4 black college students sat at an all-white lunch counter and started a sit-in protest at a Woolworth’s store
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President Kennedy issued Executive Order 10925, prohibiting discrimination in federal government hiring on the basis of race, religion or national origin and establishing.
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Freedom riders begin a bus ride through the South to protest segregation.
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James Meredith became the first African-American student to enroll at the University of Mississippi.
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Martin Luther King Jr. was arrested in Birmingham protesting in the “most segregated city in America.”
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More than 250,000 people, march on Washington to demand immediate passage of the civil rights bill.
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The 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing was an act of white supremacist terrorism by members of the Ku Klux Klan which occurred at a baptist church in Birmingham. Four girls got killed by the explosion
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John F. Kennedy was murdered in Dallas, Texas.
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President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the premier legislation for Civil Rights into law.
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The black religious leader Malcolm X is assassinated during a rally by members of the Nation of Islam.
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A march from Selma to Montgomery to fight for voting rights begins.
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President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law outlawing literacy tests.
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Huey Newton & Bobby Seale founded the “Black Power” political group known as the Black Panthers.
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Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated by James Earl Ray in Memphis.
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President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1968, also known as the Fair Housing Act, providing equal housing opportunity regardless of race, religion or national origin.