Jim Crow Laws |
“Jump Jim Crow” was the name of a 19th century song that created a stereotype about African Americans. It became the term that was used for the type of laws that allowed oppression and racial discrimination that was common in the United States.
Source: http://www.historyforkids.net/jim-crow-laws.html |
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Linda Brown was an African-American third-grader whose father, Oliver Brown, had sued the school system in Topeka, Kan., alleging that the school his daughter went to, which had only African-American students, was equal to the school that only white Americans went to. Further, Brown alleged, the school system was discriminating against African-American students in violation of the 14th Amendment, which granted all Americans the right to equal protection and, by extension, the right to an equal education.
Arguing the case before the Court were, for the plaintiffs, Thurgood Marshall, general counsel of the Legal Defense Fund, and for the defense, John W. Davis, a former solicitor general. Direct precedent in the case pointed to an 1898 case, Plessy v. Ferguson, which had upheld segregation in public railway cars. But in an opinion of historic magnitude, the Court struck down Plessy, saying "we cannot turn the clock back to 1868 when the Amendment adopted, or even to 1896 when Plessy v. Ferguson was written." In other words, the Court was applying the 14th Amendment to the realm of public education as it stood in the present day. Thus, "Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal" and "such segregation is a denial of the equal protection of the laws." Desegregation in schools happened slowly and with further verification from the Supreme Court and from lower courts, but it did happen. |
Rosa Louise McCauley was born February 4, 1913 in Tuskegee, Alabama. Her father was a carpenter, and her mother was a teacher. She had a younger brother named Sylvester. When she was two, her parents separated. Her family moved to her grandparents’ farm in Pine Level, Alabama. Both her grandparents were former slaves. Pine Level supported the idea of separate but equal. White children rode a bus to their newly built school while African-American children had to walk to a one-room schoolhouse that didn’t have enough desks or supplies. Rosa said, “Back then, we didn’t have any civil rights. It was just a matter of survival, of existing from one day to the next. I remember going to sleep as a girl hearing the Klan ride at night and hearing a lynching and being afraid the house would burn down.”
She quit high school when she was a junior to help take care of her grandmother. Afterwards, she worked as a seamstress in a shirt factory in Montgomery. In 1932, Rosa married Raymond Parks. He was a barber who was actively involved in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Rosa Parks was the first woman to join the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP. On December 1, 1955, a bus driver asked her to give her seat on a bus to a white male passenger. She refused. She was arrested and fined $10 plus court costs ($4) for violating a city ordinance that said the bus driver could assign seats. The Montgomery Women’s Political Council printed and circulated a flyer throughout Montgomery’s black community which read as follows: “Another woman has been arrested and thrown in jail because she refused to get up out of her seat on the bus for a white person … This has to be stopped. Negroes have rights too, for if Negroes did not ride the buses, they could not operate. Three-fourths of the riders are Negro … We are … asking every Negro to stay off the buses Monday in protest of the arrest and trial.” This non-violent protest was successful. Dr. Martin Luther King led the Montgomery Improvement Association. They advertised at black churches and asked people to continue the boycott. Ninety percent of Montgomery’s black citizens, estimated to be around 42,000 protesters, walked, carpooled or took cabs. In the beginning, the boycotters were willing to accept a compromise that was consistent with separate but equal rather than asking for complete integration. They asked for courteous treatment by bus operators, first-come, first-served seating on buses, and employment of African American bus drivers. The boycott lasted 381 days. The bus company lost a lot of money. The United States Supreme Court ruled that the Montgomery segregation law was unconstitutional, and on December 20, 1956, Montgomery officials were ordered to desegregate buses. The bus boycott demonstrated the power of nonviolent mass protest and brought Dr. Martin Luther King to national attention as one of the leaders of the cause. The civil rights movement led to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 – which made it illegal to refuse employment to an individual on the basis of race and made segregation at any public facility against the law. Rosa wrote four books, Rosa Parks: My Story, Quiet Strength, Dear Mrs. Parks: A Dialogue With Today’s Youth and I Am Rosa Parks. At the ceremony where President Bill Clinton presented Mrs. Parks with the Medal of Freedom, she was called “the first lady of civil rights” and “the mother of the freedom movement”. This medal is the highest award given to a civilian in the US. Time Magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. She died October 24, 2005. |
The Greensboro sit-in was a civil rights protest that started in 1960, when 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 sit-in movement soon spread to college towns throughout the South. Though many of the protesters were arrested for trespassing, disorderly conduct or disturbing the peace, their actions made an immediate and lasting impact, forcing Woolworth’s and other establishments to change their segregationist policies.
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John F Kennedy (1917-1963), nicknamed the "JFK" or the "King of Camelot", was the 35th American President and served in office from 1961-1963. The Presidency of John F Kennedy spanned the period in United States history that encompasses the events of the Cold War Era and the age of the Space Race and the Cold War Arms Race. President John F Kennedy represented the Democratic political party which influenced the domestic and foreign policies of his presidency as well as the Civil Rights movement.
The major accomplishments and the famous, main events that occurred during the time that John F Kennedy was president included the Bay of Pigs Invasion (1961), the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962) , the Berlin Wall was erected. Alan Shepard became the first American in space. The Women’s Rights Movement and Feminism emerges and the 1963 Equal Pay Act was passed. The Civil Rights Movement gains momentum with the Freedom Riders and the March on Washington. was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963, aged 46. Lee Harvey Oswald was apprehended in connection with the John F Kennedy Assassination but was killed two days later by Jack Ruby. |
This act was originally proposed by President John F. Kennedy and, at the time of the first discussion, was completely opposed by those that lived in the Southern United States, and therefore it was opposed by their representatives in Congress.
After the assassination of President Kennedy, President Lyndon B. Johnson continued to move the act forward, even though there were many that were against it. There was a great amount of arguing in Congress as members of the Southern states repeatedly tried to keep the act from being approved. The years leading up to the 1960’s were filled with unrest, violence and unhappiness as the Black Americans faces continual discrimination in almost all aspects of their lives.The Civil Rights Movement brought attention to their situation and in all parts of the country, people began to realize the unfairness that existed in the treatment of Black Americans. The March on Washington was a peaceful demonstration that finalized the meaning of freedom and opportunity. In 1964, the Civil Rights Act was passed to try to end segregation for the Black American. Up until 1964, a variety of places in the country, mostly in the southern states had complete segregation between black and white citizens. This extended to bathrooms, restaurants, public transportation, hotels and even to the point of people working together. Local laws called “Jim Crow Laws” in the south took things even further, allowing the direct attack and killing of Black Americans without due process of law as well as local rules that kept Black Americans from being able to vote. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 banned discrimination of employment based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin. It also banned discrimination involving any public place. This act was originally proposed by President John F. Kennedy and, at the time of the first discussion, was completely opposed by those that lived in the Southern United States, and therefore it was opposed by their representatives in Congress. This opened the door to allow schools, who received Federal funding, to have segregated classrooms. This was of great importance in the south, where many of the ‘Black Only’ schools were poorly supported. It removed the “Jim Crow Laws” that kept Black Americans away from the voting polls and was hailed by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr as a ‘second emancipation’. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was the beginning of the final expansion of freedoms for many people. In the years to follow, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed, which removed any of the previous requirements set in place by local governments requiring literacy tests to be passed before being allowed to vote. Additional laws that were passed, thanks to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 included The Fair Housing Act of 1968 which stated that discrimination of any kind in the purchase or renting of a home or any living area was against the law. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 became the turning point in American history for Black Americans but also led to the fair treatment of other minorities and women. It removed Federal dollars from any organization or company that promoted discrimination and that led to changes that are felt to this day. |
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