Introduction
African Americans and their allies fought for equal rights under the law and the abolition of discrimination for a long time during the American Civil Rights Movement. The long-standing campaigns to end slavery and eradicate the institutionalized racism that permeated American culture served as the inspiration for this Movement. Even while grassroots activism led to historic legislation that resulted in significant legal and social triumphs in the middle era of the 20th century, struggles for real justice and equal opportunity are still ongoing today.
The historic Civil Rights Movement’s path from the years following the Civil War to the 1960s shows how far American society has come and how far it has to go to address racial injustices. The research study analysis will focus on how the American Civil Rights Movement was a prolonged struggle, from early abolition efforts before the Civil War to the legal victories of the 1960s civil rights era.
Foundations: Abolition and Reconstruction
The early campaigns to end African Americans’ enslavement served as the basis of the Movement. Abolitionists, both white and black, began utilizing newspapers, boycotts, and assistance to fugitives traveling via the Underground Railroad in the 1830s to bring attention to the terrible effects of slavery (Lewis 24). The 13th Amendment formally outlawed slavery statewide in 1865 following a full-fledged civil war and President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation (Dudziak 117). However, it was unclear what steps would be taken to guarantee citizenship and rights for recently liberated African Americans who were still subject to prejudice and discrimination.
Black citizens made strides in gaining political authority, economic independence, and legal rights during the Reconstruction Era in the late 1860s. Equal protection and voting rights were included in the Constitution by the 14th and 15th Amendments (Zuczek31). During this brief era of development, sometimes called America’s First Civil Rights Movement,” black men held public office, gained the right to vote, and accomplished significant political victories throughout the South (Dudziak 102). Incorporating members of the African-American community was a significant advancement in the cause of inclusivity.
Seeds of a Reborn Movement
Slowly, like burning embers fanned into flames, momentum for a more significant civil rights movement rekindled in the early 20th century. Smaller-scale demonstrations and legal actions against prejudice and the denial of voting rights to Black people continued (Klarman 221). For instance, the Niagara Movement was formed by W.E.B. Du Bois in 1905, who advocated for black Americans to have full citizenship rights (Lewis 31). Not long after, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was formed in 1909 to fight racism in courts (Putnam 209). The organization served as a conduit for later mass action by providing continuity from the early initiatives.
Racial equality expectations were increased during and after World War II when black service members who had fought fascism overseas returned home to find themselves the target of discrimination. To challenge segregation in public spaces, those moving to cities joined newly formed organizations like the Congress of Racial Equality sit-ins and organized boycotts (Dudziak 88). Theologian Howard Thurman, who received training in nonviolence from Mahatma Gandhi, advised activists on how to use these strategies at home (Singh 349). A new generation of civil rights leaders researched previous social justice campaigns from other eras and locations to prepare for America’s upcoming challenges. The conditions were right by the middle of the 1950s for a nonviolent revolution in human rights.
Sparking a Movement: Montgomery and Little Rock
Rosa Parks’ situation began a 381-day bus boycott on 1995 December 1, when upon refusing to surrender her seat to a Montgomery white passenger, she got arrested in Alabama. The scenario led to the young Reverend Dr. Luther King Jr. being elected as the leader of the newly created Montgomery Improvement Association in record time (Jackson 109). King became a well-known movement spokesperson advocating nonviolent resistance to secure civil rights reform through widely reported persecution against participants in the nonviolent boycott (Jackson 110). Over the ensuing years, protests against voter suppression, Freedom Rides, and student sit-in campaigns all contributed to the momentum growth.
A new phase of widespread Black resistance to racial injustice in the South was ushered in with the Montgomery Boycott of Buses. Due to the black neighborhoods in Montgomery’s solidarity in refusing to ride city buses, the boycott lasted for more than a year. Women activists such as Jo Ann Gibson Robinson disseminated information and even assisted in setting up carpools as a substitute mode of transportation (Robinson 137). The Ku Klux Klan in Montgomery, Alabama, also staged several visible demonstrations that helped keep the momentum going (Klarman154). It was not until November 1956 that Montgomery’s bus segregation policy was declared unlawful by the US Supreme Court in a majority decision.
However, the 1957 Little Rock Central High School crisis demonstrated that certain white authorities remained stubborn. As seen in 1957, when he prevented the Little Rock Nine from enrolling in Central High School, Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus actively impeded the integration of black students’ education mandated by a court order (Putnam 98). As mob violence increased, President Eisenhower grudgingly dispatched federal troops to execute desegregation orders (Putnam 142). Even though the Little Rock Nine were finally admitted, the drastic means used and the continued hatred of white citizens made it a pyrrhic victory.
Strategic Protest in Birmingham
Birmingham, Alabama, was well known due to its severe segregation laws and infamous ‘Commissioner of Public Safety Bull Connor.’ The Southern Christian Leadership Council [SCLC] considered the city a strategic target as the protests grew (Putnam 105). Waves of trained activists launched boycotts, marches, and sit-ins during the historic Birmingham Campaign of 1963, continuing nonviolently despite being brutally attacked by white supremacists and authorities. By planning waves of business boycotts and sit-ins during the busiest Easter shopping season, the Birmingham protests in 1963 purposefully increased economic pressure (Dudziak 38).
The moment footage of Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) organizer Fred Shuttlesworth being beaten with fire hoses made national headlines (Fairclough 79). Authorities in Alabama made nearly 3,000 mass arrests, including hundreds of children, but the overcrowding in jails as a result of the crackdowns only served to heighten public indignation (Dudziak 69). The fire was spiked even further, leading to constant unrest among the civilians.
Not long after, a devastating scenario blew the extent of the situation even further. The Children’s Crusade, which saw waves of child protestors confront fire hoses and police dogs on May 2, was the pinnacle of the Birmingham Campaign (Putnam 219). Witnesses to scenes of abused children singing gospel hymns provoked fury and forced the Kennedy Administration to bring in strong civil rights legislation eventually.
President Kennedy acknowledged that he was “sick” after seeing the intense pictures from Birmingham (Sokol 220). The campaign established Martin Luther King Jr. as a key movement figure and strengthened the use of nonviolent resistance as a tactic. The horrifying violence perpetrated against activists further emphasized the need for further grassroots organizing and federal voting rights.
The tide of the battle was seen to be turning with Birmingham. The city permanently captured the violence of racism for audiences throughout the world, even if the negotiations between white business executives and movement representatives resulted in only small concessions (Fairclough 133). Through skillful staging, the campaign brought attention to racial injustice and portrayed segregation as a violent, impractical ideology in contrast with American values (Jackson 120). Resentment over unsolved issues of persistent poverty, police brutality, and cultural erasure in Northern ghettos was channeled through nationalist movements (Dudziak, 2000). Thus, the alternative Movement offered drastic remedies to the ongoing racial injustices in America, shocking the mainstream in the process. It was by exposing the unpleasant realities that victory was won.
From Protest to Policy
By the early 1960s, grassroots action in Mississippi was also picking up steam. Voter registration efforts challenged the state’s closed political system, which was upheld by violence against African Americans and dangers to the state economy (Dittmer 328). Since voting rights and discrimination were now protected by historic federal laws, the focus had switched to ensuring that these legal protections were converted into tangible social change.
Hundreds of volunteers descended upon Mississippi during the 1964 Freedom Summer to register voters and create “Freedom Schools,” which advanced young civil rights education (Singh 299). National indignation resulted after the Ku Klux Klan’s June murders of three Freedom Summer participants in Philadelphia, Mississippi: James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman (Dittmer 214). The volunteers’ murders highlighted the urgent need for federal legislation, even though their memory came to represent the tragic cost of racism.
President Lyndon Johnson signed the historic 1964 Civil Rights Act, which outlawed discrimination, and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. The Federal Supervision was allowed to safeguard African-American voters enrolling in voter registration for the first time in response to years of pressure from organized movements (Dittmer 276). These arduous judicial wins guaranteed voting rights and outlawed segregation, promising to transform racist institutions.
The civil rights alliance, however, started to disintegrate in the absence of a future legislative program. Organizations that rejected nonviolence, such as the Black Panther Party, adopted a more violent stance (Sokol 152). Thus, despite inconsistent progress, the Movement’s legacy was solidified by increased legal rights, and the challenging task of changing unfair social systems continued. The Movement’s lofty objectives, which had previously seemed unachievable, were legally enshrined in legislation when persistent citizen-led efforts compelled the federal government to take action.
From Southern Riots to Northern Riots
As soon as civil rights progress was made, white supremacists withdrew their resistance, and violent uprisings erupted in Northern cities where segregation was also the norm. Disillusioned with the slow pace of change, organizations such as the Black Panther Party turned increasingly aggressive in the late 1960s, even as the civil rights coalition won successes that resulted in the ban on segregation (Jackson 334). After years of sluggish progress and violent white backlash, Black Nationalist messages of racial pride, self-reliance, and mistrust of white society’s readiness to change struck a chord with a large number of people (Dudziak, 2000).
Malcolm X and others criticized the legalistic emphasis and demanded that the profoundly ingrained Northern manifestations of systemic racism be addressed. Furthermore, inner-city realities could not be disregarded when years of unchecked persecution and police violence culminated in unplanned riots in California’s Watts and Harlem in 1964 and 1965 (Dittmer 106). To redress persistent injustices, the Movement grew in both breadth and geography.
The civil rights movement was severely damaged by Martin Luther King Jr’s assassination on April 4, 1968. King said before his untimely death that the Movement had always been led by “the people that sat in, the people that rode freedom rides, the people that had been beaten” (King 829). When ordinary people banded together to confront egregious injustice, the Movement dramatically changed American culture. Their vision powered progress through darkness and grit through conflict. However, King also saw, having turned his attention to economic justice, how much society still needed to change when he was assassinated.
1965 was a year of horrific violence as well as hard-won successes that marked a shift in the history of the civil rights struggle. Malcolm X was assassinated in Harlem in February, which dealt a fatal blow to the Movement (Jackson 152). A few weeks later, in an incident known as “Bloody Sunday,” which provoked widespread indignation, Alabama state troopers savagely struck nonviolent civil rights protesters in Selma who were requesting the right to vote (Lewis 102).
In response, President Johnson used the Movement’s anthem, “We Shall Overcome,” in a historic speech to push for the passage of comprehensive federal voting rights legislation (Dittmer 165). Dr. King led thousands of people on the ultimately successful March 21–25 walk along Highway 80 to the capitol in Montgomery, following another failed march that was greeted with white violence. The Voting Rights Act, which Johnson signed on August 6, marked the triumphant end of that arduous journey and secured federal oversight to safeguard voting rights (Dittmer 118). However, the Watts revolt later that month showed that the Movement still had more work to eradicate systematic inequity.
Conclusion
America’s civil rights movement was a protracted battle that lasted more than a century, from abolition attempts to the historic 1960s court rulings and current movements that continue the fight against institutional racism and injustice. It was a tale of perseverance in the face of heinous persecution. With well-thought-out boycotts, voter registration drives, and marches, organizations like the Southern Christian Leadership Council (SCLC) and Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) maintained constant pressure to highlight injustice and create an unstoppable wave of change.
The legacy of leaders who churned slowly towards progress, built on bravery and selflessness, inspired the Children’s Crusade in Birmingham against Bull Connor’s dogs, the deadly consequences of Mississippi Freedom Summer, and Rosa Parks’ catalytic defiance. America was drastically changed by the civil rights movement, which made it possible to obtain voting rights, remove legal segregation, and provide opportunities for people of color. However, until all communities are safe, the police are held accountable, the judicial system acts accordingly, poverty and inequality are reduced, and all children are evaluated solely based on their character rather than their race or identity, its mission will not be done.
Works Cited
Dittmer, John. Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi. University of Illinois Press, 1994.
Dudziak, Mary L. Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy. Princeton UP, 2000.
Fairclough, Adam. Better Day Coming: Blacks and Equality, 1890-2000. Penguin Books, 2002.
Jackson, Thomas F. From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Struggle for Economic Justice. U Pennsylvania P, 2007.
King, Martin Luther, Jr. The Radical King, edited by Cornel West, Beacon Press, 2015.
Klarman, Michael J. From Jim Crow to Civil Rights: The Supreme Court and the Struggle for Racial Equality. Oxford UP, 2006.
Lewis, David L. W.E.B. Du Bois: A Biography. Henry Holt and Co., 2009.
Putnam, Carleton. Race and Reason: A Yankee View. KennikatPress, 1961.
Robinson, Jo Ann Gibson. The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It: The Memoir of Jo Ann Gibson Robinson. Univ. of Tennessee Press, 1987.
Singh, Nikhil Pal. Black Is a Country: Race and the Unfinished Struggle for Democracy. Harvard University Press, 2005.
Sokol, Jason. The Crisis of Global Modernity: Asian Traditions and a Sustainable Future. Cambridge UP, 2015.
Zuczek, Richard. State of Rebellion: Reconstruction in South Carolina. U of South Carolina, 1996.