Introduction
The Civil Rights Movement is a term for the many different types of activism that aimed to secure full social, political and economic rights/equality for African Americans in the period from 1946 to 1968. After World War II, a great push to end segregation began. The National Association for the Advancement of Coloured people (NAACP), the leading civil rights organization of this era grew from 50,000 to 500,000 members. Segregation that existed outside the South started crumbling. In 1947, Jackie Robinson broke the race barrier in Major League Baseball and soon black athletes participated in all professional sports. In 1948, President Harry S. Truman ordered the integration of the armed forces which shocked many that were for segregation.
One of the greatest victories occurred in 1954, in the Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional separate schools for blacks and whites. This deeply shocked many Southern white people. On September 3, 1957, 9 black students which were known as the Little Rock Nine arrived at Central High School to start class, instead they were met by the Arkansas National Guard (on the order of Governor Orval Faubus) and a screaming mob of white people. White Citizens Councils, joined by prominent and powerful citizens, rose up throughout the South. They vowed that integration would never take place. Thus, the social protests of the civil rights movement were born. Martin Luther King Junior, the prince of nonviolence, received criticism from clergy, journalists and politicians for engaging in peaceful demonstrations that by teasing the anger of white supremacists, threatened to turn violent at any moment.
Martin Luther King Jr. played a large role in the success of the Civil Rights Movement until his assassination in 1968. He sought equality and human rights for black people and all victims of injustice through peaceful protest. He was the driving force behind many big events during that era such as the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the 1963 Washington bus boycott. Martin Luther King Jr. was a brilliant public speaker and an extremely influential individual. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964
Background
The Civil Rights Movement was an intense struggle for social justice that happened mainly between the 1950’s and 1960’s. It was for black people to gain equal rights under the United States law. The Civil War did indeed abolish slavery, but that didn’t stop black people from being treated badly and being discriminated against, especially in the Southern states. This (violence in the South) was especially due to Jim Crow laws, laws that discriminate based on race. They segregated whites and blacks in housing, education, the use of public and private facilities and many other social aspects of our daily lives, this also denied blacks to the right to move freely, marry white people and to vote.
By 1909 black people and whites together had formed the National Association for ...
