civil rights in the 1950s (civil rights unit 2)

• revival of the KKK

  events like the montgomery bus boycott were important successes but they encouraged racist groups in the South to oppose equality, KKK membership increased, established White Citizenship Councils to fight against desegregation in education
• significance of the civil rights act of 1975

  wasn't very significant, set up a government commission to investigate states which were denying black Americans the right to vote, it did not achieve very much because in many Southern states all-white juries would not convict, by 1960 in most Southern states only 3% of black people were registered to vote
• Little Rock (1957): significance/importance


  -the incident at Little Rock showed that Brown v Board (1945) was still being challenged and resisted -showed the significance of the struggle between the federal (president) and state (Faubus) government-first time the President had intervened to ensure black children had equal access to education-white racists including the KK and White Council increased inn numbers to campaign against integration of education-gained world wide publicity for the Civil Rights Campaign and a lot of sympathy for the black students-the Supreme Court got involved again and forced Faubus to re-open schools.
• Little Rock (1957): what happened?

  -first real test of the Brown vs Topeka ruling-September 1957, 9 black high school children tried to attend their local all white school, Little Rock Central High School, Arkansas-however, they were refused entry-the governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus, decided to place state troops in front of the school to stop the 9 black children from entering-Faubus was forced to remove the troops but they were replaced by a violent mob of about 1,000 white people-one of the pupils, 15 year old Elizabeth Eckford was arriving late and had to walk through the mob to safety -President Eisenhower sent in federal troops to protect the students -Governor Faubus was so against integration that he closed down all the schools in Little Rock (1958)-however, one year later, the supreme court ordered him to re-open them and the federal troops stayed with the students to protect
• importance/significance of the Montgomery bus boycott

  -it was the first time the black community had successfully organised itself to resist Jim Crow laws-ruling of Browder v Gayle at the end of 1956 (ruled segregation on buses in states like Alabama was illegal)-made MLK famous as a spokesman for the black community through his non-violent peaceful approach-encouraged other forms of non-violet peaceful protest such as the sit-ins in 1960
• Montgomery bys boycott

  -december 1955-Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man-she was arrested and fined $14-Alabama state law stated black people need to sit at he back and if all seats were taken, they had to give up their seat-the MIA (Montgomery improvement association led by MLK, lasted 13 months) was set up which boycotted busses, people walked or used shared cars instead-bus companies lost money because there were very few passengers on buses -to avoid going bankrupt, allowed black passengers to sit anywhere
• death of emmett till

  -August 1955, 14 year old black boy was visiting relatives in the south -murdered by two white racists in money, Mississippi-till was dares to flirt with a white woman shopkeeper-her husband and brother kidnapped him and tortures and murdered him-thrown into a river-his casket was opened so the public could see his injuries-shocked the black community and gained lots of publicity -the 2 men were charged arrested and charged with the murder but were set free at. their trial bu all-white jury-angered the black community, they campaigned against violence and segregation in the south
• brown vs topeka


  Linda Brown wanted to attend her local school but was not allowed to because it was a whites only school. -Oliver Brown and the NAACP took the case to the Supreme Court, helped by the black lawyer, Thurgood Marshall. -In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled that segregation in schools was illegal and that all schools should be integrated. -This was very important in the development of the Civil Rights Movement because it showed that the Supreme Court could be used to help black people gain equal rights. -However, for a long time, many of the southern states simply ignored the ruling and schools remained segregated.