Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
History easy The civil rights movement
Civil Rights movement in the USA
History easy The civil rights movement
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
By the 1950s, people of color had already been oppressed and mistreated for generations. They were sick of it and the government’s excuses. They advocated for themselves and in 1954 the Supreme Court finally agreed to get rid of the “separate but equal” ideology, they claimed to have banned segregation. This was a big step, but it was mostly just something said, not enforced. People of color were angry and tired of being mistreated even after this law was passed. The anger was there, in the deepest parts of their hearts, and it was waiting to be let out. People of color had been mistreated and abused for centuries, the arrest of Rosa Parks for refusing to give up her seat on the bus sent the revolution in motion. This inspired thousands to …show more content…
After Rosa Parks was thrown in jail a meeting was held and the people of color living in Montgomery decided to boycott the city’s buses. Their goal was to peacefully protest the way people of color were being treated. “There was a vote to boycott all city buses... The city retaliated by indicting one hundred leaders of the boycott, and sent many to jail. White segregationists turned to violence… But the black people of Montgomery persisted, and in November 1956, the Supreme Court outlawed segregation on local bus lines.” (Page 6) People of color stopped using buses, which had negative effects on the city who then responded by putting people in jail. Many whites were outraged as well and turned to violence to try and deter any other ideas. But these people had lived in oppression too long and refused to let them discourage their ideas. In the end all that they were rewarded with was the lack of segregation on buses, which was a feat but still not enough. Boycotting the city’s buses was one of the first actions to get such a large response. It inspired many other great peaceful protest ideas, for example the sit-ins at local restaurants that normally only served white …show more content…
Make a big demonstration like this that required attention. In 1960 there were four young black college students who decided to sit in Woolworth’s lunch counter. This was a “whites only” establishment, and the four of them were refused service so they simply sat, the workers got angry and decided to close the place early. The next day they continued to sit silently in protest and everyday after more people showed up to protest with them. “...more than fifty thousand people, mostly black, some white, participated in demonstrations of one kind or another in a hundred cities, and over 3,600 people were put in jail.” (page 7) This news moved around the state and more “whites only” shops were filled with these peaceful protesters. All sorts of people, from different backgrounds, race, and location participated. Yet again, authorities and racist white people got angry, many protesters were thrown in jail. However, like the bus boycott, this created change. By 1960 most restaurants were open to everyone. This is yet another example of how people of color fought for their civil rights. After the boycott's success they planned other ways to get the public’s attention, they performed this demonstration multiple times in many locations until they obtained equality in restaurants. There were many other protests after these, some violent, some peaceful. However these seemed to stand out the most, they are what future demonstrations were based off
Sparked by the arrest of Rosa Parks in 1955, the Montgomery Bus Boycott was a political and social protest campaign that aimed for the desegregation of the bus systems in Montgomery, Alabama.[i] The organization revolved around the emerging civil rights leader and pastor Martin Luther King Jr. Three years later, King’s method of non-violent protests would inspire four students to begin the Greensboro sit-ins in North Carolina, which is regarded as one of the most significant demonstrations at the time.[ii] Many of the discriminatory practices during this time period stems from whiteness, which is a belief about entitlement and ownership for whites based solely on their skin color. The media utilizes rhetorical devices, such as analogy, polarizing
After Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger, king wanted to end the humiliating treatment of blacks on city bus liners. He decided to start the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which lasted 382 days. Eventually, the U.S. Supreme Court declared Montgomery bus segregation laws illegal. King showed great inspiration despite receiving several threatening phone calls, being arrested and having his house being bombed, he still firmly believed in nonviolence. The boycott was the first step to end segregation, king displayed great leadership and educated the whole nation that nonviolence was the best possible was to end a problem, even if it took a while for people to notice your protest.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott can be viewed as a symbol of the Civil Rights Movement as a whole, as neither one’s success was due solely to the work of the political system; a transformation in the consciousness of America was the most impactful success of both. Passionate racism ran in the veins of 1950s America, primarily in the south, and no integration law would influence the widespread belief that African Americans were the same level of human as Caucasians. The abolition of racism as a political norm had to start with a unanimous belief among blacks that they had power as American citizens; once they believed that to be true, there was no limit to the successes they could see.
The bus boycott succeed because the black people stood up for what they thought was right, they did not use violence, they did not fight back, they fought smart, and they fought right. See many of the white people abuse the power that they had by making the blacks give up their seats after long days of work, and making them go to the back of the store to purchase food and other items. They treated them different because they didn’t have the same skin tone, but little did they know that on December 1st 1955 everything was about to change; one day on the bus ride home when Rosa Parks decided that she was not going to stand and let a young white man have her seat after a long day at work, she was arrested.
At the time of the African-American Civil Rights movement, segregation was abundant in all aspects of life. Separation, it seemed, was the new motto for all of America. But change was coming. In order to create a nation of true equality, segregation had to be eradicated throughout all of America. Although most people tend to think that it was only well-known, and popular figureheads such as Martin Luther King Junior or Rosa Parks, who were the sole launchers of the African-American Civil Rights movement, it is the rights and responsibilities involved in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision which have most greatly impacted the world we live in today, based upon how desegregation and busing plans have affected our public school systems and way of life, as well as the lives of countless African-Americans around America. The Brown v. Board of Education decision offered African-Americans a path away from common stereotypes and racism, by empowering many of the people of the United States to take action against conformity and discrimination throughout the movement.
The United States in the 1950s was quite different from the modern world we live in. There was a time where it was against the law for an African American to ride in the front of a bus or to be in the same school as a white child. Thankfully today our world is more accepting than that and we have the Civil Rights movement to thank for that. The Civil Rights Movement and its participants are responsible for shaping the country we now see today.
Segregation was a big deal in the United States. Most white people believed they were better than the blacks. Water fountains, seating sections, and the bus seats are examples of things that were segregated. Segregation had a major effect as our country was leaving the 1800’s and going into the 1900s. The Jim Crow laws, White Supremacy, and the Plessy v. Ferguson trial were crucial setbacks for blacks in the late 1800s and the early 1900s.
The Civil Rights movement and the endless war in Vietnam were the two main causes for social protest in 1967. Since the end of the Civil War many organizations had been created to promote the goals of racial justice and equality in America. However progress was slow and it wasn’t until around 1967 that a hundred years of effort would begin to gain the attention that it needed in order to force a change for the better. peaceful methods and believed change could be affected by working around the established system. There were tons of marches, rallies, strikes, riots, and violent confrontations with the police. The violence of racism would claim the lives of young and old African Americans. Some Restaurants, hotels, nightclubs, public facilities, and school systems were still segregated. The African-American community, being the minority, depended on the support of the white population. Those caught up in the hippie movement racial justice and equality to the heart, and then put it into action.
America has been the site of discrimination in race for years. The Black Codes were laws each state came up with on their own that limit certain rights, prevent them from voting, and keep the black slaves under white control. Even after the Black Codes ended, a new way to keep African-Americans unequal came up. The Jim Crow laws were a series of laws passed in order to keep African-Americans unequal from white Americans. Every state had their own form of the Jim Crow laws. African-Americans used to be treated very poorly by the rest of the United States. They were still treated as though they were slaves until the end of the Jim Crow laws. Even after that, southern states still attempted to keep African-Americans from being equal to the rest of Americans. Taxes were put up in order to vote, which kept African-Americans from doing so because most were very poor. They still did not have equal opportunity in the work force either. African-Americans were not the only ones being treated like this either. Native Americans and Hispanics were treated the same way that African-Americans were. The United States used to treat immigrants inadequately.
Success was a big part of the Civil Rights Movement. Starting with the year 1954, there were some major victories in favor of African Americans. In 1954, the landmark trial Brown vs. The Board of Education of Topeka Kansas ruled that segregation in public education was unfair. This unanimous Supreme Court decision overturned the prior Plessy vs. Ferguson case during which the “separate but equal” doctrine was created and abused. One year later, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. launched a bus boycott in Montgomery Alabama after Ms. Parks was arrested for not giving up her seat in the “colored section”. This boycott, which lasted more than a year, led to the desegregation of buses in 1956. Group efforts greatly contributed to the success of the movement. This is not only shown by the successful nature of the bus boycott, but it is shown through the success of Martin Luther King’s SCLC or Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The conference was notable for peacefully protesting, nonviolence, and civil disobedience. Thanks to the SCLC, sit-ins and boycotts became popular during this time, adding to the movement’s accomplishments. The effective nature of the sit-in was shown during 1960 when a group of four black college students sat down at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in hopes of being served. While they were not served the first time they commenced their sit-in, they were not forced to leave the establishment; their lack of response to the heckling...
Since Rosa Parks was arrested, 42,000 African Americans boycotted the buses in Montgomery. This boycott induced the economic crippling of the city bus system. Police brutality emerged from the by harassing, intimidating, and arresting the leadership of the movement (Kates, "Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard
The 1950s can be describe as the era of great changes, it was the end of Korean War, civil rights movement and the United States economy was flourishing; citizen was moving from countryside to suburban house and life was prosperous. But the racial climate was very hostility for African-American living in the United States constantly. For centuries, African-American had been suffer from inequality and prejudice because of the color of their skin. Altschuler states “Rosa Park was arrested for refusing to comply with municipal ordinances, (Altschuler, p. 36, 2003)” that launched black passenger to boycott Montgomery city transportation.
Emotional distress and inequality was heightened during the time period of 1920-1973 for the African American community. Their path to equality would prove to be a long one as numerous incidents arose before they were given equal rights in 1964. During the 1950s, African Americans encountered economic, social and political injustices due to the dominant white supremacy present in the United States of America.
...ivil rights in America, galvanized by the landmark Brown vs. Board of Educa2tion of Topeka decision of 1954.” The Montgomery bus boycott happened on “December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks... who refused to give up her sear to a white passenger on a bus” she was arrested. Later, the Supreme Court ruled “segregated seating on public buses unconstitutional in November 1956.”
Blacks walked miles to work, organized carpools, and despite efforts from the police to discourage this new spark of independence, the boycotts continued for more than a year until in November 1956 the Supreme Court ruled that the Montgomery bus company must desegregate it's busses. Were it not for the leadership of Rosa Parks and Jo Ann Robinson, and the support the black community through church congregations, these events may have not happened for many years to come.