The first case study to be looked at is that of the Sit In’s. Specifically the sit in’s that started in the February of 1960 at Woolworth’s Lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina. A little known fact is that before these sit in’s there were ones that occurred in Wichita, Kansas in 1958. The sit ins that occurred were remarkably similar in that they were both peaceful and they both resulted in a chain effect of desegregation of stores. These sit ins started in July of 1958 and were done for the same purpose as the ones in Greensboro, African-American youth were tired of being demeaned by the white run society in the South. The Sit ins started by two members of a Wichita NAACP youth chapter entering Dockum’s Drug in downtown Wichita and …show more content…
Sit ins began to be organized in that all of those who chose to participate were never violent and remained peaceful even when heckled, and assaulted both mentally and physically. Protestors had things thrown at them, pulled off lunch counters, and were arrested by racially bias police for disorderly conduct. After 2 weeks there were protests occurring in Virginia and South Carolina and within 2 months there were sit-ins in 54 cities across 9 states. Student groups that were entirely white from Colombia university were even seen picketing Woolworth’s counters in New York city where segregation was illegal and hadn’t been occurring. Ultimately the movement was extremely successful in achieving its goal and even beyond. After 6 months many restaurants and lunch counters had been de-segregated including all of the Woolworth’s lunch counters in Nashville being open to all races by May 6. By the mid 1960’s hundreds of restaurants and lunch counters had followed suit. The reason for the movement being successful beyond its goal was due to the fact that the reform spread far beyond restaurants to everything from art galleries to beaches, even before the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Why was …show more content…
In this attempt the KKK had tried to kill Michael Schwerner by showing up with shotguns and over thirty members at Mount Zion Church on June 16, 1964 where they believed him to be, however he along with Chaney and Goodman were in Ohio at a CORE conference and out of frustration at their failure they burnt down the church and badly beat many of the CORE members at the church. Being as the KKK was so engrained in the culture of Mississippi there were no repercussions for the KKK’s action as some of their members included powerful members of society and law enforcement officers. After the incident Schwerner returned to Neshoba County, Mississippi where the attempted assassination had occurred after he had heard about the church being burnt down. After going and speaking with attack victims and seeing what was once Mount Zion Church he learned that he had been the target of the attack. At this time he was cautioned that local KKK members were trying to find him. The next day driving on the highway Schwerner, Goodman, and Chaney were spotted driving by Deputy Sherriff Cecil Price and were pulled over and arrested. Charged as consipartors in the burning down of the church. After their arrest and obvious lack of attendance at the CORE event they were supposed to be attending, the country Jail was called by CORE. The office did not report they had any of the men in
Months before Emmett's death in 1955, two African American activists in Mississippi had been murdered. An NAACP field worker, the Reverend George Lee, was shot and killed at point blank range while driving in his car after trying to vote in Belzoni. A few weeks later in Brookhaven, Lamar Smith was shot and killed in front of the county courthouse -- in broad daylight and before witnesses -- after casting his ballot. Both were active in black voter registration drives. No one was arrested in connection with either murder
The significance of the sit-in’s was that they sparked people to take an opportunity and use a peaceful and non-violent approach to desegregation. The simplicity of sit-in’s were that anyone could do it and within first week of the sit-ins at Greensboro there were hundreds of students participating, showing that it only took the simple actions of four people to make others challenge the issue of segregation. The sit-in’s also received media attention unlike other forms of protests. This media attention meant that more southerners were aware for the push for desegregation and the sit-ins spread, not only in North Carolina but all across the south. The sit-in’s affect chain stores which had branches in the north as they were starting to lose profits because of the sit-in’s in their southern counterparts. The reason that the initial protesters were all students was because they were the educated ones who knew how to make a difference in a segregated society.
The John Brown Anti-Klan Committee (JBAKC) is committed to fighting against the continued existence of the Ku Klux Klan, as well as the oppression and white supremacist doctrine it idolizes. The JBAKC was founded in 1978, in part by one Lisa Roth; she and others formed the group after investigating Klan ties to New York State prisons. The New York Klan incorporation papers they found told all: every New York State Klan member was employed as a guard in the Napanoch, New York prison. What’s more, the person who had incorporated the Klan’s state chapter was none other than the head of the guard unit there (Trodd 281). In Take a Stand Against the Klan, the JBAKC outlines its fight against the Ku Klux Klan, and urges its readers to stand up against white supremacy by supporting liberation struggles.
On the date May 26, 1956, two female students from Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, Wilhelmina Jakes and Carrie Patterson, had taken a seat down in the whites only section of a segregated bus in the city of Tallahassee, Florida. When these women refused to move to the colored section at the very back of the bus, the driver had decided to pull over into a service station and call the police on them. Tallahassee police arrested them and charged them with the accusation of them placing themselves in a position to incite a riot. In the days after that immediately followed these arrests, students at the Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University organized a huge campus-wide boycott of all of the city buses. Their inspiring stand against segregation set an example and an intriguing idea that had spread to tons of Tallahassee citizens who were thinking the same things and brought a change of these segregating ways into action. Soon, news of the this boycott spread throughout the whole entire community rapidly. Reverend C.K. Steele composed the formation of an organization known as the Inter-Civic Council (ICC) to manage the logic and other events happening behind the boycott. C.K. Steele and the other leaders created the ICC because of the unfounded negative publicity surrounding the National Associat...
"Greensboro Sit-In and the Sit-In Movement." History. A&E Television Networks, LLC. Web. 7 Dec. 2013. .
Around 3:00 pm on Sunday April 11, 1993 a riot started when prisoners returning from recreation time attacked prison guards in cell block L. The guards held the keys to the entire cell block and it did not take long for the prisoners to take full advantage of the keys. Four beaten guards were released within hours of the attack but 8 were retained. The riot was started for many reasons but the most obvious reason was TB testing on Muslims, they do not believe in using needles to take blood or for injections. Soon after the take over of the cell block Warren Tate shut off the power and water in the cell block. A “Death Squad” was formed in the beginning hours of the riot and black prisoners killed 5 white inmates. After this happened the two largest groups of inmates (the Muslims and the Aryan Brotherhood) meet to discuss the organization of the riot. They decided that only blacks could kill blacks and whites could only kill whites. The teamwork of the two groups was evident throughout the 11 day riot and at the end of the riot through negotiations and surrender.
“The Watts Riots were a turning point that would shift the Civil Rights Movement away from the nonviolent protests that Dr. King used to initiate the creative tension that could lead to solutions” (The Road to Civil Rights). These riots were the end to nonviolent protests. The Watt Riot was known as the most expensive and largest rebellion of the Civil Right era. It was said to be a rebellion against the long standing unemployment, low standard housing, and inadequate schooling. The Civil rights movement was in the midst of uniting whites and blacks together into one community, but for some this was not happening fast enough. The riots brought about costly damage and multiple disagreements, thus, making it more complicated to find solutions. Throughout this essay the history, effectiveness, accomplishments, and results of greater justice and social change of the Watt Riots will be discussed.
On December 5, 1955, thousands of African Americans in Montgomery, Alabama walked, carpooled, or hitchhiked to work in an act of rebellion against segregation on buses. This bus boycott was not the first of its kind – black citizens of Baton-Rouge, Louisiana had implemented the same two years prior – but the bus boycott in Montgomery was a critical battle of the Civil Rights Movement. Though the original intent of the boycott was to economically cripple the bus system until local politicians agreed to integrate the city’s buses, the Montgomery Bus Boycott impacted the fabric of society in a much deeper way. Instead of only changing the symptoms of a much larger problem, this yearlong protest was the first step in transforming the way all Americans perceived freedom and equality. Though the boycott ended when the Supreme Court ruled bus segregation unconstitutional, this was not directly caused by the refusal to ride buses, and thus cannot be defined as the primary triumph of the boycott. Instead, the Montgomery Bus Boycott succeeded in changing the consciousness of millions of Americans, specifically southern blacks. A revolution of the mind was the greatest success of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and this transformation occurred due to the small validations throughout the boycott that African Americans, as unified, free citizens, had power.
On February 8th, 1968, shots were fired on a crowd of civil rights protesters and that day became known as one of the saddest days in South Carolina history. Many problems occurred in South Carolina, mostly between blacks and whites over issues about civil rights and segregation. These issues in South Carolina lasted many years and led to many events, protests, and even massacres that all resulted in sometimes very horrible outcomes but also bringing South Carolina one step further to getting rid of segregation. One horrible event that took place in the late 60’s was the Orangeburg Massacre that resulted in a few deaths and some injuries but also furthered integration in Orangeburg. In 1968, due to the conflict between civil rights protestors
On February 18 the SCLC leader James Orange was arrested in Perry County. That evening hundreds of blacks gathered and marched on the jail. On the way they were attacked. Among the victims of the attacks were Jimmey Lee and his mother. Lee was beaten and then shot in the stomach, later dying in the hospital. At a large memorial service for Lee, a march from Selma to Montgomery was announced that would take place on March 7th. The marchers set off for Montgomery, but as they crossed the Pettus Bridge, they were attacked by troopers. As the New York Times reported the next day: "The first 10 or 20 Negroes were swept to the ground, screaming, arms and legs flying, and packs and bags went skittering across the grassy divider strip and onto the pavement on both sides.
In New York during the 1940’s a non-violent act of civil disobedience occurred among blacks to protest segregation laws. Blacks were not allowed to live in white neighborhoods, had to ride in the back of buses, lived in poverty with poor schools, and were frequently beaten by police.
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...
One of the first documented incidents of the sit-ins for the civil rights movement was on February 1, 1960 in Nashville, Tennessee. Four college African-Americans sat at a lunch counter and refused to leave. During this time, blacks were not allowed to sit at certain lunch counters that were reserved for white people. These black students sat at a white lunch counter and refused to leave. This sit-in was a direct challenge to southern tradition. Trained in non-violence, the students refused to fight back and later were arrested by Nashville police. The students were drawn to activist Jim Lossen and his workshops of non-violence. The non-violent workshops were training on how to practice non-violent protests. John Lewis, Angela Butler, and Diane Nash led students to the first lunch counter sit-in. Diane Nash said, "We were scared to death because we didn't know what was going to happen." For two weeks there were no incidences with violence. This all changed on February 27, 1960, when white people started to beat the students. Nashville police did nothing to protect the black students. The students remained true to their training in non-violence and refused to fight back. When the police vans arrived, more than eighty demonstrators were arrested and summarily charged for disorderly conduct. The demonstrators knew they would be arrested. So, they planned that as soon as the first wave of demonstrators was arrested, a second wave of demonstrators would take their place. If and when the second wave of demonstrators were arrested and removed, a third would take their place. The students planned for multiple waves of demonstrators.
One hundred years after the Emancipation Proclamation was written, African Americans were still fighting for equal rights in every day life. The first real success of this movement did not come until the Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1954 which was followed by many boycotts and protests. The largest of these protests, the March on Washington, was held on August 28, 1963 “for jobs and freedom” (March on Washington 11). An incredible amount of preparation went into the event to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of people attending from around the nation and to deal with any potential incidents.
History was often displayed in the film Mississippi Burning. For example, three civil rights workers known as James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner, were murdered in the year 1964. These young men were real human beings visiting Philadelphia, Mississippi to help register African-Americans’ voting rights. Throughout the 1960’s,...