In Early 1950’s, blacks did not have civil rights, so they had to fight for their freedom. In 1955, blacks decided to rally together for social justice and planned a boycott. This boycott became known as the Montgomery Bus Boycott. This boycott was pivotal in the Civil Right Movement by energizing blacks, particularly in the South, to become more involved in politics. This occurred with the help of Claudette Colvin, Rosa Parks, President Nixon, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and especially with the influence of Rev.
Indeed leader of the movement, James farmer later explained that the freedom rides were created with the specific intention of creating a crisis, “ We were counting on the bigots in the South to do our work for us… we figured the government would have to respond if we created a situation that was headline news all over the world” . After the long summer of 1961 it was evident that segregation on the nations interstate buses could not survive and on September that year buses were officially ... ... middle of paper ... ...me That Changed America, Random House., p191 - 196 19. Beito, David; Beito, Linda (2009). Black Maverick: T. R. M. Howard's Fight for Civil Rights and Economic Power, University of Illinois Press. P130 20.
Similar cloture votes in 1966 and 1968, with bills for equal voting rights and guaranteed equal housing respectively were used to stop Southern filibusters. The Civil Rights Act also proved that mass demonstration and peaceful protesting are heard in Washington D.C. Martin Luther King and the Leadership Conference started with nothing and achieved everything. From the segregated South those who fought for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 changed the course of American history and ridded the nation of inequality under the law. Works Cited Berman, Daniel M., A Bill Becomes a Law, The Macmillan company, New York: 1966. Levy, Peter B., The Civil RIghts Movement, Greenwood Press, Westport, Connecticut, 1998.
The 1961 Freedom Rides sought to test a 1960 decision by the supreme court in Boynton v. Virginia that segregation of interstate transportation facilities, including bus terminals, was unconstitutional as well. (History.com Staff). A big difference between the 1947 Journey of reconciliation and the 1961 Freedom Rides was the inclusion of Women. (History.com Staff).The Freedom Riders way of getting everyone's attention, that was very successful, was to use whites only restrooms and lunch counters. CORE leader James Farmer, Jr., expected the “ racist of the South to create a crisis.” (David 9).
The sit-in movement also showed clearly to whites and blacks alike that young blacks were determined to reject segregation openly. After the sit-ins, some SNCC members joined in the 1961 Freedom Rides organized by CORE. The Freedom Riders, both black and white, traveled throughout the South in buses to test the effectiveness of a 1960 Supreme Court decision. This decision had declared that segregation was illegal in bus stations that were open to interstate travel. The national civil rights leadership decided to keep pressure on both the Congress and the Kennedy administration to pass the civil rights legislation proposed by Kennedy by planning a March on Washington for August 1963.
As a response, the Congress of Racial Equality—also known as CORE—and the Fellowship of Reconciliation decided to arrange interracial and bus rides across state lines. The Journey of Reconciliation, as they were called, focused on the rampant bus segregration of the upper South, but avoided the more dangerous and risky areas of the deep south. Unfortunatly, there was a lack of media attention and, ultimatly, CORE's goals went unnoticed. In 1961, however, new—and sucessful—Freedom Rides were actualized. CORE partnered with student activists to continue previous efforts made to fight segregated bus rides and bus terminals.
This documentary, “The Freedom Riders” shows the story of courageous civil rights activists called ‘Freedom Riders’ in 1961 who confronted institutionalized and culturally-accepted segregation in the American South by travelling around the Deep South on buses and trains. This documentary is based on Raymond Arsenault’s book “Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice”. It was a radical idea organized by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) that alarmed not only those who challenged the civil rights but also deliberately defied Jim Crows Law that were enacted between 1876 and 1965, by challenging the status quo by riding the interstate buses in the South in mixed racial groups. This law segregated public services like public transportation, public places, public schools, restrooms, restaurants, and even drinking fountains for black and whites. Though these activists were faced by various bitter racism, mob violence and imprisonment, they were successful in desegregating the buses and bus facilities in the Deep South in September 22, 1961.
The question at hand is what role did Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. play in the Montgomery Bus Boycott? Dr. King fought for civil equality dealing with the segregation of public buses by defying the Jim Crow Laws, helped create the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and created motivation for black people to oppress white ruling in the south in the Montgomery Bus Boycott. After the Civil War, America was in a time of separation and segregation due to the southern state’s Jim Crow Laws. “Jim Crow laws restricted the rights of black people and kept them segregated from whites… On buses they had to sit at the rear and had to give up their seat whenever a white rider was left standing.” These Jim Crow laws caused Americans to be divided in the most superficial way possible: by the color of your skin. These laws existed for many years after the abolition of slavery.
2 Abigail and Stephen Thernstrom. America in Black and White. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997), 113. 3 Thernstrom, 116. 4 Kevin S. Hollaway, "Black Suffrage," Civil Rights: A Status Report, 24 October 1999, http://www.ghgcorp.com/hollaway/civil.htm (24 December 1998).
The boycott, which was led by Martin Luther King resulted in the Supreme Court overturning the city´s law as far as bus segregation is concerned. The Civil R... ... middle of paper ... ... an intellectual education, Washington wanted a more practical, though. The Civil Rights Movement with its Activists like Martin Luther King and W.E.B. Du Bois did really improve the treatment of African American. The Voting Right Act was established in 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968 banned discrimination in the sale and rental of housing.