The Civil Rights Movement in the 1950's

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In 1894, the US Supreme Court gave legal consent to state laws segregating black people and white people with its decision concerning the Plessey v Ferguson case. The decision stated that black and white should be separate but equal, meaning the same standard of facilities for both. In reality it legally enforced a state of affairs that assured that blacks would never be equal, and couldn’t get equal treatment, status or opportunity in their own country. During the Second World War, the black American Gi’s realised that they were fighting for a democracy abroad, which they did not have at home. One black soldier vocalised the senselessness of their situation: “just carve on my tombstone, Here lies a Black man killed fighting a yellow man for the protection of a white man". Some took up draft resistance in protest. The refusal to comply with segregation laws within the military was punished with custody. Returning to segregation at the end of the war caused the politicisation of many black Americans. The ensuing civil disobedience campaign, the non-violent resistance to the law, was one of the catalysts of the civil rights movement. It was this campaign that was the first to receive world - wide attention. One of the first challenges to the Plessey v Ferguson laws was in 1954, when the NAACP contested the right of local school boards to run segregated schools in the brown v board of education case. The Supreme Court’s unanimous verdict was that segregation in education would be illegal. However, by the end of 1956, there were still six southern states that refused to let black children attend schools with white children. O... ... middle of paper ... ... In 1955, Emmett Till was murdered for supposedly “wolf whistling” at a white woman. The men charged with his murder were acquitted by an all white jury. This blatant injustice was faced with outrage from the black community and focused attention on the discrimination and violence black people had to endure. The Supreme Court tried to banish segregation in as many places as possible, due to awareness raised by the Civil Rights movement. 1954 saw the prohibition of segregation in schools and 1956 saw the end of segregation on busses. In 1957, segregation was outlawed and abolished completely by the civil rights act, which made all segregation illegal everywhere. It was still clear that racial hatred existed, but the movement was fighting against it, and continued to protest and attract new members to their cause.

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