The 1960’s were one of the most significant decades in the twentieth century. The sixties were filled with new music, clothes, and an overall change in the way people acted, but most importantly it was a decade filled with civil rights movements. On February 1, 1960, four black freshmen from North Carolina Agriculture and Technical College in Greensboro went to a Woolworth’s lunch counter and sat down politely and asked for service. The waitress refused to serve them and the students remained sitting there until the store closed for the night. The very next day they returned, this time with some more black students and even a few white ones. They were all well dressed, doing their homework, while crowds began to form outside the store. A columnist for the segregation minded Richmond News Leader wrote, “Here were the colored students in coats, white shirts, and ties and one of them was reading Goethe and one was taking notes from a biology text. And here, on the sidewalk outside was a gang of white boys come to heckle, a ragtail rabble, slack-jawed, black-jacketed, grinning fit to kill, and some of them, God save the mark, were waving the proud and honored flag of the Southern States in the last war fought by gentlemen. Eheu! It gives one pause”(Chalmers 21). As one can see, African-Americans didn’t have it easy trying to gain their civil rights. Several Acts were passed in the 60’s, such as Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965. This was also, unfortunately, the time that the assassinations of important leaders took place. The deaths of John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr., all happened in the 60’s.
Slavery in the United States existed from the early senventeenth century un...
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...from the World Wide Wed: http://members.aol.com/StephanieR/MLK/
Bogal-Allbritten, R. (1998). Civil and Welfare Rights in the New Reform Era 1960-68. Retrieved November 18, 1999. from the World Wide Web: http://www.mursky.edu/gacd/chs/socwork/courses/char U 10 Civil and Welfare Rights in the New Roman Era 1960-68/
Chalmers, D. (1991). And the Crooked Places Made Straight-The Struggle for Social Change in the 1960s. Maryland: The John Hopkins University Press.
Martin Luther King Day-“I have a Dream” by Martin Luther King, Jr. Retrieved November 18, 1999 from the World Wide Web: http://web66.coled.umn.edu/new/MLK/MLK.html
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Robinson, A. and Sullivan, P(Eds.). (1991). New Directions in Civil Rights Studies. Virginia: Rectors and Visitors of the University Press of Virginia.
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The Civil Rights Movement refers to the political, social, and economical struggle of African Americans to gain full citizenship and racial equality. Although African Americans began to fight for equal rights as early as during the days of slavery, the quest for equality continues today. Historians generally agree that Civil Rights Movement began with the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955 and ended with the passing of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.
Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991. Weisbrot, Robert. Freedom Bound: A History Of America’s Civil Rights Movement. New York: Plume, 1991 Wexler, Sanford.
The 1950s was a great success for the civil rights movement; there were a number of developments which greatly improved the lives of black people in America and really started the civil rights movement, as black people became more confident and willing to fight for their cause.
ProQuest Staff. "Civil Rights Timeline." Leading Issues Timelines. 2014: n.p. SIRS Issues Researcher. Web. 22 Apr. 2014. .
The Sixties, by Terry H. Anderson, takes the reader on a journey through one of the most turbulent decades in American life. Beginning with the crew-cut conformity of 1950s Cold War culture and ending with the transition into the uneasy '70s, Anderson notes the rise of an idealistic generation of baby boomers, widespread social activism, and revolutionary counterculture. Anderson explores the rapidly shifting mood of the country with the optimism during the Kennedy years, the liberal advances of Johnson's "Great Society," and the growing conflict over Vietnam that nearly tore America apart. The book also navigates through different themes regarding the decade's different currents of social change; including the anti-war movement, the civil rights struggle, and the liberation movements. From the lunch counter sit-in of Greensboro, N.C. in 1960 and the rise of Martin Luther King, Jr. to the Black Power movement at the decade's end, Anderson illustrates the brutality involved in the reaction against civil rights, the radicalization of some of the movement's youth, and the eventual triumphs that would change America forever. He also discusses women's liberation and the feminist movement, as well as the students' rights, gay rights, and environmental movements.
Golod, F. (2008). Civil rights and social justice: A path to engagement and transformation. Horace, 24(3), 6.
The Movements of the New Left by Van Gosse documents the events that shaped America’s lives during the 1960s and 1970s. In these 45 documents, Gosse touches on topics of race, antiwar, gay rights and nonviolent demonstrations. The Civil Rights Movement and the Feminist Movement both shared the idea of equal rights for everyone. Both movements relate to mainstream liberalism, share similar goals or differences, evolved in the 1970s, and still have an impact on America’s to this day. Both of these movements related to mainstream liberalism in a sense that they both wanted change in a social advancement rather than through rebellion.
Although the sixties were a decade in which the United States became a more open, more tolerant, and a freer country, in some ways it became less of these things. During the sixties, America intervened in other nations and efforts were made to stop the progress of the civil rights movement. Because of America’s foreign policy and Americans fight against the civil rights movement, it is clear that the sixties in America were not purely a decade of openness, tolerance, and freedom in the United States.
World War II captured many nations, such as Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain, Canada, the Soviet Union, China, France, and Australia, New Zealand, and the United States, in order for the war to be over. Once going into war, a nation is never the same. President Truman was not the same, and neither were the people of the United States. Both blacks and whites fought and served their country. Men and women did their part. With the war over, people fell into a regular schedule, worrying bout businesses and family issues instead if they soon would be drafted. The atmosphere was different rather than before, with a fire broken out by the people themselves. In the 1900s, the civil rights movement rose as discrimination was taking over millions of African
When you think about how far as a country we have come you would be amazed. In the 1960s the Americans only knew the potential of the equal protection of the laws so that is what they followed. Not knowing that the congress would soon come up with an act that would provide even more opportunities for America. In 1964 the Congress passed an Act called the Civil Rights Act and that act is still around to this day. It has made it possible for everyone in America to have a job. The Civil Rights Act brought years of struggles to an end. It also banned discrimination in public places and as employment. Later bringing the equality to the African Americans for voting. It is considered one of the crowning legislative achievements. This act in my opinion
Barack Obama’s presidency, a 1960s fantasy and a 21st century reality, would not be possible without the movements made in the 1960s. Following the Civil War of the 1860s, the United States slowly progressed towards the need for civil rights, originally for African-Americans but advanced to include all Americans. Over the course of one hundred years, the United States Congress failed repeatedly to pass laws protecting the rights of the American people regardless of “race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.” The Civil Rights Act of 1964, a law President John F. Kennedy proposed and President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into legislation, aimed to end discrimination and was one of the most pivotal and effective pieces of legislation signed
Though it took a lot of time and hardship, segregation between the Whites and the Blacks were slowly but surely coming to an end. Dr. Martin Luther King, President John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert Kennedy, whom was Attorney General during the civil rights movement, and many influential figures, contributed their approval for this movement. They also instilled sense of confidence and security to the African Americans and civil rights activists. The 1960’s were a time when the African Americans and others have had enough of racism. These groups decided to fight for the Black people to have their civil rights set into motion rather than being suppressed. People were joining together to create a...
Historically, the Civil Rights Movement was a time during the 1950’s and 60’s to eliminate segregation and gain equal rights. Looking back on all the events, and dynamic figures it produced, this description is very vague. In order to fully understand the Civil Rights Movement, you have to go back to its origin. Most people believe that Rosa Parks began the whole civil rights movement. She did in fact propel the Civil Rights Movement to unprecedented heights but, its origin began in 1954 with Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka. Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka was the cornerstone for change in American History as a whole. Even before our nation birthed the controversial ruling on May 17, 1954 that stated separate educational facilities were inherently unequal, there was Plessy vs. Ferguson in 1896 that argued by declaring that state laws establish separate public schools for black and white students denied black children equal educational opportunities. Some may argue that Plessy vs. Ferguson is in fact backdrop for the Civil Rights Movement, but I disagree. Plessy vs. Ferguson was ahead of it’s time so to speak. “Separate but equal” thinking remained the body of teachings in America until it was later reputed by Brown vs. Board of Education. In 1955 when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, and prompted The Montgomery Bus Boycott led by one of the most pivotal leaders of the American Civil Rights Movement, Martin Luther King Jr. After the gruesome death of Emmett Till in 1955 in which the main suspects were acquitted of beating, shooting, and throwing the fourteen year old African American boy in the Tallahatchie River, for “whistling at a white woman”, this country was well overdo for change.
Whenever people discuss race relations today and the effect of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s, they remember the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was and continues to be one of the most i...