Civil Rights

Question 1

What makes the USA a difficult place to govern?

Answer 1

It’s too big
Many differences between states
People in some states don’t like the federal (central) government telling them what to do

Question 2

What are the two types of governmwnts?

Answer 2

Federal-covers the whole country

State- each of the 50 states has own government

Question 3

What did congress do?

Answer 3

Passed laws

Question 4

What was the Supreme court?

Answer 4

It can overule state laws if unconstitutional

Question 5

What does the President do in this government?

Answer 5

Control federal troops

Question 6

Define state congress

Answer 6

Two house system, like the federal system

Question 7

Define State Supreme court

Answer 7

Highest court of appeal in a state

Question 8

How did Black lives look like in the North?

Answer 8

Blacks had the worst jobs
Lives in ghettos
Poor equipment
Shortages of supplies

Question 9

How did Black lives look like in the South?

Answer 9

State laws enforced segregation
Could not eat in ‘white restaurants’
Could be thrown of buses
Cinemas, theatres and churches were seperate

Question 10

Why did attitudes in the South make any changes so unlikely?

Answer 10

Many Southern whites saw blacks as inferior
The Police and the law courts were full of racist white officials- many were even membefs of the infamois KKK
Technically black Americans were allowed to vote. However by 1965, only 20% of them had registered to do so:
Blacks were intimidated by white gangs if they tried to register
Wmployees would threaten them with the sack
States set unfair literacy tests to make it harder for blacks to be able to reguster

Question 11

Why did the CRM grow in the 1950s?

Answer 11

Factors:
Education- better education for Blacks and changed white views of black Americans.
New ideas- some races were genetically inferior
Migration- poor blacks moved north liberal whites moved south
Cold war- made the Us government sensitive to international criticism about how black Americans were treated
TV- made people more aware of racist injustice
Second world war- black Americans pushed for civil rights after integration abroad

Question 12

What were the aims of the CRM organisations?

Answer 12

The church was so important because the church was the centre of most black southern communities.
The RCNL campaigned for black rights within segregation and worked for voter registration.

Question 13

What was the politocal opposition to Civil Roghts?

Answer 13

• Opposition from both federal state politicians
• Constantly blocked by southern members of house of representative and congress
• Dixiecrats were southern democrats who had for a time broken away from the democratic party over civil rights
• Dixiecrats were strong defenders of segregation and states’ rights
• Southern governors, local mayors and other officials all favoured segregation making any change very difficult

Question 14

Why was the Brown vs Topeka case so important?

Answer 14

Southern whites were so concerned about desegregating schools because the thought that they would become friends, then date and then eventually marry.
John W Davis tried to justify schools to be segregated with blacks should be happy with what they have.
The judgement of the supreme court was that blacks could go to school with whites.

Question 15

Events of Brown v Board of education, Topeka

Answer 15

1952 NAACP take 5 desegregation cases to the Supreme court.
NAACP argued that separate was not equal. Against the 14th Amendment.
Supreme court had not yet made a decision. Earl Warren replaces pro-segregation judge, as chief Justice, December 1952
May 1954, Supreme Court ruling:’separate but equal’ had no place in education and schools had to desegregate.
May 1955, Supreme court called for desegregation ‘with all deliberate speed

Question 16

Why were events at little Rock High School significant?

Answer 16

LRCHS was the focal point of the Little Rock Integration Crisis of 1957.Nine Black students, known as the Little Rock Nine, were denied entrance to the school in defiance of the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court ruling ordering integration of public schools. This provoked a showdown between the Governor Orval Faubus and President Dwight D. Eisenhower that gained international attention.

Question 17

What was the Significance of Little Rock

Answer 17

Faubus’ name became internationally known during the Little Rock Crisis of 1957, when he used the Arkansas National Guard to stop African Americans from attending Little Rock Central High School as part of federally ordered racial desegregation.

Daisy Bates was an American civil rights activist, publisher, journalist, and lecturer who played a leading role in the Little Rock Integration Crisis of 1957.

Elizabeth Ann Eckford is one of the Little Rock Nine, a group of African-American students who, in 1957, were the first black students ever to attend classes at Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. The integration came as a result of Brown v. Board of Education.

Question 18

Who was Rosa Parks?

Answer 18

Rosa Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an American activist in the civil rights movement best known for her pivotal role in the Montgomery bus boycott. The United States Congress has called her “the first lady of civil rights” and “the mother of the freedom movement”.

Question 19

How was segregation on buses in Montgomery and other Southern towns organised?

Answer 19

Under the system of segregation used on Montgomery buses, the ten front seats were reserved for whites at all times. The ten back seats were supposed to be reserved for blacks at all times. The middle section of the bus consisted of sixteen unreserved seats for whites and blacks on a segregated basis.

Question 20

What was the WPC and how did it respond to Parks arrest?

Answer 20

The Women’s Political Council, founded in Montgomery, Alabama, was an organization that was part of the Civil Rights Movement that was formed to address the racial issues in the city.

Question 21

What was the Montgomery Improvement Association? How did it

contribute to the bus boycott?

Answer 21

The Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) was formed on December 5, 1955 by black ministers and community leaders in Montgomery, Alabama.Under the leadership of Ralph Abernathy, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Edgar Nixon, the MIA was instrumental in guiding the Montgomery bus boycott, a successful campaign that focused national attention on racial segregation in the South and catapulted King into the national spotlight.

Question 22

What role did MLK play?

Answer 22

MLK was a social activist and Baptist minister who played a key role in the American civil rights movement from the mid-1950s until his assassination in 1968. King sought equality and human rights for African Americans, the economically disadvantaged and all victims of injustice through peaceful protest.

Question 23

What were the events of the boycott?

Answer 23

1st December 1955-Rosa Parks arrested
8th December-MIA met bus company officials who refused to consider and policy changes
12th December-first car pools began
30th January 1956-King’s home was bombed, with his wife and young baby inside
1st February-winning argument in Brown
22nd February-89 MIA members were arrested
19th March-appealed trial
11th May-Browder v Gayle
5th June-the court stated that buses should be desegregated
13th November-the supreme court upheld the earlier decision
17th December-second appeal was rejected
20th December-MIA stopped the boycott

Question 24

Why did education make MLK such a influential leader?

Answer 24

Being well-educated allowed him to think through a campaign strategy carefully, establish clear goals, and decide on the best means to achieve them.

Question 25

Why did non-violent approaches made MLK such a influential leader

Answer 25

While others were advocating for freedom by “any means necessary,” including violence, Martin Luther King, Jr. used the power of words and acts of nonviolent resistance, such as protests, grassroots organizing, and civil disobedience to achieve seemingly-impossible goals.

Question 26

Why did passionate speeches make MLK such a influential leader?

Answer 26

with this Martin Luther King got his fame and a lot of support

Question 27

Why did widepsread appeal make MLK such a influential leader?

Answer 27

a lot of people followed him and he became famous with a widespread appeal

Question 28

Why did Christian virtues make MLK such a influencial leader?

Answer 28

he believed in God therefore making him more popular

Question 29

Why was the boycott a success?

Answer 29

Buses were desegregated
A very symbolic victorh in legal terms
Showed power of non-violent, organised protest
Brought MLK into the spotlight

Question 30

Why was the boycott not a success?

Answer 30

White backlash
MIAs leader were attacked
Black people riding buses were shot at
Bus services were suspended for several weeks
Even though buses were desegregated, no further desegregation happened in Montgomery
Even bus stops remained segregated

Question 31

What was the Civil Roghts Act of 1957?

Answer 31

In 1957 Eisenhower introduced the first Civil Rights Act since 1875.
The first draft of it had to be amended as many felt that it was forcing change on people too much
Eventually, it set up a commission to prosecute anybody who tried to deny American citizens their rights.
HOWEVER – it was limited by the fact that anybody prosecuted under this was tried in a state jury which was unlikely to find a white southerner guilty

Question 32

Four key features of the SCLC policies

Answer 32

Reject and protest ALL forms of segregation
Use non-violent direction action tactics
Mass action
Attract broad-based black and white membership

Question 33

What were the events of the Greensbro sit-ins?

Answer 33

• at first it started at a few people sitting at the bar but within the couple next days it went through to the whole nation
• within weeks hundreds of people where doing this and it was a national problem.
• CORE became one of the leading organizations of the civil rights movement in the early 1960s by organizing activist campaigns that tested segregation laws in the South. The actions of the SCLC directly contributed to the passing of legislation in the 1960s designed to eliminate segregation and racial discrimination. The SCLC was founded as a direct result of the American Civil Rights Movement and was designed to promote the movement’s goals of social equality.
• the SNCC was setup with the aim of using non-violent to campaign for civil rights

Question 34

What were the freddom riders and reaction towards them? What happened to them in Aniston, Alabama, 15 May 1961?

Answer 34

• Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated Southern United States in 1961 and subsequent years to challenge the non-enforcement of the United States Supreme Court decisions Morgan v. Virginia (1946) and Boynton v. Virginia (1960), which ruled that segregated public buses were unconstitutional.
• The Freedom Rides, and the violent reactions they provoked, bolstered the credibility of the American Civil Rights Movement. They called national attention to the disregard for the federal law and the local violence used to enforce segregation in the southern United States.
• On this Mother’s Day, a group of Freedom Riders traveling by bus from Washington, D.C., to New Orleans were met by a white mob in Anniston, Alabama. The mob attacked the bus with baseball bats and iron pipes. They also slashed the tires.
• Freedom Riders end racial segregation in Southern U.S. public transit, 1961. Goals: To desegregate interstate transportation, including highways, bus stops, and train terminals.

Question 35

Who was James Meredith?

Answer 35

James Meredith, (born June 25, 1933, Kosciusko, Mississippi, U.S.), American civil rights activist who gained national renown at a key juncture in the civil rights movement in 1962, when he became the first African American student at the University of Mississippi.

Question 36

What were the events Sept 1961-Summer 1962?

Answer 36

30th September- Meredith registers to uni
JFK- Kennedy called for calmness through the radio and TV
Governor Barnett-Ross Robert Barnett (January 22, 1898 – November 6, 1987) was the Governor of Mississippi from 1960 to 1964. He was a prominent member of the Dixiecrats, Southern Democrats who supported racial segregation.
Violence- blacks still faced violence against them so they were protected by the federal troops
JFK federal troops-On the evening of Sunday, September 30, 1962, Southern segregationists rioted and fought state and federal forces on the campus of the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss) in Oxford, Mississippi to prevent the enrollment of the first African American student to attend the university, James Meredith

Question 37

What was the significance of events in Birmingham, Alabama, April 1963?

Answer 37

Birmingham was targeted for a civil rights campaign because the head of police in Birmingham was known for being racist and very aggressive.

In the spring of 1963, activists in Birmingham, Alabama launched one of the most influential campaigns of the Civil Rights Movement: Project C, better known as The Birmingham Campaign.

Birmingham, Alabama, U.S. Theophilus Eugene “Bull” Connor (July 11, 1897 – March 10, 1973) was an American politician who served as Commissioner of Public Safety for the city of Birmingham, Alabama, for more than two decades. He strongly opposed the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.

The Birmingham Campaign was a movement led in early 1963 by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) which sought to bring national attention of the efforts of local black leaders to desegregate public facilities in Birmingham, Alabama. The campaign was led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Question 38

Ways in which the Freedom Summer was Successful

Answer 38

1000 volunteers went to Mississippi to work with local campaigners
Many white college students
Freedom Schools set up
Helped many to pass voter registration tests

Question 39

Ways in which the Freedom Summer was unsuccessful

Answer 39

Reaction of many white Mississippians
Many blacks lost jobs
Beatings and violence common
Only 1600 of 17000 successfully registered to vote Mississippi murders

Question 40

What were the events in Selma, Alabama 1965?

Answer 40

Selma, Alabama was a town that had a particulary low amount of black Americans registered to vote so was chosen as a place to protest.
Bloody Sunday (March 7, 1965) was when police attacked and brutally beat Civil Rights Movement demonstrators with horses, clubs, and tear gas as they were attempting to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge on their march to the state capital, Montgomery.

Question 41

Why was Selma chosen as a place to protest?

Answer 41

Selma was chosen as a place to protest as Selma is in Alabama which is a state known for violence against black people.

Question 42

What were the aims of the SCLC and MLK?

Answer 42

With the goal of redeeming “the soul of America” through nonviolent resistance, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) was established in 1957 to coordinate the action of local protest groups throughout the South. Martin Luther King Jr. sought to raise the public consciousness of racism, to end racial discrimination and segregation in the United States. While his goal was racial equality, King plotted out a series of smaller objectives that involved local grassroots campaigns for equal rights for African Americans.

Question 43

What happened on 7 March, 1965?

Answer 43

On 7th March 1965 the was a peaceful protest that started from a church and involved mainly Black people but also white people and when they got to the Edmund Pettus bridge they were stopped by lawmen and state guard. They were beaten and shot at with tear gas.

Question 44

How did the government react?

Answer 44

On March 17, 1965, even as the Selma-to-Montgomery marchers fought for the right to carry out their protest, President Lyndon Johnson addressed a joint session of Congress, calling for federal voting rights legislation to protect African Americans from barriers that prevented them from voting.

Question 45

What happened between 21-25th March?

Answer 45

Selma March, also called Selma to Montgomery March, political march from Selma, Alabama, to the state’s capital, Montgomery, that occurred March 21–25, 1965. Together, these events became a landmark in the American civil rights movement and directly led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Question 46

What were the effects of Selma?

Answer 46

On March 17, 1965, even as the Selma-to-Montgomery marchers fought for the right to carry out their protest, President Lyndon Johnson addressed a joint session of Congress, calling for federal voting rights legislation to protect African Americans from barriers that prevented them from voting.

Question 47

Civil rights act 1964

Answer 47

It banned discrimination in many aspects of life
Force school desegregation and to remove federal funding from state projects that discriminated.
However didn’t abolish discrimination, nothing to impose fair registering voting and schools in the South still segregated.

Question 48

Voting Rights Act 1965

Answer 48

It outlawed the discriminatory voting practices adopted in many southern states after the Civil War, including literacy tests as a prerequisite to voting.

However blacks still faced discrimination