The Civil Rights Movement--6pgs.
The Civil Rights Movement in the United States was a political, legal, and social struggle by black Americans to gain full citizenship rights and to achieve racial equality. The Civil Rights movement was first and foremost a challenge to segregation. During the Civil Rights Movement, individuals and organizations challenged segregation and discrimination with a variety of activities, including protest marches, boycotts, and refusal to abide by segregation laws. Many believed that the movement began with the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955 and ended with the Voting Rights act of 1965. However, there has been debate about when it began and whether it has ended yet. The Civil Rights Movement has also been called the Black Freedom Movement, the Negro Revolution, and the Second Reconstruction. There were three main tenets to the Civil Rights Movement, the Post Civil War Period, the Educational Period, and the Social Movement. Following the Civil War, the 13th 14th and 15th amendments to the U.S. Constitution were passed. The 13th amendment made all blacks citizens of the United States. The 14th amendment granted them equal protection under the law. The 15th amendment gave black citizens the righ
Many people argue that the Civil Rights Movement ended two years later, when on April 4th 1968, Martin Luther King was assassinated. Following his assassination in Memphis, Tennessee, riots erupted in 125 U.S. cities. To many this sparked the end to the Civil Rights Movement. Others argued that it ended with the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and yet others contended that it was a struggle still going on. In show of his opposition, in 1957 Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus defied a federal court order, and with the aid of national guardsmen, attempted to prevent the admittance of nine black students to Little Rock's Central High school. President Dwight Eisenhower sent 1,000 federal paratroopers to enforce the desegregation and protect the "Little Rock Nine" for the entire school year. The national media event dramatized the seriousness of the desegregation for many Americans. Similar events occurred on September 30, 1962 at the University of Mississippi and in 1963 at the University of Alabama under President Kennedy's administration. The Black Panther Party (BPP) picked up on Brown's "Take your gun and go get what you want" mentality. The Black Panthers were a paramilitary organization founded in Oakland, California in 1966 by Huey Newton and Bobby Seales. Despite their reputation for an aggressive approach to civil rights, the BPP were also involved with "survival programs." These included free health clinics; free breakfast programs, soup kitchens, ambulance patrols, voter registration assistance, and community patrols. The Black Panther Party was also the first organization to begin teaching Black history to children. Encarta 98 Encyclopedia. CD-ROM Microsoft. 1998. After the passage of the Voting Rights act of 1965 , the Civil Rights Movements began to move away from it non-violent roots. The new head of the SNCC, Stokely Carmichael, popularized the term Black Power. Influenced by the philosophy of Malcolm X, the leader of the Nation of Islam, Black Power called for black separatism and self-sufficiency. Carmichael and his successor as chairman of SNCC, H. Rap Brown became national symbols of black radicalism. They wanted the Civil Rights Movement to be headed by "Ghetto Negroes" because they had never lived or been influenced by the white "system." The men sought to instill pride in the black community.
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1937
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)
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