Previous to the 1950s Civil Rights movement, the longest sustained period of black struggle occurred around the turn of the century, at the close of the once- promising Reconstruction era, which instead of reducing or overcoming institutionalized racial tension, had the opposite result. By the late nineteenth century, the rights of blacks, granted just thirty-five years earlier with the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments were already being eroded and hardened into the Jim Crow system. In response grew two related but radically different responses from the black community. The two major figures of this struggle

In addition, the Brown decision set a precedent for the NAACP and other black civil rights organizations. Throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, the Supreme Court was exceptionally receptive to civil rights battles at a time when other government agencies, to say nothing of public opinion, were reluctant if not hostile to the struggle. Therefore, it was common for civil rights leaders to fight their battles through the courts rather than to fight for new legislation or local ordinances. With Brown, the courts became the arena of the civil rights movement.

The boycott lasted for over a year and garnered a great deal of national press and general sympathy. Blacks walked where they needed to go, formed carpools, and utilized the services of a black-owned taxi company that reduced fares for blacks boycotting the buses. The result was a Montgomery public transportation system nearing bankruptcy. Resistance and violence occurred, of course. King's house was bombed, and he and 89 others were indicted for conspiracy to conduct an illegal boycott. They were convicted and forced to pay $1,000 fines, but the convictions only enhanced their moral credibility. In 1956 a federal court ordered that the Bus system be desegregated

Directly opposed to Booker T. Washington, and espousing a philosophy more akin to the 1950s non-violent organizations like SCLC, stood W.E.B. DuBois. The first black person to graduate with a Ph.D. from Harvard University, DuBois believed that rather than look for self sufficiency within a marginalized niche, blacks should fight for integration using all the legal means they could muster. With his eye on achieving complete black civil rights, DuBois co-founded the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) in 1909. When the struggle for black civil rights was renewed in the 1950s, the NAACP stood at the forefront. Dubois also fought for the concept of black pride well before others spoke about it. He organized Pan-African conferences, led philosophical discourses about the concept of black culture, and eventually moved to Africa when he became disgusted with America's inability to respect the rights of her black citizens.

Even the President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, was reluctant to enforce the court's decision. He did not take steps to do so until fall 1957, when the governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus, blatantly defied the Supreme Court's order and encouraged mob violence against the nine black children seeking admittance to Central High School in Little Rock. Eisenhower sent in federal troops to ensure the safety of children, and to ensure also that the children gained admittance to the school.

This period of civil rights history embodied by Washington and Dubois had important consequence

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