Civil Rights
By: Reagan Webb, Jordy Gleason, Abby Green
Civil Rights Info
The Civil Rights Act was in 1964. It prohibits racism and the act was expanded and reviewed by congress to enforce Civil Rights. This was not an act that everyone supported, but it was fought for and eventually passed by congress.
History of Civil Rights movement, 4th grade Lesson Intro.
Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. was a priest that lived in Montgomery, Alabama for most of his life. He is a very well known civil rights activist and leader. He believed that everyone should have equal rights as citizens no matter what your skin color was. Martin Luther supported peaceful protest, and sit-ins. He was an extremely non-violent man. Here is a list of the awards he has won for the work he did for Civil Rights, Nobel Peace Prize, Time's Person of the Year, Presidential Medal of Freedom, Congressional Gold Medal, Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album, Spingarn Medal, Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding, Margaret Sanger Awards, Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards. He was a brilliant man who made his mark on the world in great measures.
Martin during a speech
Leading a peaceful march!
Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr I Have A Dream speech with text
Jim Crow Laws
From the 1880s into the 1960s, a majority of American states enforced segregation through "Jim Crow" laws (so called after a black character in minstrel shows). From Delaware to California, and from North Dakota to Texas, many states (and cities, too) could impose legal punishments on people for consorting with members of another race. In a nut shell, it segregated people people by their race. For example, people had to use separate bathrooms, drinking fountains, stores, and even schools. These laws made conditions harsh for people who weren't white. It was a terrible, terrible, terrible, god forbidden thing.
The Jim Crow Laws
The Birth of Civil Rights
Eric Foner on 1866 and the Birth of Civil Rights
The Death of Emmett Till
A huge event that happened exactly a year before Rosa Parks refused to move seats, was the death of Emmett Till. It was so big, that the famous artist Bob Dylan wrote a song about it. He was a young man that was brutally murdered by two white men for no reason other than the color of his skin. When the men were faced with charges, the jury pleaded them not guilty and they got away with the pure evil crime they had committed. To show you just how evil this crime was I have found a before and after picture of Emmett Till, when I first saw it, I cried. Look how much hate there is in our world.
Bob Dylan - Freewheelin Outtakes - 03-The Death Of Emmett Till by Martyn Page
Women's Suffrage
"In 1848 Elizabeth Cady Stanton and four other women invited the public to the First Women's Rights Convention to discuss expanding the role of women in America. At the end of the two days, 100 people made a public commitment to work together to improve women’s quality of life. While women have achieved greater equality with the vote, property rights, and education, the revolution continues today."
Eleanor Roosevelt
Eleanor was a women’s rights activist, she was married to President Roosevelt. She was an extremely strong leader, and liked by much of the American public. Eleanor believed that all woman should be equal to men. She was paralyzed by polio in her 40's, but still gave speeches about human rights.
After President Roosevelt had come out with the affair with his secretary, Eleanor and him supposedly broke up, but she still supported him, and they stayed married. They just had didn't have a romantic relationship. In the 1930's Eleanor was in a private relationship with a woman named Lorena Hickok. There is much speculation about their relationship, wether or not it was romantic or not. But many letters between the two point toward the direction of a relationship that was definitely more than friends. There were also other men throughout her life that she seemed to like, but never had any public relationship with. She died after President Roosevelt in 1962.
Alice Paul
"Alice Paul was the creator of some of the most outstanding political achievements on behalf of women in the 20th century. Born on January 11, 1885 to Quaker parents in Mt. Laurel, New Jersey, Alice Paul dedicated her life to the single cause of securing equal rights for all women."
Alice Paul presented by The Alice Paul Institute