IMAGES OF ACTIVISTS
Malcolm X & Martin Luther King, Jr.
Civil Rights Movement
Nearly 100 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, African Americans in Southern states still inhabited a starkly unequal world of disenfranchisement, segregation and various forms of oppression, including race-inspired violence. “Jim Crow” laws at the local and state levels barred them from classrooms and bathrooms, from theaters and train cars, from juries and legislatures. Many leaders from within the African American community and beyond rose to prominence during the Civil Rights era, including Martin Luther King, Jr., Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Andrew Goodman and others. They risked—and sometimes lost—their lives in the name of freedom and equality.
IMPORTANT QUOTES
- Malcolm X
"A man who stands for nothing will fall for anything."
- Malcolm X
"We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
"I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was born on January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Georgia, to Reverend Martin Luther King, Sr. and Alberta Williams King. He was an American pastor, activist, humanitarian, and leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for his role in the advancement of civil rights using nonviolent civil disobedience based on his Christian beliefs.
Malcolm X
Malcolm X was born May 19, 1925, in Omaha, Nebraska, the fourth of seven children of Grenada-born Louise Little and Georgia-born Earl Little. Malcolm X born Malcolm Little and also known as El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, was an African-American Muslim minister and a human rights activist. To his admirers he was a courageous advocate for the rights of blacks, a man who indicted white America in the harshest terms for its crimes against black Americans; detractors accused him of preaching racism and violence. He has been called one of the greatest and most influential African Americans in history.
MORE CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS
Rosa Parks
She was an African-American civil rights activist, whom the United States Congress called "the first lady of civil rights" and "the mother of the freedom movement."
Andrew Goodman
He was one of three American civil rights activists murdered near Philadelphia, Mississippi, during Freedom Summer in 1964 by members of the Ku Klux Klan.
Fannie Lou Hamer
She was an American voting rights activist and civil rights leader.