Background
The civil rights movement was a mass popular movement to secure for African Americans equal access to and opportunities for the basic privileges and rights of U.S. citizenship. Although the roots of the movement go back to the 19th century, it peaked in the 1950s and 1960s. African American men and women, along with whites, organized and led the movement at national and local levels. They pursued their goals through legal means, negotiations, petitions, and nonviolent protest demonstrations (see pacifism and nonviolent movements). The civil rights movement was largest social movement of the 20th century in the United States. It influenced the modern women's rights movement and the student movement of the 1960s.
The civil rights movement centered on the American South. That was where the African American population was concentrated and where racial inequality in education, economic opportunity, and the political and legal processes was most blatant. Beginning in the late 19th century, state and local governments passed segregation laws, known as Jim Crow laws; they also imposed restrictions on voting qualifications that left the black population economically and politically powerless. The movement therefore addressed primarily three areas of discrimination: education, social segregation, and voting rights.
By the mid-1960s, however, most eligible black voters in the South remained disfranchised. Following World War II, African Americans initiated local efforts to exercise the right to vote but faced strong and sometimes violent resistance from local whites. Organized initiatives to enfranchise blacks climaxed with the Summer Project of 1964. Popularly known as Freedom Summer, it came under the auspices of the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO), which included the SCLC, the SNCC, CORE, and the NAACP. Targeting Mississippi, where in many counties no blacks were registered to vote, COFO launched a massive and largely unsuccessful voter-registration drive. White resistance was widespread and included several killings. (In one particularly notable case, three civil rights workers disappeared on June 21, and their bodies were found on August 4; a federal court convicted seven individuals in connection with the murders in 1967, but the state of Mississippi did not prosecute the case until 2005, when one 80-year-old man was convicted of manslaughter.) The voter-registration effort did, however, capture the attention of many lawmakers, who began calling for federal voting-rightslegislation.
Such legislation was enacted following events in Selma, Ala. King and the SCLC went there in February 1965, hoping to boost a languishing voting-rights drive that had been organized by the SNCC and local blacks. After two failed attempts, King led an 87-km (54-mi) march from Selma to Montgomery. Three activists lost their lives during the Selma demonstrations, but in August 1965, President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act.
Black Power: By this time, civil rights activists were turning their attention to race discrimination in the urban North and West. Many younger activists, discontented with the slow process of change, were also becoming more militant. The SNCC, for instance, in 1966 replaced its chair, John Lewis, with the more radical Stokely Carmichael. Carmichael expanded SNCC operations beyond the South and helped popularize the concept of "black power." Advocates of black power favored African Americans' controlling the movement, exercising economic autonomy, and preserving their African heritage. Most controversial were the call for racial separatism and the principle of self-defense against white violence. These tenets were contrary to the ideals of more traditional activists who favored racial integration and passive resistance. A leading group within the black-power struggle was the Black Panthers. Organized in Oakland, Calif., in 1966 by Bobby Seale and Huey P.Newton, it included among its members the activist and writer Eldridge Cleaver. Probably the best-known figure within the radical wing of the civil rights movement was Malcolm X. He emerged from but broke with the Nation of Islam, also known as the Black Muslims. By the mid-1970s, however, the black-power movement had faded. It never gained the support of the larger African American populace.
Information from History.com, click on the link to explore more background information.
The civil rights movement centered on the American South. That was where the African American population was concentrated and where racial inequality in education, economic opportunity, and the political and legal processes was most blatant. Beginning in the late 19th century, state and local governments passed segregation laws, known as Jim Crow laws; they also imposed restrictions on voting qualifications that left the black population economically and politically powerless. The movement therefore addressed primarily three areas of discrimination: education, social segregation, and voting rights.
By the mid-1960s, however, most eligible black voters in the South remained disfranchised. Following World War II, African Americans initiated local efforts to exercise the right to vote but faced strong and sometimes violent resistance from local whites. Organized initiatives to enfranchise blacks climaxed with the Summer Project of 1964. Popularly known as Freedom Summer, it came under the auspices of the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO), which included the SCLC, the SNCC, CORE, and the NAACP. Targeting Mississippi, where in many counties no blacks were registered to vote, COFO launched a massive and largely unsuccessful voter-registration drive. White resistance was widespread and included several killings. (In one particularly notable case, three civil rights workers disappeared on June 21, and their bodies were found on August 4; a federal court convicted seven individuals in connection with the murders in 1967, but the state of Mississippi did not prosecute the case until 2005, when one 80-year-old man was convicted of manslaughter.) The voter-registration effort did, however, capture the attention of many lawmakers, who began calling for federal voting-rightslegislation.
Such legislation was enacted following events in Selma, Ala. King and the SCLC went there in February 1965, hoping to boost a languishing voting-rights drive that had been organized by the SNCC and local blacks. After two failed attempts, King led an 87-km (54-mi) march from Selma to Montgomery. Three activists lost their lives during the Selma demonstrations, but in August 1965, President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act.
Black Power: By this time, civil rights activists were turning their attention to race discrimination in the urban North and West. Many younger activists, discontented with the slow process of change, were also becoming more militant. The SNCC, for instance, in 1966 replaced its chair, John Lewis, with the more radical Stokely Carmichael. Carmichael expanded SNCC operations beyond the South and helped popularize the concept of "black power." Advocates of black power favored African Americans' controlling the movement, exercising economic autonomy, and preserving their African heritage. Most controversial were the call for racial separatism and the principle of self-defense against white violence. These tenets were contrary to the ideals of more traditional activists who favored racial integration and passive resistance. A leading group within the black-power struggle was the Black Panthers. Organized in Oakland, Calif., in 1966 by Bobby Seale and Huey P.Newton, it included among its members the activist and writer Eldridge Cleaver. Probably the best-known figure within the radical wing of the civil rights movement was Malcolm X. He emerged from but broke with the Nation of Islam, also known as the Black Muslims. By the mid-1970s, however, the black-power movement had faded. It never gained the support of the larger African American populace.
Information from History.com, click on the link to explore more background information.