After the emancipation of slavery in the 1800’s, African Americans have struggled to be treated with the same equal rights as Europeans. Even with the laws that were pasted to protect African Americans there were states that ignored and created new laws to overturn the laws to protect African Americans. The ignorant of Europeans who denied African Americans the equal rights the laws stated they deserved. African Americans decided to stand up for themselves by developing non violent protest movement to fight for the equal rights of African Americans. ("Civil Rights Movement") Martin Luther King Jr. became the leader of the non violent protest movement in the 1950’s.The development of Martin Luther King Jr. in this era started when an African American woman named Rosa Parks, who refused to give up her seat to a white man in Montgomery, Alabama.
The fourteenth Amendment (1868) gave citizenship rights to all people bon in the USA and was an attempt to assure the rights of previous slaves. Furthermore the Fifteenth Amendment (1870) gave all citizens voting rights regardless of their race. However these rights were never fully enforced, although progress was made toward racial inequality, even in the south. Between 1890 and 1910, southern states introduced legal segregation which was achieved by passing local laws which denied black Americans from using the same facilities e.g. educational, health care, cinemas, etc.
As far as Johnsons voting record while in congress on civil rights, he shared similar attitudes with the south towards civil rights for black people. Johnson had a strong desire to become one of the greatest domestic Presidents in the history of the U. S. He believed that the U. S. could not be considered as the Great Society if it denied civil rights to American Negroes. Johnson believed that he owed it to Kennedy’s life to push this act forward. The passive approach to civil rights in the 50’s had now gone and the Northern ghettos were now moving more towards militancy. Johnson realised that society had changed in a short space of time of just a few years; he wanted change before civil unrest forced through.
He gave the speech "I Have a Dream" in 1963 on the "March to Washington" after which he established himself as one of the greatest orators in the history of America. He wrote this speech in order to inspire and convince the people of America that each and every American no matter what the color of their skin is or from where they belong, each and every one of them should be treated equally, with justice and equality. He wanted to stop the injustice that was taking place in each and every street of America and he wanted to inspire the African American people to start a non-violent protest against this wrong doing. For this speech, his target audience were all the American's present on that day in Washington and all the people of the country. His final purpose of the speech was to attain freedom for his fellow African American citizens who were being treated unfairly during that period in the country.
American History II/HIS 132N Instructor: Rex Etheridge April 4, 2012 The Civil Right Movement The laws passed to protect the people of the United States after the events of World War I, such as the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, brought African Americans and other minorities a sense of belonging. Given the opportunity to proudly serve and fight for their country. However a stream of racial discrimination by white solidarity, took place right after these Amendments were passed and the Jim Crows laws violated these laws. Yet it wasn’t until the case of Brown v. Board of Education that speeded the process towards a Civil Right Movement. The Civil Right Acts of 1964 and the Voting Right Acts are but two pieces of legislation which made sure that these Amendments were not being violated.
All the criticizes did not influence his leadership. In Aug 28, 1963, Dr.King gave an astonish speech in Washington, D.C. in a March on Washington movement. About 200,000 people joined the movement, and the speech he gave called, I Have A Dream. This is his most famous speech, and he is the first black to give a speech in front of Lincoln Memorial. Dr.King had been through so many movements, and had been through lots of difficulty.
In order to understand the recent trends in voter identification laws, we must first look back at the civil rights movement in the South. This movement was determined to secure equal rights for African Americans, including the right to vote. In 1965, at the height of the civil rights movement, black civil rights marchers started a 50-mile walk to Montgomery, Alabama to demand equal rights in voting, when white police in Selma used violence to disperse them. “What happened that day in Selma shocked the nation, and led President Johnson to call for immediate passage of a strong federal voting rights law,” (U.S. Department of Justice 2013). This led Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which “protects every American against racial discrimination in voting.
Using the Law In 1947, President Truman told the Committee on Civil Rights that it was time to make sure civil rights laws were enforced. He said ‘We have been trying to do this for 150 years’ However; many state laws enforced only change these laws if they could show they were unconstitutional. This should have been easy; the fourteenth amendment to the constitution made black people full American citizens. Many people in government (especially people of southern states), fought to keep these laws in place. In 1896, in the case of Plessy vs. Ferguson, the Supreme Court had ruled that facilities, transport, and education could all be segregated as long as they were kept separate but equal.
The Civil Rights Movement – What Caused the Change? The Civil Rights Movement – What Caused the Change? Slavery ended in 1865, yet over 100 years later African Americans were still fighting for their basic civil rights. The Civil Right Movement of the 1960s started out as a much focused movement with one goal in mind, equality for African Americans. African Americans wanted their voting rights, desegregation of schools and employment, and adequate housing.
Civil Rights are the rights give to a citizen by the United States government, such as the right to vote, the Civil Rights Movement was when African Americans and other minorities began to protest and fight for these rights, which at the time was only given to white Americans I the believe the Federal Government has the right to integrate the southern Untied States. The states in the south, like Mississippi, did not have the right to ignore the federal law to set by Congress and the Civil Right Act of 1964. Even with the tenth amendment the laws of the federal government over power the rights of the state. The common good of the southern population was interrupted by the racist laws and regulations set by the “Southern Manifesto”. The common good was affected one way by these because the majority population in the south was African American.