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The Dream Diminished?

The Dream Diminished?. New Successes and Challenges for the Civil Rights Movements (18.3). A Push for Voting Rights. Friend of the movement, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy wants SNCC to focus on voter registration change in the South Voter Education Project:

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The Dream Diminished?

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  1. The Dream Diminished? New Successes and Challenges for the Civil Rights Movements (18.3)

  2. A Push for Voting Rights • Friend of the movement, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy wants SNCC to focus on voter registration change in the South • Voter Education Project: • Success 1.9 million new voters in 1964 • Mississippi holds out – only 5% of blacks registered

  3. SNCC & Freedom Summer - 1964 • Effort to test bounds of 1964 Civil Rights Law • They would bring in black and white students to Mississippi with two focuses: • Register southern blacks to vote • Strengthen Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) (alternative to pro-white Dem. Party) • 3 Volunteers were executed (Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner)

  4. The MFDP gets the cold shoulder • 1964 Democratic Convention – MFDP leader Fannie Lou Hamer sought to represent Mississippi over the white, mainstream party • She was denied • Dem. Party offers to seat some but not all of the MFDP so they walk out over lack of compromise

  5. Selma 1965 • SCLC pushes governor to fulfill promises of 1964 legislation with new voting rights legislation • 7 March 1965 - “Bloody Sunday” • Heavily armed troops attacked marchers as they tried to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge • Forced the US gov’t to extend voting rights • LBJ – “Their cause is our cause, too…And we shall overcome!”

  6. Voting Rights Act 1965 • Banned literacy tests and let Federal Gov’t oversee registration and elections (extended to Hispanics in 1975) • Poll Taxes eliminated in 1964’s 24th Amendment • Baker v. Carr eliminates racial “gerrymandering”

  7. Thurgood Marshall • First African American appointed to the Supreme Court • Named in 1967

  8. Frustration Explodes- 1967 • Anger and frustration of slow pace of change, continued poverty, despair, and discrimination finally take their toll • Riots break out in many cities • Watts in LA and many northern cities (Little Italy in Cleveland armed itself against the Hough Riots) • Federal Troops are mobilized • This frightened many white Americans

  9. The Kerner Commission 1967 • LBJ created the Kerner Commission to find the riot causes • Long term racial discrimination and poverty seen as the impetus • Recommended establishing and expanding federal programs aimed at overcoming the problems of America’s urban ghettos • Many whites tiring of the movement, fear its meaning

  10. New Voices Emerge: Elijah Muhammad • Leader of the Black political and religious group – the Nation of Islam (NOI) • Preached complete separation from Whites in society • Believed Blacks ruled the world and the Whites tricked them out of power • All Caucasians are evil • Believed that most African slaves were Muslim and urged re-conversion to restore their lost heritage • NOI wanted to create a second Black nation within the US

  11. New Voices Emerge: Malcolm X • 19 May 1925 Malcolm Little was born in Omaha, Nebraska • His father was an outspoken Baptist minister and supporter of Marcus Garvey • His family was forced to relocate multiple times because of the Black Legion, a white supremacist group • 1929 – his house was burned to the ground • 1931 – his father was found dead across the town’s RR tracks • He had trouble with the law after that • Converted to the NOI while in jail and become Malcolm X, a NOI leader

  12. X’s Pilgrimage to Mecca • While in Mecca in 1964, Malcolm discovered that orthodox Muslims preach equality among races • X changed his views about Caucasians • Still held that only Blacks could free themselves • He split from the NOI and formed the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU) • As a threat to the NOI, in 1965 X was assassinated by a Black Muslim at a New York City rally

  13. Black Power and the Black Panthers • Young African Americans saw themselves as the heirs of Malcolm X’s teachings • They began to move away from the ideas of nonviolence and question the goals of integrations • Stokely Carmichael: blacks should use economic Black Power to gain strength • Invest in themselves

  14. “Black Power” • First used by Carmichael after he was released from prison in 1966 • James Meredith created a “March Against Fear” across the state of Mississippi • After only 20 miles Meredith was shot and left for dead by white supremacists • When Carmichael and the other marchers made it to Greenwood, MS they were arrested and thrown in jail • When he was released he told a crowd they needed “Black Power”

  15. An Aggressive Change • Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panthers to protect people from the police • “By any means necessary” • Organized armed patrols around “Black Neighborhoods” protect the inhabitants • Took over Capital Building in California to protest 2nd Amendment violations • Confront the police • Afro-Centrism growing (Afros, African names, etc)

  16. The Death of Martin Luther King Jr. • 4 April 1968 – MLK gunned down • James Earl Ray • Riots occur across the US in spite of his message • Was trying to reject “Black Power” through the “Poor People’s Campaign” • Pressuring the nation to do more to end the plight of the poor

  17. The Movement Continued • Ralph Abernathy (next SCLC leader) continued the “Poor People’s Campaign” • CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1968 – provided for equal housing opportunities regardless of race, creed, or national origin • made it a federal crime to “by force or by threat of force…interfere with anyone…by reason of their race, code, religion, or national origin” • Court Ordered Busing (To break up ghettos and forcibly create equality…Anger)

  18. Affirmative Action • What was it intended to do? • Take factors including race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or national origin into consideration in order to benefit an underrepresented group, usually justified as countering the effects of a history of discrimination

  19. Efforts to Undermine the Black Power and Civil Rights Movement • FBI and J. Edgar Hoover kept files on and tracked all leaders (MLK infidelity) • COINTELPRO created to drive wedges between more radical groups and leaders

  20. African American Leaders Today Andrew Young John Lewis Al Sharpton Jesse Jackson (Operation PUSH & the Rainbow Coalition)

  21. Current Historic Movements • The New Black Panthers - Malik Shabbaz • The Current Nation of Islam - Louis Farrakhan

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