New Successes and Challenges

1. Chapter 27, Section 3 New Successes and Challenges

2. The Push for Voting Rights • SNCC Stages Freedom Summer • South states used literacy tests, poll taxes, and intimidation to keep African Americans from voting • 1964, SNCC staged massive campaign, known as Freedom Summer – included voter education and registration projects • 1,000 volunteered went to Mississippi, mostly black and white students - Formed the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) • At the beginning of the summer, 3 civil rights workers went missing – Michael Schwerner, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman • President Johnson ordered a massive search – ended when their bodies were discovered, all three had been murdered

3. The Push for Voting Rights • SNCC Stages Freedom Summer (Continued) • Despite the danger, students continued to Mississippi for the campaign • At the end of the summer, MFDP traveled to the Democratic National Convention and asked to be recognized as the only Democratic Party for Mississippi • Party offered to give them two delegation seats at the party and to reform the nomination rules to give minorities more of a say • They rejected the offer • The regular delegation walked out over the offer

5. The Push for Voting Rights • March on Selma • MLK and SCLC planned a march on Selma to pressure the federal government to enact voting rights legislation • Protesters were attacked by state troopers and other authorities on the Edmund Pettus Bridge • National news picked up the event, became known as “Bloody Sunday” (March 7th, 1965) • March 15th, President Johnson made a televised speech calling for a federal voting rights bill to be passed

10. The Push for Voting Rights • New Legislation Guarantees Voting Rights • Voting Rights Act of 1965 – banned literacy tests and allowed the federal government to oversee voting registration and elections • 24th Amendment – ratified in 1964, it banned the poll tax • Baker v. Carr and Reynolds v. Simms – limited racial gerrymandering and established the legal principle “one man, one vote” • African American participation in politics increased dramatically

11. African American Voter Registration(Percentage of voting-age African Americans)

13. Frustration Explodes Into Violence • Racial Violence Plagues Cities • Frustration with continued discrimination and poverty caused rioting in cities across the US – including Detroit, Newark, LA • 1965, race riots broke out in Watts in LA – one of the worst the country had ever seen • Violence, looting, and arson continued for days before the National Guard stopped it

15. Frustration Explodes Into Violence • The Kerner Commission Seeks the Cause • Kerner Commission investigated the cause of the rioting • Concluded it was the long-term racial discrimination was the cause • Recommended establishing programs to overcome the problems of urban ghettos • Some backlash from the report, thought it would reward rioters • Johnson never followed through with the recommendations because the Vietnam War was taking up so much of the budget

16. New Voices for African Americans • Malcolm X Offers a Different Vision • Abandoned his given last name, Little, because he said it was his slave name • Converted to the Nation of Islam while in prison, became a prominent minster after his release from jail • Branched off in 1964, and became the face of the more militant part of the movement • Was assassinated in 1965 by three members of the Nation of Islam

19. New Voices for African Americans • Young Leaders Call for Black Power • Some of the younger generation began to question nonviolence and even integration • Stokely Carmichael, leader of SNCC, began to advocate for “black power” – using their economic and political muscle to gain equality • Whites were threatened by the new turn of the movement

20. New Voices for African Americans • Militants Form the Black Panthers • Huey Newton and Bobby Seale formed the Black Panthers in 1966in California • Organized patrols to protect urban neighborhoods from police abuse and created antipoverty programs • Began to embrace the “Black is Beautiful” movement

22. Martin Luther King’s Final Days • Martin Luther King is Assassinated • Understood the frustration but continued to call for nonviolent protests • Began a massive “Poor People’s Campaign” to pressure the government to do more to address poverty in the US • Was in Memphis, Tennessee for the campaign – on April 4th, on the balcony of his motel room, he was shot and died shortly after at the hospital • Riots broke out across the US in response to his death

25. “All of us might wish at times that we lived in a more tranquil world, but we don’t. And if our times are more difficult and perplexing, so are they challenging and filled with opportunity.” – Robert F. Kennedy

26. Significant Gains and Controversial Issues • Civil Rights Are Advanced • Ended de jure segregation • Increased African American voting and political participation • Poverty rates for African Americans fell, graduation rates and income rose • Thurgood Marshall was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1967 • Fair Housing Act – banned discrimination in housing

27. Significant Gains and Controversial Issues • Controversial Issues Remain • To integrate schools, Johnson ordered forced busing • Nixon enacted Affirmative Action to close economic gap between blacks and whites • Was controversial – whites claimed it was reverse discrimination