Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement

1. January 15, 1929 Michael Luther King Jr., later renamed Martin, is born to schoolteacher Alberta King and Baptist minister Michael Luther King.

2. May 17, 1954. The US Supreme Court rules on the landmark case, Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, unanimously agreeing that segregation in public schools is unconstitutional. The ruling paves the way for large-scale desegregation. The decision overturns the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson ruling that sanctioned "separate but equal" segregation of the races, ruling that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." It is a victory for NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall, who will later return to the Supreme Court as the nation's first black justice.

3. August, 1955. Fourteen-year-old Chicagoan Emmett Till is visiting family in Mississippi when he is kidnapped, brutally beaten, shot, and dumped in the Tallahatchie River for allegedly whistling at a white woman. Two white men, J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant, are arrested for the murder and acquitted by an all-white jury. They later boast about committing the murder in a Look magazine interview. The case becomes a cause célèbre of the civil rights movement.

4. December, 1955. The bus boycott is launched in Montgomery, Alabama, after an African-American woman, Rosa Parks, is arrested and jailed December 1 for refusing to give up her seat at the front of the “colored section” of a bus to a white bus passenger. As newly elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr, is instrumental in leading the boycott. www.kasd.org/~civilrights8

5. March 22, 1956. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is welcomed by his wife Coretta after leaving court in Montgomery, Alabama. King was found guilty of conspiracy to boycott city buses in a campaign to desegregate the bus system, but a judge suspended his $500 fine pending appeal. GENE HERRICK / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

6. 1956. The Southern Manifesto is written by legislators in the United States Congress opposed to racial integration in public places. It is signed by 96 Democratic politicians from the former Confederate States - Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. The document is largely drawn up to counter the landmark Supreme Court 1954 ruling Brown v. Board of Education, which integrated public schools. It is signed by 19 Senators and 77 members of the House of Representatives, including the entire congressional delegations of the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina. All of the signatories are Southern Democrats. School segregation laws are some of the most enduring and best-known of the Jim Crow laws to characterize the American South at this time.

7. May 20, 1956. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. speaks to the media about his arrest for leading the Montgomery bus boycott. www.sithly.com

8. December 21, 1956. Rosa Parks sits in the front of a city bus in Montgomery, Alabama the day a Supreme Court ruling banning segregation of the city's public transit vehicles went into effect. UPI

9. January – February, 1957. Martin Luther King, Charles K. Steele, and Fred L. Shuttlesworth establish the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, of which King is made the first president. The SCLC becomes a major force in organizing the civil rights movement and bases its principles on nonviolence and civil disobedience. According to King, it is essential that the civil rights movement not sink to the level of the racists and hatemongers who oppose them: "We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline.” 1957. In this typical year of demonstrations, King traveled 780,000 miles and made 208 speeches.

10. April 25, 1957. Rev. Ralph Abernathy and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., leaders of the black bus boycott in Montgomery. GENE HERRICK / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

11. September 26, 1957. At a previously all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, nine black students are blocked from entering the school on the orders of Governor Orval Faubus. President Eisenhower sends 1,000 Federal paratroopers to Little Rock to restore order and escort the nine African American pupils safely to class without trouble; these nine students become know as the “Little Rock Nine.” THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

12. June 23, 1958. President Eisenhower (third from left) meets with civil rights leaders. From left to right: Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., E. Frederic Morrow, A. Philip Randolph, William Rogers and Roy Wilkins. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

13. September 3, 1958. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is arrested on a charge of loitering (later changed to "failure to obey an officer") in the vicinity of the Montgomery Recorder's Court. He was released on $100 bond. http://home.earthlink.net/~gfeldmeth/mlk.jpg

14. September 23, 1958. New York Governor Averell Harriman talks with Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King in Harlem Hospital where King was recovering from a stab wound. He was attacked by an African American woman while promoting his book - "Stride Toward Freedom" (Harper), his recollections of the Montgomery bus boycott - in a Harlem bookstore. www.sithly.com

15. February 1, 1960. The sit-in protest movement begins in February at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, and moves across the nation. The photo features The Greensboro Four - Jibreel Khazan (Ezell Blair Jr.), Franklin McCain, Joseph McNeil and David Richmond - four black freshmen at North Carolina A&T State University, who took seats at the segregated lunch counter of F. W. Woolworth's in Greensboro, N.C. They were refused service and sat peacefully until the store closed. They returned the next day, along with about 25 other students, and their requests were again denied. The Greensboro Four inspired similar sit-ins across the state and by the end of February, such protests were taking place across the South. Student sit-ins would be effective throughout the Deep South in integrating parks, swimming pools, theaters, libraries and other public facilities. Six months after the February 1 sit-in, the original four protestors are served lunch at the same Woolworth’s counter. www.sitins.com

16. April 1960. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) is founded at Shaw University, providing young blacks with a place in the civil rights movement. The SNCC later grows into a more radical organization, especially under the leadership of Stokely Carmichael (1966–1967).

17. October 20, 1960. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is arrested from a picket line in front of an Atlanta department store where people staged a sit-in demonstration. The trespassing charges were dropped the following week. All jailed demonstrators were released except Dr. King, who was held on a charge of violating a probated sentence in a traffic arrest case. He is transferred to the Dekalb County Jail in Decatur, Ga., and was then transferred to the Reidsville State Prison. He was released from the Reidsville prison on a $2 million bond. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

18. May 4, 1961. The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) begins sending student volunteers on bus trips to test the implementation of new laws prohibiting segregation in interstate travel facilities. One of the first two groups of "freedom riders," as they are called, encounters its first problem two weeks later, when a mob in Alabama sets the riders' bus on fire. The program continues, and by the end of the summer 1,000 volunteers, black and white, have participated.

19. May 24,1961. Freedom Riders have breakfast at a lunch counter in the bus station in Montgomery shortly before leaving for Jackson, Mississippi and New Orleans. It was the first time the eating facilities at the station had been integrated. The first group of Freedom Riders, with the intent of integrating interstate buses, left Washington, D.C. by Greyhound bus in early May 1961. The Freedom Riders were arrested in Jackson, Mississippi and spent 40 to 60 days in jail. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

20. October 2, 1962. James Meredith, center, successfully applied the laws of integration and became the first African American student accepted by the University of Mississippi. A pivotal moment in the civil rights movement, his attendance sparked riots on the Oxford campus that left two are killed. President Kennedy sent 5,000 Federal troops to allow Meredith to register for classes. http://expectingrain.com

21. April 1963. Dr. King and SCLS oppose Birmingham, Alabama laws that support segregation. Riots, fire-bombing and police are used against protesters. Dr. King is arrested after demonstrating in defiance of a court order. Dr. King writes “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” a notable document of the civil-rights movement, in response to white ministers who urge him to stop causing disturbances. In the letter, Dr. King articulates a statement of nonviolent resistance to wrongs of American society.

22. May 1963. Police use dogs to quell civil unrest in Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham's police commissioner "Bull" Connor also allowed fire hoses to be turned on young civil rights demonstrators. These images of brutality, which are televised and published widely, set off a backlash of sentiment that are instrumental in gaining sympathy for the civil rights movement around the world and for rejuvenating the flagging civil rights movement. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

23. June 11, 1963. President John F. Kennedy (JFK) makes his historic civil rights speech, promising a bill to Congress the next week. About civil rights for "Negroes," in his speech he asked for "the kind of equality of treatment which we would want for ourselves."

24. June 12, 1963. Medgar Evers, Mississippi’s NAACP field secretary, is murdered as he enters his home in Jackson, Mississippi. Byron De La Beckwith is tried twice in 1964; both trials resulting in hung juries. Thirty years later he is convicted for murdering Evers. http://en.wikipedia.org

25. August 28, 1963. Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. at the Lincoln Memorial for his "I Have a Dream" speech during the march on Washington, D.C. About 250,000 people attended the march to urge support for impending civil-rights legislation. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

26. August 28, 1963. An aerial view shows the crowd at the Lincoln Memorial for the march on Washington. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

27. September 15, 1963. Four young girls, Denis McNair, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Addie Mae Collins, attending Sunday school are killed in the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, a popular location for civil rights meetings. Riots erupt in Birmingham, leading to the deaths of two more black youths. www.npr.org

28. November 22, 1963. President Kennedy is assassinated. The new President Lyndon Johnson decides that accomplishing JFK's legislative agenda is his best strategy. January 23, 1964. The 24th Amendment abolishes the poll tax, which originally had been instituted in 11 southern states after Reconstruction to make it difficult for poor blacks to vote.

29. June 5, 1964. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. looks at the glass door of his rented beach cottage in St. Augustine, Florida, that was shot into. No one was in the house at the time of the shooting. King was in St. Augustine to meet with other integration leaders. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

30. Summer 1964. The Council of Federated Organizations (COFO), a network of civil rights groups that includes CORE and SNCC, launches a massive effort to register black voters during what becomes known as the Freedom Summer. It also sends delegates to the Democratic National Convention to protest—and attempt to unseat—the official all-white Mississippi contingent.

31. June 29, 1964. Elinor Tideman of San Francisco types a letter in an office of the Council of Federated Organizations in Meridian, Mississippi. Watching are Lenora Thurmond, left, Lexington, Miss., and Sue Brown, Meridian. Hundreds of students came to racially tense Mississippi to push for fair voter registration policies and other education projects. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

32. July 2, 1964. President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination in voting, education, and the use of public facilities. For the first time since the Supreme Court ruled on segregation in public schools in 1954, the federal government has a means of enforcing desegregation; Title VI of the act bars the use of federal funds for segregated programs and schools. In 1964 only two southern states (Tennessee and Texas) had more than 2% of their black students enrolled in integrated schools. Because of Title VI, about 6% of the black students in the South were in integrated schools by the next year. http://lcweb.loc.gov

33. December 10, 1964. Dr. King wins the Nobel Peace Prize. www.alisal.org

34. August 4, 1964. In Neshoba Country, Mississippi, the bodies of three civil-rights workers—two white, one black—are found in an earthen dam, six weeks into a federal investigation backed by President Johnson. James E. Chaney, 21; Andrew Goodman, 21; and Michael Schwerner, 24, had been working to register black voters in Mississippi, and, on June 21, had gone to investigate the burning of a black church. They were arrested by the police on speeding charges, incarcerated for several hours, and then released after dark into the hands of the Ku Klux Klan, who murdered them. February 1965. Dr. King continues to protest discrimination in voter registration, is arrested and jailed. February 9, Dr. King meets with President Lyndon B. Johnson and other American leaders to discuss voting rights for African Americans.

35. February 21, 1965. Malcolm X, black nationalist and founder of the Organization of Afro-American Unity, is murdered Three men are later convicted of his murder. www.pbs.org

36. March 7, 1965. Blacks begin a march to Montgomery in support of voting rights but are stopped at the Pettus Bridge by a police blockade. Fifty marchers are hospitalized after police use tear gas, whips, and clubs against them. The incident is dubbed "Bloody Sunday" by the media. The march is considered the catalyst for pushing through the voting rights act five months later.

37. March 16-21, 1965. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr leads thousands in a 54-mile march from Selma to the courthouse in Montgomery to support black voter registration. Despite attacks from police and interference from Governor Wallace, marchers reach Montgomery. www.kasd.org

38. June 6, 1965. Marchers fill a street in Selma, Alabama to protest voting issues. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

39. August 6, 1965. President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The act, which King sought, authorized federal examiners to register qualified voters and made illegal devices such as literacy tests and poll taxes that aimed to prevent African Americans from voting. After passage, southern black voter registration grows by over 50% and black officials are elected to various positions. In Mississippi, black voter registration grew from 7% to 67%.

40. August 11-16, 1965. Six days of rioting in the Watts section of Los Angeles. In the violence, 34 people were killed and 856 injured. www.npr.org

41. August 18, 1965. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addresses a public gathering in the riot-torn areas of Los Angeles. King attended many meetings in an attempt to solve the problems connected with the uprising. At left is King's aide, Bayard Rustin. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

42. September 24, 1965. Asserting that civil rights laws alone are not enough to remedy discrimination, President Johnson issues Executive Order 11246, which enforces affirmative action for the first time. It requires government contractors to "take affirmative action" toward prospective minority employees in all aspects of hiring and employment.

43. June 7, 1966. James Meredith, right, pulls himself to cover near a parked car after a sniper shot him. Other marchers and newsmen took cover behind another car. Meredith had been leading a march to encourage African Americans to vote. He recovered from the wound, and later completed the march. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

44. June 8, 1966. Mississippi patrolmen shove Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other marchers during the 220-mile "March Against Fear" from Memphis, Tennessee to Jackson, Mississippi. www.eco.utexas.edu

45. August 6, 1966. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. holds his head after being struck by a rock as he led 600 demonstrators on a civil-rights march through crowds of angry whites in the Gage Park section of Chicago's southwest side. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

46. October 1966. The militant Black Panthers are founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

47. Undated. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. tells reporters he is "disenchanted" with President Johnson's Vietnam policies and may endorse either Sen. Robert Kennedy or Sen. Eugene McCarthy for the 1968 Democratic presidential nomination. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

48. April 19, 1967. Stokely Carmichael, a leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), coins the phrase "black power" in a speech in Seattle. He defines it as an assertion of black pride and "the coming together of black people to fight for their liberation by any means necessary." The term's radicalism alarms many who believe the civil rights movement's effectiveness and moral authority crucially depend on nonviolent civil disobedience. June 12, 1967. In Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court rules that prohibiting interracial marriage is unconstitutional. Sixteen states that still banned interracial marriage at the time are forced to revise their laws. July 1967. Major race riots take place in Newark (July 12–16) and Detroit (July 23–30). These are the worst riots in U.S. history, resulting in 43 deaths in Detroit and troops being called in to restore order.

49. March 28, 1968. A police officer clubs a youth reportedly involved in the looting that followed the breakup of a march led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, in Memphis, Tennessee. Black leaders accused the police of brutality while police officers said they did what was necessary to restore order. In the wake of the violence, a curfew was imposed and more than 3,800 National Guardsmen were rushed to the city. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

50. April 3, 1968. Hosea Williams (left), Jesse Jackson, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rev. Ralph David Abernathy on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel Memphis hotel, a day before King's assassination. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS