1950's Turning Point

The montgomery bus boycott was successful through the efforts of the African American community and supporters. The exertion of the community is shown in Robinson's letter. According to the letter, it says :” “More and more of our people are already arranging with neighbors and friends to ride to keep from being insulted and humiliated by bus drivers”. The boycott was strong in the community, if it wasn't for them it would not have lasted 381 days, and it would still be the same segregated buses. They stayed strong and worked together to get transportation for their daily needs using neighboring taxi’s and cars. Another reason the boycott was so successful was, it was lead with courageous and empowering leaders. Dr Martin Luther King Jr. talks on the protest and asserts “I believe that

Though the conclusion of the American Civil War in 1965 marked the end of slavery in the United States, African-Americans would not see anything resembling true freedom from the segregation and isolation imposed by slavery until very recently, and only after decades of difficult struggle. Some of the most important achievements occurred during the 1960s, when a generation of African-American leaders and activists, including Martin Luther King Jr., Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, and the Freedom Riders, fought against some of the last vestiges of explicit, institutionalized segregation, discrimination, and isolation in order to attain equality and civil rights. Only by examining the treatment of African-Americans throughout America's history can one begin to understand how the the ending of slavery, the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, and the contemporary issues facing the African-American community are inextricably linked. In turn this allows one to see how rather than existing as a single, identifiable turning point in the history of civil rights, African American's struggle for equality and an end to isolation must be considered as an ongoing project.

The reconstruction amendments established in the 19th century made many believe that African Americans would finally reach equality. However, the abolishment never changed society’s view on African Americans and instead, barriers such as oppression and segregation came out of it. Despite the ceaseless barriers faced by African Americans in the South, they were able to utilize methods in which gave the movement strength in the 1950s and ultimately, led to their gained civil rights.

supremacist group. The arrests largely brought an end to the busing-related violence. The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a very important and vital part in the civil rights movement for many reasons. First, it was the one of the first mass protests on civil rights in the U.S. The Montgomery bus boycott set the stage for other large protests outside the court system to bring fair treatment for African Americans. Second, Martin Luther King came up as a prominent national leader of the civil rights movement while also.keeping true to his commitment to nonviolent protest. Shortly after the boycott' s end, he

In the Late 1950’s, America was in the beginnings of an important Cultural revolution. The Civil Rights movement as a whole was still very new and the country had just recently been desegregated. As such,

Later, due to the events of the boycott, Martin Luther King Jr. emerged and was the movement’s “most effective leader” (Clayborne Carson). He is known for his nonviolent tactics and his ‘I Have a Dream’ speech. Martin Luther King Jr. was also a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and later became the president of the SCLC in 1957 following the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

Dr. King was looking for support from members of society in order to create an effective change in society’s ethics. Moreover, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s large audience and public movement used nonviolent tactics, such as sit-ins, marches, and freedom rides to put the Civil Rights Movement in action. Before directly acting against the law, Dr. King had used other means to try to obtain justice for all; he used the four basic steps of a nonviolent campaign to decide how he would approach this cultural issue of racism: determination of whether injustices exist, negotiation, self-purification, and direct action (King 1). After the first three steps of his nonviolent campaign proved to be ineffective, he decided to seek direct action through a large demonstration of civil disobedience. Dr. King had a tremendous impact on the segregation issue in not just Birmingham, but the entire country, by leading the Civil Rights Movement, which eventually helped influence anti-segregation legislation such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that affected a massive population of the entire country. Although Dr. King’s journey ended in his assassination, his relentless passion for equal rights was empowering to many and helped to create a more just society.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott was successful because the protesters used nonviolence, the community helped each other, and the car pool was a major step in outcome. First of all, on March 22, 1956, Martin Luther King Jr. gives a speech and he states, “Democracy gives us this right to protest and that is all we are doing. We can say honestly that we have not advocated violence, have not practiced it, and have gone courageously on with a Christian movement”. This statement exemplifies that the protesters have done nothing wrong and they don’t plan on using violence. To continue, in a letter by Virginia Foster Durr written on January 30, 1956, she writes,“I think it is the first time that a whole Negro community has ever stuck together this way and

A debate in civil rights history appeared in the decades following the well-publicized struggles of the early 1960s and continues today. This debate is of whether the movement was finished with its goals when it attained equal treatment under the law, or whether it had changed to a new goal of fighting all forms of discrimination, not just the formal version found in Jim Crow.

Throughout the 1960’s, the widespread movement for African American civil rights had transformed in terms of its goals and strategies. The campaign had intensified in this decade, characterized by greater demands and more aggressive efforts. Although the support of the Civil Rights movement was relatively constant, the goals of the movement became more high-reaching and specific, and its strategies became less compromising. African Americans’ struggle for equality during the 1960’s was a relentless movement that used change for progress. In essence, the transformation of the Civil Rights Movement throughout the 1960’s forwarded the evolution of America into a nation of civil equality and freedom.

Commencing in the late 19th century, state level governments approved segregation acts, identified as the Jim Crow laws, and assigned limitations on voting requirements that caused the African American population economically and diplomatically helpless (Davis, n.d.). The civil rights movement commenced, intensely and assertively, in the early 1940s when the societal composition of black America took an increasingly urban, popular appeal (Korstad & Lichtenstein, 1988). The 1950s and 1960s was well known for racial conflicts and civil rights protests. The civil rights movement in the United States during the late 1950s and 1960s was based on political and social strives to achieve

The Montgomery Bus Boycott embodies Martin Luther King jr’s belief in nonviolence. In “Pilgrimage to Nonviolence”, Martin Luther King jr describes how he was influenced by Gandhi’s teachings, specifically the Gandhian method of nonviolence. He states, “nonviolence became more than a method to which I gave intellectual assent; it became a commitment to a way of life” (MLK 38). His commitment to the use of non violence is seen in his leadership role during the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott began soon after Rosa Parks’s refusal to give up her seat on the bus to a white man.  During this boycott, MLK encouraged African Americans to boycott the buses.

Martin Luther King, Jr. chose to use peaceful protests, one of them being the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955-56. “The boycott proved to be effective, causing the transit system to run a huge deficit.” This boycott was successful and caused the bus transportation system to have a huge downfall. A boycott is an act of voluntary and intentional abstention from using, buying, or dealing with

African Americans in America in history have gone through many hard times trying to just progress out of slavery and obtain freedom and have equal rights. In this paper I will attempt to explain what some of the important events of the time revealed about the role of African Americans in broader American society in, respectively, the 1920s and the late 1960s. I will explain how and why the roles of African Americans in the 1920s differed from their roles in the late 1960s, and explain how events in the 1920s may have contributed to

Therefore, it