Case Study: Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Due to his involvement in civil rights terrorists would bomb his home and threaten him by phone and through letters. Despite this King stood by nonviolent ways and studied Gandhi's techniques during a trip to India. With the help of other black minister King organized the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and served as president for the rest of his life. It helped promote nonviolence and black equality. The SCLC worked for voter registration, political education, leadership training, education in nonviolent methods, and economic development

Under the leadership of Martin Luther King, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), bought the Black Civil Rights Movement and his desegregation concepts to Birmingham in 1963 for several reasons. The most pivotal of these reasons being his African American racial status and his Christian faith which drove him to fight for the rights his people deserved.

In the art and literature memorializing the Civil Rights movement, no one individual is more prominently represented than Martin Luther King Jr. . He is remembered in books, statues, and even streets bearing his name in almost every city. One historian said, “We trapped King in romantic images… frozen his legacy in worship.” King has become the martyr of the Civil Rights Movement and his legacy has thus overshadowed the legacy of the other activists and groups who helped move the Civil Rights movement forward, including the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, an organization created by southern black youth. Though King’s actions were powerful tools in the push for racial equality, his efforts were only a part of the overall impetus driving the United States towards equality. The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (“SNCC”) led activism in a community based, long-term protest fashion. At the same time the Southern Christian Leadership Council (“SCLC”), the group led by Dr. King, used a media-powered and more presentation-based protest method to rally Americans at the national level. Towards the end of the Civil Rights Movement SNCC became more radical in its approach, eventually leading to its own demise, while the SCLC stayed religiously peaceful. The different ideas and sometimes-contradicting actions of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference eventually helped lead to the racial equality as we know it

Meanwhile, in 1963 King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), continued to fight for civil rights but this time they marched to Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham was the worst city for the blacks in the south. King went to the city’s leaders and demanded that they change the laws about public places being segregated, but the leaders of Birmingham refused to change. Many blacks were afraid to protest because they were scared that they would end up in jail. King responded with, “If the road to freedom leader through the jailhouse … then, turnkey, swing wide the gates!” (Hakim 18). On April 12, 1963 King led a march down the streets of Birmingham. They headed towards City Hall, but never made it because the police stopped the

Its charismatic, Nobel-prize winning first president was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who along with Malcolm X, is often seen as the non-violent voice of the Civil Rights movement. The SCLC organized several key marches and boycotts such as the relatively unsuccessful Albany Movement, which provided lessons learned which were applied successfully during the Birmingham Campaign. The SCLC also was the primary organization responsible for the March on

Political change can take a long time. Sometimes it is so slow in coming that those who stand to gain from such change decide to help expedite the process of political decision-making. African Americans in the US, especially in the south were still at the receiving end of racial injustice.

In looking at how the actions of two of the Blount curriculum’s selected writers influenced historical change, progress, and thought I chose to focus on their respective views of race and race relations, in particular the Civil Rights Movement. I chose to write on the two diametrically opposed civil rights

“The S.C.L.C is an African-American civil rights organization, joined the SNCC in a desegregated coalition called “the Albany Movement” in 1961-1962.”- Southern Christian Leadership Conference. (2017, March 06). Retrieved March 07, 2017. “This Movement was formed in Albany, Georgia on November 17, 1961 by many local activists, the S.N.C.C, and the N.A.A.C.P, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (an organization that protest black inequality and racial injustice, led by William G. Anderson, a local black Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine and founded by black and white activists).”- Albany Movement. (2017, February 16). Retrieved March 07, 2017. “In 1962 the S.N.C.C, N.A.A.C.P and the Congress of Racial Equality (C.O.R.E) helped organize the Freedom Summer campaign which had a purpose of ending the political disenfranchisement of African Americans in the Deep South.”- Congress of Racial Equality. (2017, March 06). Retrieved March 07,

Dr. King finally impacted history with by helping establish and then lead the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference(SCLC) was designed as a way to offer leadership in the civil rights movement, which MLK was elected President in 1957 and continued as the head until 1968, the

“King addressed the huge late afternoon crowd of more than 250,000” (Garrow). The Civil Rights Movement was at its peak through the 1950’s and 1960’s. People like Dr. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, the Black Panthers, and Americans against segregation helped take the first step to stopping racism from spreading to further generations. “The Black Panthers Platform,” by: Alexander Bloom and Wini Brienes is a book that helps spread light onto what the black communities wanted and to show how daily life was for a African American under a racist government. The theme of this book is to fight for what brings justice and equality to the people so that they could have the opportunity to be treated fairly. The civil

Led by Martin Luther King, Jr, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference was a group of sixty black ministers and pastors that met in Atlanta to make plans to end discrimination in a non-violent, civil disobedient way. Their goal was to “redeem the soul of America” through peaceful resistance according to Dr. King, "because we have no moral choice, before God, but

The Civil Rights Movement, which turned ten in 1964, grew worse as the 1960s neared the halfway mark. It was at this time where rivalries were mad, only to be pushed aside so groups can work together to get to one goal: gaining civil rights African-Americans have been fighting for since the Black Codes were put into place in the 1870s. With this, Student Nonviolent Coordinate Committee (SNCC), the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and many other organizations created under one of these group’s members worked together to pave way for African-American civil rights during these times. While they did have the nonviolent strategy through and through, the only

In spring of 1963 the SCLC, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, led by Martin Luther King Jr, organized a movement in Birmingham, Alabama: Project C which is more commonly known as The Birmingham Campaign. The movement was to help push the integration efforts of African Americans. The Birmingham campaign was led to be series of nonviolent events such as lunch counter sit-ins, marches on City Hall and boycotts on downtown merchants. While the members of the SCLC kept their nonviolent demeanor many police officers used the force of high-pressure fire hoses and police dogs. These violent acts yielded some of the most iconic yet troubling images of the Civil Right Movement. Despite the horrible acts of this protest it is known as one of the

King to recommend establishing a permanent organization that would keep the momentum of the boycott going. Baker was hired, reluctantly, by King to work at the newly formed Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in Atlanta; however, Baker soon realized that it was an environment similar to the NAACP where men dominated the decision making. Although most of these leaders were Baptist ministers who were never challenged, Baker was not one to keep silent and seldom hesitated to speak her mind. Baker expressed her leadership philosophy in simple and straight-forward terms: “strong people don’t need strong leaders” (Carey, 2014). Baker was a proponent of the "under class," and believed ordinary people could become political

Civil rights groups such as the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR) heavily influenced the abolishment of the Jim Crow laws. The ACMHR was a civil rights group that focused on demolishing segregation in Birmingham, Alabama. In the Birmingham Manifesto, the President of the ACMHR quotes the Declaration of Independence to relate civil rights in order to prove that they are people too and should be treated equally. Besides the ACMHR, another group that affected the civil rights movement is the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). This group is led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr who was a very influential leader regarding civil rights. His wife, Coretta Scott King, wrote about his intentions in a 1969 LIFE Magazine