How Did The Supreme Court Support The Civil Rights Movement

Fredrick Douglas once said, “If there is no struggle, there is no progress.” During the 1960’s in America, there were major movements the promoted change throughout the country. The Civil Rights movement, which got its start in the 1950’s, strived for racial equality for African Americans. Meanwhile, the Women’s Rights Movement, focused on battling for better pay and equal opportunities for women. While the Civil Rights Movement and the Women’s Liberation Movement differed in their initial purposes, both groups worked to promote equality in the United States and made a profound impression for the decades to come.

Women made substantial progress during this era, but African Americans were severely limited in their fight for civil rights. The black population saw little to no advancement in their fight for civil rights, as progressives were known to share the prejudices of the time and considered other reform movements more important and beneficial to society. A leader in the African American community, W.E.B. Dubois pointed out in The Crisis that progressive reforms had failed short in its ideals for civil rights equality, as blacks were still oppressed and segregated. (DOC I) Black men were being drafted into war and serving gladly for their country, yet only saw further segregation under the Wilson presidency. However, the women’s rights movement was a powerful and the driving force of the progressive era. The phrase “New Women” was created to describe the young, college educated women who were pursuing careers and looking for equality. It was primarily middle class women who drove the reforms of this time, and it was through groups such as The National American Women Suffrage Association and the National Women’s Party that they fought for equal rights, like the right to vote.

The Brown case decision could not have happened prior to 1954 if these cases had not set a precedent for violations of the Fourteenth Amendment under the “equal protection” clause. In the case Plessy v. Fergguson (163 U.S. 537(1896)), this case was responsible for the “separate but equal” doctrine, where segregation began. In the case, Sweatt v. Painter (339 U.S. 629), African American law students fought for an equal opportunity education.

Community events in our country leading up to the Brown v. The Board of Education case were segregated. The Plessy v. Ferguson decision of 1896 made segregation stronger with the “separate but equal” doctrine. Blacks and whites are separated in all areas of society, including education(“Supreme Court Decisions”). Segregation in schools existed throughout the nation. While segregated schools were legal, they were never equal(Walker). There was a lack of educational and equal rights in African-American communist(Walker). By the 1950’s, the African-American communities were fed-up with not having the same educational rights and opportunities as white americans. An African-American team, lead by Thurgood Marshall, won several cases involving

During the 1900’s, it was hard for a black to get a good paying job, male or female. The NAACP would hold and support multiple court cases over the years in the pursuit of getting better jobs for the black populace of america. One of these court cases was 1970’s Griggs v. Duke Power co. (link to the NAACP LDF article) Six years after congress passed Title VII of the civil rights act, making it illegal for companies and business to segregate and discriminate based on race, After Title Seven of the civil rights act was written, Duke power had to change the way they hired and worked their employees. Instead of purposely putting blacks that they hired into the labor department, they made requirements for Hiring, promotions and transfers. In order to be hired by Duke Power co., one had to have a High-School graduate diploma, scores on an IQ test equal to that of a normal High-School graduate. These changes were discrete discrimination against blacks, considering the quality of schools for blacks and how difficult it was for a black to get an education. This discrimination was noticed by NAACP president and director/counselor of the legal defence and educational fund Jack Greenberg, who argued in favor of the African American employees at Duke power co. In a surprising decision, the court ruled against Duke Power co. They stated that Title VII protects from both open discrimination AND acts that are fair in writing but discriminatory in practice. Title seven was meant to force companies to measure the person's ability to do the job and not the person on paper. Among many court cases that the NAACP participated in, this case was the breaking point for blacks in the

Although American schools were technically desegregated by the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision handed down in Brown v. Board of Education, in practice they remained largely segregated due to trends in housing and neighborhood segregation. Consequently, busing came to be a main remedy by which the courts sought to end racial segregation in the U.S. schools. The court’s 1970 ruling in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education furthered desegregation efforts by upholding busing as a constitutional means to achieve integration within a school district. Due to patterns of residential segregation, busing became a principal tool for promoting school desegregation, by which minority students were transported to largely white schools and white students were brought to largely minority schools. It was intended to safeguard the Civil Rights of students and to provide equal opportunity in public education. Also, busing was an

Civil Rights Movements recollections are responsible for shaping how people behave in society as well as the numerous protests on human rights that are seen in present day. What was evidenced back in the 1950s and 60s was focused on breaking racial barriers which were centered around degrading, confining and marginalizing the minority population of the United States. The case is relatively different in present day, what is conceptualized is a case of people supporting the movement driven by different purposes. With the history of what transpired throughout time is what shapes our daily politics. Social movements of the 19th and 20th Century are responsible for shaping progressive thought. The movements were driven by the need for racial disenfranchisement with legal requirements of segregation were constitutionally inconsistent with a focus on its eradication. What was conceptualized back in the early 20th Century is a case scenario where the women suffrage, environmental protection to dismantlement of Jim Crow laws. These were considered as relatively utopian ideas but that is not the case in present day where they are considered as being common sense. Radical issues for yester years have been considered into mainstream policy formulation of present day. During the 20th Century, the whole process reads as some of the most progress accomplishments until present day. The whole process of social justice was conceptualized

The civil rights movement occurred in America from the 1940s to 1960s. During this time protestors stuck up for and behind African American people being granted basic civil liberties and combat racial injustice. Although, there were many supporters of the civil rights movement there were many opposed to African Americans being granted equality. Those opposed stood firmly behind the Jim Crow laws. These laws kept everyone “equal but separate” as in the Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896. This case basically stated, “as long as racially separate facilities were equal they did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantees of equal protection of the law” ("Separate but Equal: The Plessy v. Ferguson Case"). Those who opposed the civil rights movement went to great lengths to ensure the failure of the movement. According to John Franklin, white supremacist groups, “used intimidation, force, ostracism in business and society, bribery at the polls, arson and even murder to accomplish their deeds” (qtd. in Morris). The nation was segregated from all walks of life;

to privacy based on the Fourteenth Amendment The case was originally filed by Norma McCorvey (“Jane Roe”) in 1971, stating that the abortion law in Texas violated her constitutional rights and the rights of other women. She was suing Henry Wade, the district attorney of Dallas County. He had enforced a Texas law prohibiting abortion, except to save a woman’s life.

During the 20th century, male and females were not being treated equally a lot of women started getting mad because they weren’t getting jobs or the right to vote as men, so it led to the Civil Rights Movement, the Equal Rights Amendment was involved, because women weren’t treated equally or given the same rights as males. The Civil RIghts Movement was when there was a lot of racism and black and white people weren’t given the same rights, it was unfair to the black because they couldn’t do so many things like vote and also there was sex discrimination. In 1923, Alice Paul, leader and founder of the National Woman’s Party, considered that ERA should be the next step in the 19th Amendment in granting equal justice under the law to both sexes, male and female, in the U.S. Alice Paul said “ We women of America tell you that America is not a democracy. Twenty million women are denied the right to vote.” A text from the amendment said “Equal of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.”

This motion got the ball rolling; and marked the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement which lasted from 1954-1965. As more people called for equality, oppositions to this movement became Specifically, the South remained extremely racist and upheld their Jim Crow laws. Outraged African Americans, and ally white Americans were fed up with the lack of equality and the white resistance. Grassroot social movements that included sit-ins, marches, speeches and sprung up all around the country and brought into light the horrible injustices of racial inequality. Alongside with organizations like the National Advancement for American Colored People, or the NAACP, great things were accomplished during this period. With the victories of court cases like Brown v Board of Education, caused the standing ideology of ‘separate but equal’ to be repealed by the United State Supreme Court and lead to the desegregating of the nation. The end of the Civil Rights Movement was marked by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which made it illegal to discriminate against people based on their color, race, religion, nationality, or sex. Unfortunately, even with the amazing work done during the second reconstruction era, and much like the original Reconstruction Era, we are left with an imperfect system. There are still holes in the legislation created and there are promises that have yet to be met, and people of color are still disproportionately disadvantaged

Reed- The landmark case of 197 in which the Supreme Court for the first time upheld a claim of gender discrimination.

The segregation laws that came to be with Plessy v. Ferguson coincided with the rise of a generation of blacks detached from slavery. Segregation of everything from public parks to transportation, to libraries and schools was a system that often lent itself to inequity in the quality of these goods and underlined social inequality. Although segregation was the rule in public, black women frequently served as domestic workers within white homes, looking after the house and white children. This demonstrates how separation of the races was a structure meant to serve only white citizens.

The need for the new law to be established began with the conflicting outcomes coming from the various levels of the court system. The courts disagreed on what constituted sex discrimination. Six different United States Courts of Appeals had ruled in favor of pregnant women saying that any employment act that would adversely affect a pregnant woman was sex discrimination as outlined by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. Supporting this position was the view of the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission who also agreed that discrimination based on a pregnancy would be considered sex discrimination. However, the United States Supreme Court would change all of that with its ruling in two separate court

The women’s movement began in the nineteenth century when groups of women began to speak out against the feeling of separation, inequality, and limits that seemed to be placed on women because of their sex (Debois 18). By combining two aspects of the past, ante-bellum reform politics and the anti-slavery movement, women were able to gain knowledge of leadership on how to deal with the Women’s Right Movement and with this knowledge led the way to transform women’s social standing (Dubois 23). Similarly, the movement that made the largest impact on American societies of the 1960’s and 1970’s was the Civil Right Movement, which in turn affected the women’s movement (Freeman 513). According to