Sit In Movement Essay

The beginning of the sit-ins were hard, but they overcame many hardships to achieve their goal. Most of their sit-ins they suffered from being attacked by white customers. They got beat up and never said a word and just dealt with it. After having their sit-ins they motivated others to do the same

The Greensboro sit-ins occurred in 1960 in Greensboro, North Carolina. The Greensboro Sit-Ins was a movement with the purpose to banish the inequalities that black people faced. A black person was treated very differently, unequally, and unfairly compared to how a white person was treated. The Greensboro Sit-Ins was noted to be one of the most important events in the Civil Rights movement. Racism and unequal treatment had been a common occurrence around North Carolina since colonial times. Even though slavery was abolished, black people felt they deserved just as much equal freedom as a white person.

The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) used a form of protest by union workers called sit-ins. After it was successful with CORE 4 African Americans Joseph McNeil, Ezell Blair, Jr, David Richmond and Franklin McCain suggested a sit in Woolworth department store. They were afraid, but they did it. They entered and bought supplied, then sat at the lunch counter and ordered coffee. The people there wouldn’t service them, but serviced them on the other counter. The four stayed until they closed and said they would do that every day until they were serviced. They left the Woolworth exited and persuaded by what they did. This convinced more and more African American to sit-in and wait until they were serviced. The NAACP and SClC were nervous about the sit-in campaign.

The Greensboro Sit-Ins were another way that people progressed the Civil Rights movement. These took place in North Carolina, in the year 1960. They had many people participate in this nonviolent protest. The interview with Franklin McCain states, “We actually got to the point where we had people going down in shifts” (My Soul is Rested: Movement Days in the Deep South Remembered). The movement was

The Greensbro sit-ins first started on February 1st, 1960. Four black college freshman in Greensbro, North Carolina, visited a white-only Woolsworth's lunch counter where they demanded service. The black waitress refused to serve them, remarking that "fellows like you make our race look bad,". Regardless of this, the four men stayed seated. They returned the next day with nineteen classmates, and the day after that with eighty-five. By the end of the week there were over one-thousand black students attending the sit-in. The Sit-in movement began to spread throughout the South, though this time not just at lunch counters. The transportation industry, restaurants, and even voter registration were all recipients of this movement. The goal was

The sit-in movement acted as a major protest and turning point for the Civil Rights Movement. The sit-ins highlighted the main moral issue that was being fought: racial discrimination and segregation. Blacks utilized the strategies of nonviolence and student involvement in order to combat the moral issue of racial segregation (“Ain’t Scared of Your Jails”).

This was one of the first sit in. The next day a larger group of students had returned to also join and protest. In a few days time the word had be sent by students of that college to several other schools. The overall plan of the sit ins were to gather a group of students or several colored men to ask and wait to be served at the lunch counters. If they were denied they still continued to wait all the men were wearing suit and ties trying to be peaceful and nonviolent, most of the time several of them had brought their own textbooks and studied while they had waited. They had planned to showed their own friendly sides of themselves smiling, they didn’t fight back even when they were attacked. By the first week of the sit ins were pretty quiet the colored men were still not yet served. Then by February, 27 the sit in students in Nashville were attacked by a group of white teenagers. The teenagers weren’t charged with anything but for the protesters they had been punished for “Disorderly conduct “and were charged a $150 court cost. Then pretty soon there was another group that took their place. By August 1961 there was approximately 70,000 participants, with over 3,000 arrests.

Blacks couldn’t use the same public places as whites, live in many of the same towns or go to the same schools.Racially mixed marriage was illegal, and most blacks couldn’t vote because they were unable to pass voter literacy tests. Jim Crow laws weren’t taken in northern states; however, blacks still experienced discrimination at their jobs or when they tried to buy a house or get an education.On February 1, 1960, African American students were denied counter service at a lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina because the policy was that only white customers could sit at the counter; African Americans had to stand. The next day they returned with more students and the peaceful protest called a "sit-in" was begun. Across the South, peaceful sit-ins by students took place in more than 100 cities in 1960. Although the protesters were beaten, and sometimes sent to jail, they continued to peacefully sit-in until they achieved their goals -- desegregation of places of public

Sit-ins were very important in the 1960’s they were against segregated businesses and lunch counters.

The success of the boycott of the Montgomery buses and the court case Brown vs. Board of education led African Americans into the 1960’s with the belief that non-violent protest and legal action could make a difference. In the beginning of the 1960’s, students held sit in’s at segregated lunch counters throughout the south. February 1st 1960, was the day of the first sit in at a segregated lunch counter. Four seventeen year old freshman at North Carolina A&T University in Greensboro- Franklin Mccain, Ezell Blair Jr., Joseph Mcneil, and David Richmond- peacefully and politely took seats at the lunch counter and asked for coffee. “By the end of the month similar protest were beginning in thirty one cities and seven southern states” (“The

Another significant transformation took place in the Civil Rights Movement in terms of its strategies. In analyzing this facet of the movement, we notice a great shift from nonviolent demonstration to forward, forceful action. Specifically, at the start of the Civil Rights Movement, lunch counter sit-ins were evident throughout the nation, as were Freedom Riders. Starting in Greensboro, North Carolina at a luncheonette called Woolworths, young black citizens would seat

SNCC was a group of young protesters that wanted change immediately. John lewis along with Diane Nash and other leaders created a group for non-violent protesting. They made the sit-ins at lunch counters so that African Americans could have equal rights in the diners. After a while many people started joining in the the sit- ins across the states. They may say that the sit-ins only played a small role in the Civil Rights Movement

"The Act of Disruption" from Engler & Engler This is an uprising: How nonviolent revolt is shaping the 21st century). The “sit ins” were a nonviolent effort to desegregate lunch counters. Their tactic was to sit at the counters until they got served in hopes of bringing social awareness against racial segregation. These types of boycotts and others like it had a major economic impact on local business (Chapter 6, P.146,160. "The Act of Disruption" from Engler & Engler This is an uprising: How nonviolent revolt is shaping the 21st century). The success from this sit-in and many others like them can be contributed to the movements well organized planning in detailing and calculating there every move, down to there last step (No easy walk 1961–1963: Eyes on the prize—America’s Civil Rights Movement 1954–1985 [Video file]. (1994). Retrieved September 5, 2017, from

The Greensboro Lunch Counter Sit-In was a civil rights event that occurred in 1960. Young African-American college students staged a sit-in at a segregated Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina. They refused to leave the diner after being denied service. The sit-in movement soon spread to college towns throughout the South. Many protesters were arrested for trespassing, disorderly conduct, or disturbing the peace. The actions of a few made an immediate and long lasting impact which forced Woolworth’s and other businesses to change policies of segregation.

The popularity of sit-ins can be reflected in the involvement of the N.A.A.C.P. (The National Association of the Advancement of Colored People). An article published by the New York Times talks about planned demonstrations that will occur in New York City which will be headed by the N.A.A.C.P (Robinson 54). This example shows how large the movement had become by summer 1961 because a nationally recognized organization was already actively involved in demonstrating. Another article, printed in late 1961, reports that the national director of the Congress of Racial Equality would begin planned sit-ins nation wide, with a focus in the South and the Midwest (“Negroes to Broaden” 18). This again proves how effective sit-ins were because a nationally recognized organization was taking the movement and organizing a nation wide effort to end discrimination.