Analysis of Civil Rights Movement - Literature review Example

[Supervisor Civil Rights Movement Thesis ment Civil rights movement was a difficult struggle. Main BodyOn March 25, 1965, Martin Luther King, Jr., and upwards of twenty-five thousand marchers converged on the state capitol building in Montgomery, Alabama, the cradle of the old Confederacy. Their demonstration brought to a climax one of King's and the civil rights movement's greatest moments, the march from Selma to Montgomery, itself the culmination of weeks of bloody protests in and around Selma. Addressing the crowd from the capitol steps, King reviewed the progress that the movement had made over the past decade. It was fitting that King found himself in Montgomery. Just ten years earlier he and the modern civil rights movement had burst into public view with the Montgomery bus boycott, which began when Rosa Parks, who was one of the honorees at this demonstration, refused to give up her seat to a white man. "... began-that we were being trained for a war unlike any this nation had seen up to that time, a nonviolent struggle that would force this country to face its conscience. Lawson was arming us, preparing us, planting in us a sense ..." 1 Certainly it is comforting to believe that history progresses in such a manner. Yet, even if one could develop a cogent argument that the civil rights movement was inevitable, how does one account for its timing and shape Why did it take place when it did Why didn't these ideas prove compelling at an earlier or later time Why did "man's unending search for freedom" reach such heights in the early and mid-1960s Why did certain actors emerge as leaders and not others Why were certain goals or demands given priority And to a lesser extent, why did the movement achieve some objectives but not others "... as if it might actually apply to American society at large, to the nation's attitude about and response to the struggle for racial equality. " 2 The modern civil rights movement had both external and internal origins and causes. It came into being when and in the way it did because of both structural and human factors. Forces that were only indirectly related to the movement helped give rise to it and sustained it, as did complex developments within the African American community. Demographic shifts, particularly the great migration, the emergence of the United States as a world power, and the overall process of modernization played key roles. "... It's human nature, I guess. We did our best to control it, but there was a bit of a power struggle from the beginning between Nashville and Atlanta. After Dr. King had come up that spring and given his blessing to ..." 3 So too did several internal factors, most importantly the accumulation of resources by the African American community. These developments were intertwined and reinforced one another. In addition, the success of the civil rights movement depended on human agency. "... Jim Peck, Al Bigelow and Jim Zwerg stand and suffer with us. 'v/N'e had become brothers and sisters to the struggle. We bled together. We suffered together. How could you look at something like race after experiences like that ..." 4 (194) With the great migration, African Americans also advanced economically. Even though they continued to work for less pay and under worse conditions than whites, blacks in the industrial North began to enjoy a standard of living heretofore unknown to them or their counterparts in the rural South. Between 1940 and 1970, the mean income for black men, adjusted for inflation, more than tripled. During the same years, home ownership by blacks virtually doubled and the number of school years completed by African Americans rose rapidly. Increased income, economic security, and education all benefitted the cause of civil rights. Such advances afforded African Americans the opportunity to contribute financially to civil rights organizations, such as the NAACP, and to build black-owned institutions, such as the black press, which provided support for the cause of racial reform. Blacks also increased their power as consumers, a power that they used to influence white businesses. "... I think this is something that separated me from man), of rriy colleagues in SNCC-the fact that they saw this struggle as an either/or situation, that they believed it was impossible to feel hope and love at the same time a: ..." 5 The great migration made race a national problem, or more precisely made northerners more aware of race as their problem. Initially, northerners focused on the southern dimension of racism, but by the latter half of the 1960s they could no longer ignore the existence of racism and racial inequality in their own communities. Indeed, some have suggested that by seeing race as a southern problem, northerners and the nation at large ensured that the problem would fester and, like a raisin in the sun, ultimately explode. The debate over our involvement m the march, the struggle over my speech-the entire Washington experience-had set us further apart from the movement's mainstream than we had ever been. In ..." 6 Without knowledge about the long-term fight for legal equality and the specific context in which affirmative action programs developed, is it possible to determine whether or not affirmative action represents a betrayal of the civil rights movement and the aims of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. And is it possible to judge the purpose and merits of affirmative action without an understanding of the history of the struggle for legal equality that preceded its development Based on the assumption that it is not possible to do so, this chapter will survey the fight for legal equality from colonial times to the present, with an emphasis on the modern era. While the legal status of the first Africans who arrived in British America remained imprecise, by the mid-seventeenth century a variety of laws had made clear that black and white were not equal. Many Africans brought to North America before the 1670s labored in the fields side by side with white indentured servants, who outnumbered them. While some of these Africans received their freedom after a set number of years of service, they came to America as captives rather than of their own free will. In addition, early censuses listed men and women of African ancestry as Negroes, often without personal names, while those of English ancestry were listed by name without reference to their race. Moreover, by the 1640s some blacks and their offspring were in servitude for life. "... shaping a group of young men and women who would lead the way for years to come in the nonviolent struggle for civil rights in America. Those Tuesday nights in the basement of Clark became the focus of my life, more ..." 7 As the number of blacks in America increased, the colonies clarified their status as slaves. In 1661 Maryland defined slavery as lifelong and inheritable. A year later, Virginia declared that "all children born in this country shall be held bond or free according to the condition of their mother." In 1670 Virginia established that "all servants not being Christian" were slaves for life. A subsequent act made clear that conversion to Christianity did not free one's offspring from slavery. Even before these statutes were enacted, the rights of blacks, free and slave, to bear arms and travel had been limited. In addition, nearly every colony restricted intermarriage between blacks and whites. "... It was the rallying cry of native Africans resisting Portuguese colonialists in Mozambique and Angola: Aluta continua-"the struggle continues." Frederick Douglass said essentially the same thing back in 1877: "There must be a struggle." 8 As the institution of slavery expanded in the South and disappeared in the North, the debate over slavery grew in intensity. The role of the national government in either encouraging or prohibiting the expansion of slavery into its territories only added to friction between those who favored and opposed slavery. Congress tried to avoid the question by enacting compromises and accepting such ideas as popular sovereignty. Its roots went back to the 1830s, to slavery, when the blacks sat in the upper balcony while the whites sat below just the way the movie theater in ..." 9 In the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, the former Confederate states passed a number of "black codes," which collectively signified that African Americans, though freed, were not legally equal. Blacks were denied the right to vote, limited in the kind of work they could do and how much property they could own, blocked from testifying against whites in court, and constrained in their movement and ability to assemble. Some northern states followed suit, tightening old restrictions on free blacks. Yet, for a variety of reasons, the black codes and the restrictive legislation in the North did not last. Building on the momentum that had led to the emancipation of the slaves, and gaining support from moderate Republicans who were appalled by the South's arrogance in the face of defeat, Radical Republicans in 1866 and 1867 pushed through Congress reforms that dramatically altered the legal status of African Americans. Grappling with civil rights for the first time, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which defined citizenship to include blacks and guaranteed basic civil rights. More far-reaching were three constitutional amendments intended to secure liberty. The Thirteenth Amendment, adopted in 1865, abolished slavery in all states and territories, and, in a potentially powerful clause, empowered Congress to pass all necessary measures to do so. "... they are Negroes. Therefore, this Monday I will send to the Congress a request for legislation to carry out the amendment of the Constitution." 10 Conclusion Civil rights movement was a difficult struggle as the fight for legal equality was staged by the black masses in concert the black elite, that the struggle against desegregation was not a middle-class fight alone. Bibliography John Lewis, Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement. (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1998). Read More