page_title: Civil Rights Movement
section_title: Integrating Mississippi universities (1956–1965)
hierarchical_section_title: Civil Rights Movement / Important events / Integrating Mississippi universities (1956–1965)
caption_attribution_description: English: Photograph shows James Meredith walking to class accompanied by U.S. marshals.; James Meredith walking to class at University of Mississippi, accompanied by U.S. marshals. According to http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3c35515, the men flanking Meredith are U.S. Marshal James McShane (left) and John Doar of the Justice Department (right)
context_page_description: The Civil Rights Movement was a social movement in the United States that tried to gain equal rights for African Americans. The movement is famous for using non-violent protests and civil disobedience. Activists used strategies like boycotts, sit-ins, and protest marches. Sometimes police or racist white people would attack them, but the activists never fought back.
  However, the Civil Rights Movement was made up of many different people and groups. Not everyone believed the same things. For example, the Black Power movement believed black people should demand their civil rights and force white leaders to give them those rights.
  The Civil Rights Movement was also made of people of different races and religions. The Movement's leaders and most of its activists were African-American. However, the Movement got political and financial support from labor unions, religious groups, and some white politicians, like Lyndon B. Johnson. Activists of all races came to join African-Americans in marches, sit-ins, and protests.
  The Civil Rights Movement was very successful. It helped to get five federal laws and two amendments to the Constitution passed.
context_section_description: Starting in 1956, a black man named Clyde Kennard wanted to go to Mississippi Southern College. Kennard had served in the Korean War, and he wanted to use the GI Bill to go to college. The college's president, William McCain, asked state politicians and a local racist group who supported segregation to make sure Kennard never got into the college.
  Kenner was arrested twice for crimes he never committed. Eventually he was convicted and sentenced to seven years in prison. After Kennard had spent three years in prison doing forced labor, Governor Ross Barnett pardoned him. Journalists had looked into Kennard's case, and wrote that the state did not give Kennard the treatment he needed for his colon cancer. Kennard died that same year. Later, in 2006, a court ruled that Kennard was innocent of the crimes he had been sent to jail for.
  In September 1962, James Meredith won a lawsuit that gave him the right to go to the University of Mississippi. He tried three times to get into the university to sign up for classes. Governor Ross Barnett blocked Meredith each time. He told Meredith: "[N]o school will be integrated in Mississippi while I am your Governor."
  Attorney General Robert Kennedy sent United States Marshals to protect Meredith. On September 30, 1962, Meredith was able to enter the college with the Marshals protecting him. However, that evening, students and other racist whites started a riot. They threw rocks and fired guns at the Marshals. Two people were killed; 28 marshals were shot; and another 160 people were hurt. President John F. Kennedy sent the United States Army to the school to stop the riot. Meredith was able to begin classes at the college the day after the Army arrived. Meredith survived harassment and isolation at the college and graduated on August 18, 1963, with a a degree in political science.
  Meredith and other activists kept working on de-segregating public universities. In 1965, the first two African American students were able to go to the University of Southern Mississippi.
caption: James Meredith walking to class, protected by U.S. Marshals.
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