Civil Rights Movement

The **Civil Rights Movement** was a social movement in the United States that tried to gain equal rights for African Americans that European Americans had. The movement is famous for using non-violent protests and civil disobedience (peacefully refusing to follow unfair laws). 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. These officially protected African Americans' rights. It also helped change many white people's attitudes about the way black people were treated and the rights they deserved.

## Before the Civil Rights Movement
 celebrates after passing the 13th Amendment.]]
Before the American Civil War, there were almost four million black slaves in the United States. Only white men with property could vote, and only white people could be United States citizens.

After the Civil War, the United States government passed three Constitutional amendments:
* The 13th Amendment (1865) ended slavery
* The 14th Amendment (1868) gave African Americans citizenship
* The 15th Amendment (1870) gave African American males the right to vote (no women in the U.S. could vote at the time).

### In the South
After the Civil War, the U.S. government tried to enforce the rights of ex-slaves in the South through a process called Reconstruction. However, in 1877, Reconstruction ended. By the 1890s, the Southern states' legislatures were all-white again. Southern Democrats, who did not support civil rights for blacks, completely ruled the South. This gave them a lot of power in the United States Congress. For example, Southern Democrats were able to make sure that laws against lynching did not pass.

Starting in 1890, Southern Democrats began to pass state laws that took away the rights African Americans had gained. These racist laws became known as Jim Crow laws. For example, they included:
 of Will James in Cairo, Illinois (1909)]]
* Laws that made it impossible for blacks to vote (this is called disenfranchisement). Since they could not vote, blacks also could not be on juries.
* Laws that required racial segregation - separation of blacks and whites. For example, blacks could not: Things were separate, but not equal.

Violence against black people increased. Individuals, groups, police, and huge crowds of people could hurt or even kill African Americans, without the government trying to stop them or punishing them. Lynchings became more common.

Segregation in housing was a problem across the United States. Many African Americans could not get mortgages to buy houses.  would not sell black people houses in the suburbs, where white people lived. They also would not rent apartments in white areas. Until the 1950s, the federal government did nothing about this.

Black people fought in both World War I and World War II. However, the military was segregated, and they were not given the same opportunities as white soldiers. After activism from black veterans, President Harry Truman de-segregated the military in 1948.

### Early activism
African Americans tried to fight back against discrimination in many ways. They formed new groups and tried to form labor unions. They tried to use the courts to get justice. For example, in 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was created. It fought to end race discrimination through lawsuits, education, and .

However, eventually, many African Americans became frustrated and began to dislike the idea of using slow, legal strategies to achieve desegregation. Instead, African American activists decided to use a combination of protests, nonviolence, and civil disobedience. This is how the Civil Rights Movement of 1954-1968 began.

### Photo gallery

File:And Not This Man? (August 1865), by Thomas Nast.jpg|1865 Cartoon about how blacks served in the Civil War and thus should be able to vote
File:Racistcampaignposter1.jpg|A white supremacist campaign poster (1866). It tells people to vote for the person who will not support civil rights
File:ColfaxMassacre.jpg|White militia members killed 62153 blacks in the Colfax massacre in Louisiana (1873)
File:JimCrowCar2.jpg|Cartoon from 1904 showing how blacks were not treated equally under "Jim Crow"
File:Ku Klux Klan members and a burning cross, Denver, Colorado, 1921.jpg|The KKK used terrorism to keep blacks from using their rights or fighting for more
File:Wilson-quote-in-birth-of-a-nation.jpg|A quote from Woodrow Wilson used in the racist movie *Birth of a Nation* (1915). The quote says the KKK will save the South from blacks
File:Lynching of six African-Americans in Lee County, GA, 20 Jan 1916.tiff|Lynching of six African Americans in Georgia (1916)
File:Duluth-lynching-postcard.jpg|Lynchings also happened in the north. This postcard shows a lynching in Minnesota (1920)
File:Rex theatre.jpg|A separate movie theater for black people in Mississippi (1937)
File:ColoredDrinking.jpg|A black man drinks from a "colored" drinking fountain in Oklahoma City (1939)
File:African-americans-wwii-002.jpg|A black Military Policeman (MP) in front of a "colored" MP entrance in Georgia (1942)
File:We want white tenants.jpg|Segregation also happened in the North. This sign is from Detroit (1942)

## Important events
### *Brown v. Board of Education* (1954)
Schools in the South, and some other parts of the country, had been segregated since 1896. In that year, the Supreme Court had ruled in *Plessy v. Ferguson* that segregation was legal, as long as things were "separate but equal."

In 1951, thirteen black parents filed a class action lawsuit against the Board of Education in Topeka, Kansas. In the lawsuit, the parents argued that the black and white schools were not "separate but equal." They said the black school was much worse than the white one. The Supreme Court ruled that segregated schools were illegal. All nine Supreme Court judges agreed.

In their decision, the Court said:

*We conclude that, in ... public education, the  of "separate but equal" has no place. Separate educational facilities are  unequal.*  She was arrested.

African-Americans gathered and organized the Montgomery Bus Boycott. They decided they would not ride on the buses again until they were treated the same as European-Americans. Under segregation, blacks could not sit in front of whites - they had to sit in the back of the bus. Also, if a white person told a black person to move so they could sit down, the black person had to.

Most of Montgomery's 50,000 African Americans took part in the boycott. It lasted for 381 days and almost bankrupt the bus system. The boycott ended with a victory.

File:Rosa Parks being fingerprinted by Deputy Sheriff D.H. Lackey after being arrested for refusing to give up her seat for a white passenger on a segregated municipal bus in Montgomery, Alabama.jpg|Rosa Parks being fingerprinted after her arrest
File:Rosa Parks Bus.jpg|The bus Rosa Parks was riding when she refused to give up her seat
File:Rosaparks busdiagram.jpg|Court evidence showing where Parks was sitting on the bus
File:Rosaparks policereport.jpg|Police report on Parks, describing her "crime"

### De-segregating Little Rock Central High School (1957)
In 1957, the NAACP had signed up nine African American students (called the "Little Rock Nine") to go to Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Before this, only whites were allowed at the school. However, the Little Rock School Board had agreed to follow the Supreme Court's decision in *Brown v. Board of Education* and de-segregate its schools.

Then came the black students' first day of school. The Governor of Arkansas called out soldiers from the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the black students from even entering the school. This was against a Supreme Court ruling, so President Dwight D. Eisenhower got involved. He took control of the Arkansas National Guard and ordered them to leave the school. Then he sent soldiers from the United States Army to protect the students. This was an important civil rights victory. It meant the federal government was willing to get involved and force states to end segregation in schools. At the end of the school year, Little Rock Central High School closed so it would not have to allow black students the next year. Other schools across the South did the same thing.

 sit-ins]]
Many of the Nashville students were attacked and abused by groups of white people; arrested; and even beaten by police. However, the students were always nonviolent. Their protests, and the attacks on them, brought more newspaper stories and attention. It also showed how the activists were truly nonviolent. After three months of sit-ins, all of the lunch counters in Nashville's downtown department stores were de-segregated.

Soon, there were sit-ins all over the country. Sit-ins even happened in Nevada, and in northern states like Ohio. Over 70,000 people, black and white, took part in sit-ins. They used sit-ins to protest all kinds of segregated places - not just lunch counters, but also beaches, parks, museums, libraries, swimming pools, and other public places.

The sit-ins even got the support of President Eisenhower. After the Greensboro sit-ins started, he said he was "deeply sympathetic with the efforts of any group to enjoy the rights of equality that they are guaranteed by the Constitution."

In April 1960, students who had led sit-ins were invited to a conference. At the conference, they decided to form the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). SNCC would become an important group in the civil rights movement.

File:Lunch Counter-2.jpg|Example of a 1950s lunch counter inside a drug store
|thumb|Activists at one of the earliest sit-ins, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
File:Former Woolworth store in Greensboro, NC (2008).jpg|The Woolworth's five and dime store where the Greensboro students sat in
File:Sit-in map.svg|Map with numbers showing all the stores in Nashville where students sat in
File:WhiteTradeOnlyLancasterOhio.jpg|A sign on a restaurant window in Lancaster, Ohio

### Freedom Rides (1961)
In 1960, the Supreme Court had ruled in *Boynton v. Virginia* that it was illegal to segregate people on public transportation that was going from one state to another. In 1961, student activists decided to test whether the Southern states would follow this ruling. Groups of black and white activists decided to ride buses through the South, sitting together instead of segregating themselves. They planned to ride buses from Washington, D.C., to New Orleans, Louisiana. They called these rides the "Freedom Rides."

The Freedom Riders were met with danger and violence. For example:
, June 16, 1961]]
* One bus in Alabama was firebombed, and the Freedom Riders had to run for their lives.
* In Birmingham, Alabama, Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor let Ku Klux Klan members attack the Freedom Riders for 15 minutes before the police "protected" them. The Riders were badly beaten, and one needed 50 stitches in his head.
* In Montgomery, Alabama, the Freedom Riders were attacked by a mob (a large, angry group) of white people. This caused a huge riot that lasted two hours. Five Freedom Riders needed to go to the hospital, and 22 others were hurt.

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) brought in more Freedom Riders to keep the movement going. They were also met with violence:

* In Montgomery, another mob attacked a bus. They knocked one activist unconscious and knocked another's teeth out.
* People could sit wherever they chose on buses
* There could be no "white" and "colored" signs in bus stations
* There could be no separate drinking fountains, toilets, or waiting rooms for whites and blacks
* Lunch counters had to serve people of all races

File:Children with Dr. Samuel Green, Ku Klux Klan Grand Dragon, July 24, 1948.jpg|The Ku Klux Klan were allowed to attack Freedom Riders in Montgomery. Here two children stand with a KKK leader
File:MSPPrisoncamp.jpg|Prison camp at the state prison where Freedom Riders were jailed
File:Robert F Kennedy crop.jpg|Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy insisted on a new law about de-segregation
File:1943 Colored Waiting Room Sign.jpg|Under the new law, segregated buses or bus stations, like this one, were illegal
File:John lewis official biopic.jpg|John Lewis, now a U.S. Congressman, was attacked during a Freedom Ride
File:Freedom Rider plaque (4653382530).jpg|Sign in Birmingham honoring the Freedom Riders

### Voter registration (1961-1965)
Between 1961 and 1965, activist groups worked on trying to get black people registered (signed up) to vote. Since the end of Reconstruction, the Southern states had passed laws and used many strategies to keep black people from registering to vote. Often, these laws did not apply to white people.

Meanwhile, black people who tried to register to vote were fired from their jobs, thrown out of their homes, beaten, arrested, threatened, and sometimes murdered. However, even after this law was passed, the Southern states still made it very difficult for black people to vote. Finally, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed. This law included ways to make sure that all United States citizens were getting their right to vote.

### Integrating Mississippi universities (19561965)
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. 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. Meredith survived harassment and  at the college and graduated on August 18, 1963, with a Bachelor's 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.

File:Former Gov. and Mrs. Ross Barnett at Paul Johnson's Inaugural Ball, Jan., '64..png|Governor Ross Barnett refused to let Meredith into the University
File:US Marshals at Ole Miss October 1962 cph.3c35522.jpg|U.S. Army trucks drive across the University of Mississippi campus on October 3, 1962
File:JFK White House portrait looking up lighting corrected.jpg|President Kennedy had to send the U.S. Army to stop the riots at the University
File:Historical Landmark Plague.jpg|Memorial outside the University's School of Journalism, honoring the journalist who was killed during the riots

### Birmingham Campaign (1963)
In 1963, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) started a  in Birmingham, Alabama. Its goals were to de-segregate the stores in downtown Birmingham; make  fair; and create a , including blacks and whites, that would make a plan for de-segregating Birmingham's schools. Martin Luther King described Birmingham as "probably the most [completely] segregated city in the United States."

Birmingham's Commissioner of Public Safety was Eugene "Bull" Connor. (A Commissioner of Public Safety is in charge of the police and fire department, and deals with emergencies that could be dangerous to people in the city.) Connor was very much against integration. He often let the police, Ku Klux Klan, and racist white people attack civil rights activists. He promised that blacks and whites would never be integrated in Birmingham.

The activists used a few different non-violent ways of protesting, including sit-ins, "kneel-ins" at local churches, and marches.

While in jail, King was held in solitary confinement. While there, he wrote his famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail." He was let go after about a week.

#### The Children's Crusade
However, very few activists could afford to risk being arrested. One of SCLC's leaders then came up with the idea of training high school, college, and elementary school students to take part in the protests. He reasoned that students did not have full-time jobs to go to, they did not have families to take care of, and they could "afford" to be in jail more than their parents.

*Newsweek* magazine later named this plan the "Children's Crusade." They were all arrested.

The next day, another 1,000 students started to march. Bull Connor let police dogs loose to attack them and used fire hoses to knock down the students. Reporters were there, and videos and pictures showing the violence were shown on television and printed across the country.

#### Agreement
People throughout the United States were so angry at seeing these videos that President Kennedy worked with the SCLC and the white businesses in Birmingham to work out an agreement. It said:p.&nbsp;301

On September 15, 1963, the Ku Klux Klan bombed a church in Birmingham, where civil rights activists often met before starting their marches. Since it was a Sunday, church services were going on. The bomb killed four young girls and hurt 22 other people.

File:Recreation of Martin Luther King's Cell in Birmingham Jail - National Civil Rights Museum - Downtown Memphis - Tennessee - USA.jpg|Example of what Dr. King's prison cell looked like
File:Bomb wreckage near Gaston Motel (14 May 1963).JPG|On May 11, a hotel where Dr. King had been staying was bombed
File:16th Street Baptist Church.JPG|The church which the Ku Klux Klan bombed in September
File:Congress of Racial Equality and members of the All Souls Church, Unitarian march in memory of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing victims.jpg|Activists march in Washington, D.C., in memory of the four girls killed in the bombing

### "Rising tide of discontent" (1963)
 standing in the doorway of the University of Alabama to keep black students out]]
During the spring and summer of 1963, there were protests in over a hundred United States cities, including Northern cities. There were riots in Chicago after a white police officer shot a 14-year-old black boy who was running away from the scene of a robbery. In Philadelphia and Harlem, black activists and white workers fought when the activists tried to integrate state-run construction projects. On June 6, over a thousand white people attacked a sit-in in North Carolina; black activists fought back, and a white man was killed.

In Cambridge, Maryland, white leaders declared martial law to stop fighting between blacks and whites. Attorney General Robert Kennedy had to get involved to create an agreement to de-segregate the city.

On June 11, 1963, Alabama Governor George Wallace actually stood in the doorway of the University of Alabama to stop its first two black students from getting inside. President Kennedy had to send United States soldiers to make him get out of the doorway, and make sure that the black students could get into the school.

Meanwhile, the Kennedy government had become very worried. Black leaders had told Robert Kennedy that it was getting harder and harder for African Americans to be nonviolent when they were getting attacked, and when it was taking so long for the United States government to help them get their civil rights. On the evening of June 11, President Kennedy gave a speech about civil rights. He talked about "a    of discontent [unhappiness] that threatens the public safety." He asked Congress to pass new civil rights laws. He also asked Americans to support civil rights as "a moral issue ... in our daily lives."

In the early morning of June 12, Medgar Evers, a leader of the Mississippi NAACP, was murdered by a Ku Klux Klan member.p.&nbsp;113 The next week, President Kennedy gave Congress his Civil Rights bill, and asked them to make it into law. The marchers included about 60,000 white people (including church groups and labor union members), and between 75 and 100 members of Congress.p.&nbsp;160 Together, they marched from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial. There, they listened to civil rights leaders speak.

Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke last. His speech, called "I Have a Dream," became one of history's most famous civil rights speeches.

Historians have said that the March on Washington helped get President Kennedy's civil rights bill passed.

File:March-on-washington-jobs-freedom-program.jpg|The official program advertising the March on Washington
File:Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. (Leaders of the march) - NARA - 542056.jpg|The leaders of the March
File:March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Joachim Prinz 1963.jpg|Marchers head toward the Lincoln Memorial
File:Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. (Leaders of the march leading marchers down the street.) - NARA - 542003.tif|Protestors' signs show how many different kinds of people marched
File:Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. (Faces of marchers.) - NARA - 542070.tif|Nearly 250,000 people marched, including 60,000 white people
File:Selma to Montgomery Marches protesters.jpg|A protester holds a sign saying "We march together!"
File:Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. (Aerial view of Washington Monument showing marchers.) - NARA - 541997.tif|View of the crowd from the air
File:Joan Baez Bob Dylan.jpg|Joan Baez and Bob Dylan sang at the March
File:Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. (Former National Baseball League player, Jackie Robinson with his son.) - NARA - 542024.tif|Jackie Robinson and his son at the March
File:Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. (Four young marchers singing.) - NARA - 542025.tif|Four young marchers singing
File:Martin Luther King - March on Washington.jpg|Martin Luther King gives his "I Have a Dream" speech
File:Photograph of Meeting with Leaders of the March on Washington August 28, 1963 - NARA - 194276.jpg|After the March on Washington, President Kennedy meets with civil rights leaders

### Malcolm X joins the movement (1964)
 meets with Martin Luther King, Jr., March26, 1964|alt=Malcolm X and Martin Luther King speak to each other thoughtfully as others look on]]
Malcolm X was an American minister who converted to Islam in prison, around 1948. He became a member of the Nation of Islam.p.&nbsp;138 This group believed in black supremacy - that the black race was the best of all. They believed that blacks should be completely independent from whites, and should eventually return to Africa.pp.&nbsp;149–152 They also believed that black people had the right to fight back and use violence to get their rights. Because of this, Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam did not support the civil rights movement, because it was non-violent and supported integration. He offered to work with other civil rights groups, if they accepted that blacks had the right to defend themselves.

On March 26, 1964, Malcolm met with Martin Luther King, Jr. Malcolm had a plan to bring the United States before the United Nations on charges that the U.S.  African Americans' human rights. Dr. King may have been planning to support this.

Between 1963 and 1964, civil rights activists got more angry and more likely to fight back against whites. In April 1964, Malcolm gave a famous speech called "The Ballot or the Bullet." ("The ballot" means "voting.") In the speech, he said that if the U.S. government is "unwilling or unable to defend the lives and the property of Negroes," then African Americans should defend themselves.p.&nbsp;43 He warned politicians that many African Americans were not willing "to turn the other cheek any longer." Most of them were white college students.

On June 21, 1964, three Freedom Summer activists disappeared. Weeks later, their bodies were found. They had been murdered by members of the local Ku Klux Klan - including some who were also police in the Neshoba County sheriff's department.

During Freedom Summer, activists set up at least 30 Freedom Schools, and taught about 3,500 students. The students included children, adults, and the elderly. The schools taught about many things, like black history; civil rights; politics; the freedom movement; and the basic reading and writing skills needed to vote.

Also during the summer, about 17,000 black Mississippians tried to register to vote. Only 1,600 were able to. However, more than 80,000 joined the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP). This showed that they wanted to vote and take part in politics, not just let white people do it for them.

File:Aaron Henry 1964.jpg|Members of the MFDP at the 1964 Democratic National Convention (DNC)
File:African American and white Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party supporters demonstrating 05237v.jpg|Protesters at the DNC hold signs showing the three murdered Freedom Summer activists
File:Mississippi KKK Conspiracy Murders June 21 1964 Parties To The Conspiracy.jpg|The Ku Klux Klan members who were part of the conspiracy to kill the activists
File:Lawrence Rainey flanked by FBI agents.jpg|Sheriff Lawrence Rainey, who was part of the conspiracy, being taken to court
File:Mt. Zion Methodist Church state history marker in Neshoba County.JPG|Sign honoring the three murdered activists

### Civil Rights Act of 1964
John F. Kennedy's suggested civil rights bill had support from Northern members of Congress - both Democrats and Republicans. However, Southern Senators blocked the suggested law from passing. They filibustered for 54 days to block the bill from becoming a law. Finally, President Lyndon B. Johnson got a bill to pass.

On July 2, 1964, Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The law said: Together, they started working on voting rights.

However, the next month, an African-American man named Jimmie Lee Jackson was shot by a police officer during a peaceful march. Jackson died. This would be a 54-mile (87-kilometer) march. Activists hoped the march would show how badly African-Americans wanted to vote. They also wanted to show that they would not let racism or violence stop them from getting equal rights. This day came to be called **Bloody Sunday**. Pictures and film of the marchers being beaten were shown in newspapers and on television around the world.

Seeing these things made more people support the civil rights activists. People came from all over the United States to march with the activists. One of them, James Reeb, was attacked by white people for supporting civil rights. He died on March 11, 1965.

Finally, President Johnson decided to send soldiers from the United States Army and the Alabama National Guard to protect the marchers. Martin Luther King gave a speech called "How Long? Not Long" at the Alabama State Capitol. He told the marchers that it would not be long before they had equal rights, "because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

After the march, Viola Liuzzo, a white woman from Detroit, drove some other marchers to the airport. While she was driving back, she was murdered by three members of the Ku Klux Klan.

File:Selma to Montgomery Marches.jpg|Activists marching from Selma to Montgomery
File:Bloody Sunday-officers await demonstrators.jpeg|Police get ready to attack marchers crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge
File:Memorial to Viola Fauver Gregg Liuzzo, (Lowndes County, Alabama).jpg|Memorial to Viola Liuzzo, who was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan after the march
File:Selma to Montgomery marches - historic route retouched.jpg|The Selma-to-Montgomery march route is now a National Historic Trail
File:President Obama Delivers Remarks on the 50th Anniversary of the Selma Marches.webm|Video of President Barack Obama's speech on the march's 50th anniversary
File:The Obamas and the Bushes continue across the bridge (cropped to Obama and Bush couples).jpg|The Obamas, ex-President Bush, and civil rights activists march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge

### The Voting Rights Act of 1965
On August 6, 1965, the United States passed the Voting Rights Act. This law made it illegal to stop somebody from voting because of their race. This meant that all the state laws that kept black people from voting were now illegal.

For almost 100 years, registrars (the government workers who had registered people to vote) were all white. They had total power over who they could register and who they would not register. If a registrar refused to let a black person register, that person could only file a lawsuit, which they were not likely to win. However, the Voting Rights Act finally made a change to this system. If a registrar discriminated against black people, the Attorney General could send federal workers to replace local registrars. One out of every three of them was registered by a federal worker who replaced a racist registrar. (Later, in 1966, California made the Fair Housing Act the law again.)
 and Dr. King talk about fair housing in 1966]]

Activists, including Martin Luther King, led a movement for fair housing in Chicago in 1966. The next year, young NAACP members did the same in Milwaukee. Activists in both cities got attacked physically by white homeowners, and legally by politicians who supported segregation.

#### The Fair Housing Bill
Of all the civil rights laws passed during the Civil Rights Movement, the Fair Housing Act was the hardest to pass.

The suggested Fair Housing Bill was sent to the United States Senate first. There, most Senators - Northern and Southern - were against the bill. In March of 1968, the Senate sent a weaker version to the House of Representatives. The House was expected to make changes that would make the bill even weaker.

As part of his work against poverty, Dr. King and the SCLC started to speak out against the Vietnam War. King argued that poor people in Vietnam were being killed, and that the War would only make them poorer. He also argued that the United States was spending more and more money and time on the War, and less on programs to help poor Americans.

In March 1968, Dr. King was invited to Memphis, Tennessee to support garbage workers that were on strike. These workers were paid very little, and two workers had been killed doing their jobs. They wanted to be members of a labor union. Dr. King thought this strike was a perfect fit for his Poor People's Campaign. The next day he was murdered. After King was killed, people rioted in more than 100 cities across the United States.

Civil rights leader Ralph Abernathy continued the Poor People's Campaign after King's death. About 3,000 activists camped out on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., for about six weeks.

The day before Dr. King's funeral, his wife, Coretta Scott King, and three of their children led 20,000 marchers through Memphis. Soldiers protected the marchers. On April 9, Mrs. King led another 150,000 people through Atlanta during Dr. King's funeral. An old, wooden , pulled by mules, pulled Dr. King's casket. The wagon was a symbol of Dr. King's Poor People's Campaign.

Mrs. King once said:

File:I Am a Man - Diorama of Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike - National Civil Rights Museum - Downtown Memphis - Tennessee - USA.jpg|Statues of sanitation workers on strike
File:Martin Luther King was shot here Small Web view.jpg|The motel where King was murdered (now a museum). The wreath marks the spot where King was shot
File:James Earl Ray-F.B.I. wanted poster-.jpg|"FBI's Most Wanted" poster for James Earl Ray, who was later convicted of murdering King
File:Damage to a store following the riots in Washington, D.C., April 16, 1968.jpg|Damage to a store from riots in Washington, D.C., after King's murder
File:Leffler - 1968 Washington, D.C. Martin Luther King, Jr. riots.jpg|Soliders stand near buildings ruined by riots in Washington, D.C.
File:Garment workers listen to funeral service for MLK on portable radio April 8 1968.jpg|Garment workers listen to Dr. King's funeral by radio
File:Poor People's March at Lafayette Park ppmsca.04302.jpg|Poor People's Campaign protesters in Washington, D.C.
File:Resurrection City Washington D.C. 1968.jpg|"Tent city" where protesters slept in Washington, D.C.

## Deaths
Many people were killed during the Civil Rights Movement. Some were killed because they supported civil rights. Others were killed by the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) or other racist whites who wanted to terrorize black people. No one knows just how many people were killed during the Civil Rights Movement. However, here are some examples. People whose names are highlighted in blue were children or teenagers when they were killed.

An unknown number of other people died or were killed during the Civil Rights Movement.

## Related pages
* **History:** Slavery; American Civil War; Reconstruction; *Plessy v. Ferguson*
* **Causes:** Racism; white supremacy; racial segregation; discrimination; Jim Crow laws; lynchings
* **People:** Martin Luther King, Jr.; Coretta Scott King; James Lawson; James Meredith; Little Rock Nine; Rosa Parks; Malcolm X
* **Groups:** National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP); Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC); Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
* **Law & government:** Law of the United States; case law; federal law; legislation; Constitution of the United States; Supreme Court; United States Congress
* **Rights:** Civil rights; civil liberties; human rights; right to vote; social equality; social justice
* **Other:** Ku Klux Klan; sundown towns; White Citizens' Council

## Notes
## References