The Nonviolent Civil Rights Movement. Overview Origins Main features Organizations Early Events Freedom Rides Events Aftermath In what ways did the early movement succeed and fail? Could the violent movements of the late 1960s-early 1970s be avoided?.
Focused on the South
Focused on legal rights rather than poverty issues
Important groups: students, African-American Church, grassroots movement
SCLC - Southern Christian Leadership Conference
CORE - Congress on Racial Equality
SNCC - Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
1954 Brown v. Board of Education
1955 Rosa Parks and Montgomery Bus Boycott
1960 Greensboro sit-ins
1961 Freedom Rides
1963 Birmingham protests
1964 Freedom Summer
1965 Selma marches - the last great integrated Civil Rights event
Just the other day, just last Thursday to be exact, one of the finest citizens in Montgomery (Amen)--not one of the finest Negro citizens (That's right) but one of the finest citizens in Montgomery--was taken from a bus (Yes) and carried to jail and arrested (Yes) because she refused to get up to give her seat to a white person. (Yes, That's right) Now the press would have us believe that she refused to leave a reserved section for Negroes, (Yes) but I want you to know this evening that there is no reserved section. (All right) The law has never been clarified at that point. (Hell no) Now I think I speak with, with legal authority--not that I have any legal authority, but I think I speak with legal authority behind me (All right)--that the law, the ordinance, the city ordinance has never been totally clarified. (That's right)
We are here, we are here this evening because we're tired now. (Yes) [Applause] And I want to say, that we are not here advocating violence. (No) We have never done that. (Repeat that, Repeat that) [Applause] I want it to be known throughout Montgomery and throughout this nation (Well) that we are Christian people. (Yes) [Applause] We believe in the Christian religion. We believe in the teachings of Jesus. (Well) The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. (Yes) [Applause] That's all.