Civil Rights Movement:Civil Rights Movement:Eisenhower YearsEisenhower Years

How are Jim Crow laws being slowly dismantled during the Eisenhower Years?

Jim Crow South

• Plessy v. Furguson was 1896 ruling by the Supreme Court that allowed for “separate but equal” facilities and accommodations

• Till case showed how unequal the south truly was

Brown v. Board of Education

• 1951: Brown family wants to enroll their daughter in all-white school closer to their home, file a lawsuit against Topeka BOE

• Others join suit arguing that separate schools violate the 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection under the law

• A Federal court in Kansas rules against the Browns

Separate is not equal

• 1954: Supreme Court hears an appeal in the Brown case

•Ruling: plaintiffs have been deprived of 14th Amendment rights stating “separate but equal” has no place in education

•Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal and all schools must be desegregated

• 1955: Griffin v. School Board of Prince Edward County (Brown II) orders the desegregation of public schools w/ “deliberate speed”

Little Rock Crisis• 1957: Black students enroll in Little Rock schools• Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus orders the Ntl Guard to

prevent nine black students from entering Central HS

Eisenhower steps up• Pres. Eisenhower sends in 101st Airborne to escort students

into Central Highhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oodolEmUg2g

1. What was the attitude of segregationists in Little Rock?2. What happened to Elizabeth Eckford?3. What is significant about the Little Rock Nine?

Montgomery Bus Boycott• Rosa Parks refuses to give her seat to a white man, is arrested• Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. leads a boycott of

Montgomery public buses• 1956: Supreme Court outlaws bus segregation

Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

• Founded by MLK, staged protests & demonstrations against inequality

• Used black churches to spread the word and gain support – goal work with whites to end segregation

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

• Began in 1960 at Shaw University (NC), more confrontational• Greensboro Four begin sit-in at Woolworth’s lunch counter,

refused service return each day w/ more students

• Sit-ins spread, some turn violent

• Eisenhower publicly supports students

1. Whose methods are used at sit-ins?2. What is reaction of employees and

patrons?