Civil Rights Movement
The Civil Rights Movement is one of the most important and memorable movements in American history. It was a very long journey of African Americans and all colored people fighting for their rights. Even though the Emancipation Proclamation had freed the the slaves over 100 prior, they still did not have equal rights. Laws and discrimination were keeping them from being able to have the rights a person in America should have. The Civil Rights movement was a huge movement in the 1960s in which colored people gained their rights.
President Kennedy pushed for Civil Rights during his presidency, which was soon taken over by president Johnson. They pushed to press laws such as the Civil Rights Act, to get African Americans the rights they deserved. However, pushing from the President was not enough. People had to change on their own. Many blacks held protests and marches and participated in things such as boycotts and sit ins.
Two famous leaders of the Civil Rights Movement were Martin Luther King Junior and Malcolm X. Martin Luther King Junior was a life long civil rights supporter and he believed in using nonviolence to get the rights in which blacks deserved. Martin Luther King Jr. led peaceful marches and encouraged his people to not retaliate when they were attacked or discriminated against. Malcolm X on the other hand, believed in the almost opposite. Malcolm believed that his people should fight back and defend themselves, in which they had a right. He supported groups that used violence such as the black panthers. What the leaders do have in common however, is they were sadly both assassinated. Malcolm X was assassinated first in a ballroom in New York City, 1965. And Martin Luther King Junior followed in 1968, in Nashville, Tennessee.
President Kennedy pushed for Civil Rights during his presidency, which was soon taken over by president Johnson. They pushed to press laws such as the Civil Rights Act, to get African Americans the rights they deserved. However, pushing from the President was not enough. People had to change on their own. Many blacks held protests and marches and participated in things such as boycotts and sit ins.
Two famous leaders of the Civil Rights Movement were Martin Luther King Junior and Malcolm X. Martin Luther King Junior was a life long civil rights supporter and he believed in using nonviolence to get the rights in which blacks deserved. Martin Luther King Jr. led peaceful marches and encouraged his people to not retaliate when they were attacked or discriminated against. Malcolm X on the other hand, believed in the almost opposite. Malcolm believed that his people should fight back and defend themselves, in which they had a right. He supported groups that used violence such as the black panthers. What the leaders do have in common however, is they were sadly both assassinated. Malcolm X was assassinated first in a ballroom in New York City, 1965. And Martin Luther King Junior followed in 1968, in Nashville, Tennessee.