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Note Taking Study GuideEARLY DEMANDS FOR EQUALITY

CHAPTER

20SECTION 1

Name Class Date

Focus Question: How did African Americans challenge segregation afterWorld War II?

Fill in the timeline below with events of the early civil rights movement. When youfinish, write two sentences that summarize the information in your timeline.

1945

1947

1950

1955

1960

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221

READING CHECK

What action did the governor ofArkansas take to prevent thedesegregation of schools in Little Rock?

VOCABULARY BUILDER

Find the word compliance in the underlined sentence. Whatdo you think it means? Here is a clue. An antonym forcompliance is disobedience.Use this clue to figure out whatcompliance means.

READING SKILL

Summarize List three key eventsof the 1950s that helped to endsegregation.

In the South, African Americans were separated from whiteAmericans. Jim Crow laws made this separation legal. Segrega-tion that is enforced by law is called de jure segregation.African Americans in the North also faced segregation, evenwhere there were no explicit laws. Segregation by tradition isknown as de facto segregation.

In the 1950s, the NAACP turned to the federal courts to endsegregation. In Brown v. Board of Education, the NAACPchallenged segregation in public schools. Thurgood Marshall,an African American lawyer, was part of the legal team. TheSupreme Court agreed that segregation in public schools wasillegal. Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote the Brown decision. Hedeclared that the idea of “separate but equal” was wrong.

However, southern states found ways to resist compliancewith the law. In Little Rock, Arkansas, nine African Americanstudents volunteered to desegregate the high school. The gov-ernor ordered the National Guard to stop the students fromentering the school. President Eisenhower then sent federaltroops to protect the students.

In 1955, Rosa Parks, an African American woman wholived in Montgomery, Alabama, refused to give up her bus seatto a white passenger. She was arrested. Civil rights activistsorganized a bus boycott to protest her arrest. On the eveningfollowing the boycott, a Baptist minister named Martin LutherKing, Jr., spoke to a group of African Americans. He askedthem to protest segregation in a nonviolent way. The Montgomery bus boycott continued for over a year.

In 1956, the Supreme Court ruled that the Montgomery lawthat segregated buses was illegal. The boycott showed thatAfrican Americans could be powerful if they worked together.The protest also made King very important within the civilrights movement.

Review Questions1. Why was Brown v. Board of Education important?

2. How did the Montgomery bus boycott help the civil rightsmovement?

Section SummaryEARLY DEMANDS FOR EQUALITY

CHAPTER

20SECTION 1

Name Class Date

222© Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Pearson Prentice Hall. All rights reserved.

Note Taking Study GuideTHE MOVEMENT GAINS GROUND

CHAPTER

20SECTION 2

Name Class Date

Focus Question: How did the civil rights movement gain ground in the 1960s?

Use the concept web below to record information about the civil rights protests of the 1960s.

Civil RightsProtests

Sit-ins

Protested restaurantsegregation

March onWashington

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223

READING CHECK

Which civil rights organizationbegan a grass-roots movement?

VOCABULARY BUILDER

Find the word tolerate in theunderlined sentence. The wordforbid is an antonym of the wordtolerate. The word forbid means“to not permit.” Use contextclues and the meaning of forbidto figure out the meaning oftolerate.

READING SKILL

Summarize Summarize whatJames Meredith accomplishedin 1962.

Despite some victories, activists continued to struggle for civilrights for African Americans. In North Carolina, four collegestudents started a sit-in at a restaurant to protest discrimina-tion. This sit-in led to sit-ins across the nation. A new civilrights organization, the Student Nonviolent CoordinatingCommittee, or SNCC, began a grass-roots movement.

The next battleground was interstate transportation. TheSupreme Court had ruled that segregation on interstate buseswas illegal. In 1961, riders set off on two buses on a “freedomride.” After the freedom riders met with violence, PresidentJohn F. Kennedy intervened. The riders were successful.

In 1962, James Meredith enrolled at the all-white University of Mississippi. Civil rights activist Medgar Evershelped win the federal court case that ordered the university to desegregate. A riot broke out the night before Meredith’sarrival. Still, Meredith went on to graduate.

In 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., began a civil rights cam-paign in Birmingham, Alabama. It began with nonviolentmarches and sit-ins. However, Birmingham’s Public SafetyCommissioner would not tolerate the demonstrations. He usedpolice dogs and fire hoses on the peaceful protesters. ManyAmericans were shocked by images of violence on the news.

To put pressure on Congress to pass a new civil rights bill,supporters planned a March on Washington. On August 28,1963, more than 200,000 Americans gathered in Washington,D.C. The highlight was King’s “I Have a Dream” speech.

On November 22, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinat-ed. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson became President. Johnson used his political skills to gain the passage of the CivilRights Act of 1964. This act banned segregation in publicplaces. The civil rights movement had changed the relation-ships between races. It also set the stage for future reforms.

Review Questions1. What was the purpose of the March on Washington?

2. Describe the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Section SummaryTHE MOVEMENT GAINS GROUND

CHAPTER

20SECTION 2

Name Class Date

224© Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Pearson Prentice Hall. All rights reserved.

Note Taking Study GuideNEW SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES

CHAPTER

20SECTION 3

Name Class Date

Focus Question: What successes and challenges faced the civil rightsmovement after 1964?

Complete the outline below to summarize the contents of this section.

I. Push for Voting Rights

A. Freedom Summer

B.

II. Frustration Explodes into Violence

A.

B.

III. New Voices for African Americans

A.

B.

IV.

A. King continues to seek nonviolent methods.

B.

V.

A.

B.

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225

READING CHECK

Which group became the symbolfor young militant African Americans?

VOCABULARY BUILDER

Find the word confrontations inthe underlined sentence. Whatdoes confrontations mean? Lookfor clues in nearby words orphrases. Circle any that help youfigure out what confrontationsmeans.

READING SKILL

Summarize Summarize theeffect Malcolm X had on the civilrights movement.

The civil rights movement had made some progress. However,many African Americans were still unable to vote. In 1964, theSNCC organized a project known as Freedom Summer.Volunteers registered African Americans to vote in Mississippi.

In 1965, Martin Luther King, Jr., organized a march inSelma, Alabama. He wanted the government to pass laws toprotect voting rights. The march met with a series of violentconfrontations. Television coverage of the violence outragedthe nation. In response, Congress passed the Voting RightsAct of 1965. This law banned literacy tests. In 1964, the Twenty-fourth Amendment banned the poll tax. It had beenused to keep poor African Americans from voting.

Some African Americans were angry that discriminationand poverty continued. In many cities, this anger led to violentriots. The Kerner Commission was established to figure outthe cause of the riots. The commission blamed discriminationagainst African Americans over a long period of time.

At the same time, many young African Americans werebecoming more radical. Malcolm X was the most well-knownAfrican American radical. He was a minister of the Nation ofIslam. This religious group demanded that the races be sepa-rated. However, Malcolm X was shot and killed in 1965.

Many young African Americans wanted to continue thepolicies of Malcolm X. They no longer supported the idea ofnonviolence. SNCC leader Stokely Carmichael thought AfricanAmericans needed “black power.” He wanted African Americans to use their economic and political power to gainequality. Not long after, the Black Panther Party was formed.The Black Panthers became the symbol of young militantAfrican Americans.

In 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated. The civilrights movement had made segregation illegal. However, theradical methods that had been used left some people bitter.

Review Questions1. Why was the march in Selma important?

2. Why did violence occur in many American cities during the1960s?

Section SummaryNEW SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES

CHAPTER

20SECTION 3

Name Class Date