The Civil Rights Movement
How can groups of people get their voices heard when government isn’t honoring their rights?
Marches
Sit-ins
Freedom Rides
Boycotts
Court Cases
Voter Registration
General Information on the Civil Rights Movement:
Chicano Rights Movement
Disability Rights Movement
- General information about the March on Washington can be found here , here and here
- Here are interviews with activists who attended the March on Washington.
- Information about the Selma to Montgomery March can be found here.
- NBC News published this article of lesser-known facts about the Selma to Montgomery March on the 50th anniversary of the march.
- In this interview John Lewis remembers the attacks on Bloody Sunday (part of the Selma ot Montgomery March).
- Photos of the United Farmworkers' march from Delano to Sacramento are here.
Sit-ins
- Information about sit-ins as a peaceful protest strategy is here.
- Information about the sit-in movement of the early 1960s can be found here, here,
- A timeline of photographs from the sit-in movement in the early 1960s is here.
- An article about a major sit-in of the disability rights movement is here.
- This website has text and videos about the disability rights movement, including how sit-ins were used.
Freedom Rides
- Information about Freedom Rides can be found here, here, here and here.
- PBS wrote introductions to the individual people who participated in Freedom Rides here.
- PBS created a documentary about Freedom Riders here.
- NBC created short documentary clips about Freedom Riders here and here
Boycotts
- Information about the first bus boycott of the Civil Rights Movement (before the one led by MLK, Jr. and Rosa Parks!) is here and here.
- Information about the Montgomery Bus Boycott can be found here,
- Information about the Chicago Public Schools Boycott in 1963 is here.
- Information about the Seattle Public Schools Boycott in 1966 is here.
- Information about a New Orleans boycott of stores on Dryades Street in 1960-61 is here.
- Information about the 1965 Grape Boycott is here.
Court Cases
- A website with a variety of resources about the Mendez v. Westminster case is here.
- Information about Browder v. Gayle, the court case that ended bus segregation, is here and here.
- Information about the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas can be found here, here and here.
- Here is a short informational video that gives an overview of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas.
- Here is a summary of major court cases that led up to the Brown v. Board of Education decision.
Voter Registration
- This website offers information and primary sources about the ways different Southern States made it hard to vote before the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
- This short video gives an overview of ways voting rights have been denied to African Americans throughout history.
- Information about Freedom Summer, a voter registration effort in 1964, can be found here and here.
- Information about Freedom Summer and the Bloody Sunday march for voting rights is here.
- PBS created a documentary about Freedom Summer here.
- Information about citizenship schools, which prepared African Americans to pass literacy tests to vote, is here.
- A biography of Septima Clark, who founded citizenship schools, is here.
General Information on the Civil Rights Movement:
- The Constitutional Rights Foundation gives an overview of many different protest strategies and events here.
- History.com offers many resources to honor "the triumphs and struggles of African-Americans throughout history" here.
- PBS offers many resources about The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow laws here.
- Take a video tour of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute here.
- Lyrics to various songs of the Civil Rights Movement are here.
Chicano Rights Movement
- (See headings above for resources about the farmworkers' movement in California.)
- A website with a variety of resources about the Mendez v. Westminster case is here.
- A video about Ruben Salazar, a leader of the Chicano (Mexican-American) movement, is here.
- An informational video about the Chicano farmworkers movement is here.
- Present Day Connection: Migrant Justice (Justicia Migrante) is leading a movement for farmworkers' rights on dairy farms in Vermont!
Disability Rights Movement
- A short documentary on the movement for rights for disabled people is here.
- An article about a major sit-in of the disability rights movement is here.
- This website has text and videos about the disability rights movement, including how sit-ins were used.