Civil Rights Movement: The Plessy Vs. Ferguson Case

The decade of the 1960s is remembered as one of the most turbulent times of Americanhistory. The decade, from riots to assassinations, was filled with violent disorder and confusion.Even with opposition and disagreement all over the United States, some movements took apeaceful, nonviolent approach with one of the most well-known and successful being the CivilRights Movement.The African American Civil Rights movement was a nonviolent fight for equal rights forAfrican Americans after years of mistreatment and segregation. The ultimate goal of themovement was to gain the rights of an American citizen. After years of not being offeredservices and refusal of education, the movement surged and African Americans felt they werecapable of making a change

This decision overruled the Plessy vs. Ferguson case which concluded that separatebut equal in the case of schools was constitutional. The Plessy vs. Ferguson case resulted in the
Jim Crow laws which were a set of rules based on discrimination and segregation of AfricanAmericans in American society. The results of the trial and laws created an uproar in AfricanAmerican society pushing them to start a movement. After the success of the Brown vs. Board ofEducation case, the movement received a burst of hope in knowing that what they were doingwas obtainable.Another imperative event pertaining to the events of the Civil Rights Movement was theMontgomery Bus Boycotts. The protests all began when a woman by

Two specific groups strongly opposed to the movement were the Ku Klux Klan andJohn Birch’s Society. The KKK was founded in 1866 and originally opposed the RepublicanParty’s policies aimed at establishing political and economic equality for blacks. The group soonbegan to despise African Americans as a whole and took on aggressive and evil acts to tormentthem. The Civil Rights Movement in particular saw an increase in KKK activity includingbombings of black schools and churches and violence against black and white activists. JohnBirch’s Society was founded in 1958 and severely opposed the Civil Rights Movement. Thegroup created the Anti Civil Rights Campaign of the 1960s which proclaimed their views on theCivil Rights Movement. They published an article in the Palm Beach Post called “What’sWrong with Civil Rights?” The JBS claimed the Movement’s goal was to create a “Soviet NegroRepublic” which they considered a communist idea. Although the group did not engage inviolent or aggressive acts, they still convinced readers that the Civil Rights Movement as a wholewas a communist idea from the beginning and caused the movement to lose supporters.But above all, the biggest shock to the Civil Rights Movement and American society wasthe assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. MLK was shot and killed