My Aunt's Role In The Civil Rights Movement

For over two centuries, African Americans were treated as property, being sold and inspected at every moment, not even considered human. After the Emancipation Proclamation, African Americans thought they would be free, however there were many loopholes and restrictions keeping them as second-class citizens. They had just entered the era of extreme segregation that would last nearly a century more. During this time, many African Americans found the strength to speak out against the injustices and demand change, this was known as the Civil Rights Movement. While my aunt was impacted by many events in American history, the most significant movement in her lifetime has been the Civil Rights Movement because it created equality, freedom, and opportunity

This was the day the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, freeing all slaves in Confederate states. In her adult years, Francis moved to Mississippi and became one of the first African American female teachers in Mississippi (due to the Freedman’s Bureau during Reconstruction). Not long after, Black Codes were created, starting in Mississippi and South Carolina, further restricting African Americans by finding ways to get around the14th amendment. The White supremacists tried to keep the freedmen out of work and ultimately created the secret ‘hate group’ by the name of the Ku Klux Klan. According to PBS, “After the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision, segregation became even more ensconced through a battery of Southern laws and social customs known as “Jim Crow.” Schools, theaters, restaurants, and transportation cars were segregated. Poll taxes, literacy requirements, and grandfather clauses not only prevented blacks from voting, but also made them ineligible to serve on jury pools or run for office (Jim Crow and Plessy v. Ferguson).” This quotation shows just how limiting life was for Black Americans in the 19th and 20th centuries. The Plessy vs. Ferguson case also introduced the idea of ‘separate but equal’ which helped justify segregation. It stated that White and Black communities would be segregated, but have equal resources and opportunity. However, this was not the case,

This included President John F. Kennedy and Mr. Meany from the trade industry. “ True trade union brotherhood shows no racial distinction- a fact which your brotherhood has now underscored. The trade union movement cannot and will not rest until the civil rights battle has been won.” Mr. George Meany (Raskin, A. H.,A Loss for Jim Crow). However, at the same time, the KKK was expanding and gaining more followers resulting in a mass number of undiscovered lynchings. “Lynching was a linchpin of Jim Crow America, and victims were killed for "minor transgressions against segregationist mores—or simply for demanding basic human rights or refusing to submit to unfair treatment," as Lauren Gambino write for the Guardian (Blakemore, Lynchings in the South).” During 1963, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference began to do large-scale demonstrations such as sit-ins and boycotts. All of these demonstrations were organized through the 16th Street Baptist church and were viewed globally. At the time, Birmingham Alabama had very strict rules regarding segregation and many citizens practiced White supremacy. Aiming to shut down these demonstrations, the KKK bombed the church and killed four innocent Black teenage girls. “The Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing of September 15, 1963, was a racially motivated attack carried out by members of the Ku Klux Klan in Birmingham,