In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson went to Congress and asked them to pass a comprehensive civil rights bill. President John F. Kennedy had proposed such a bill in June of 1963, mere months before his death, and Johnson used Kennedy’s memory to convince Americans that the time had come to address the problem of segregation.

Background

After the end of Reconstruction, white Southerners regained political power and set about reordering race relations. Sharecropping became the compromise that ruled the Southern economy, and a number of African Americans moved to the cities of the South, leaving farm life behind. As the African-American population of the South’s urban centers grew, white Southerners began passing restrictive segregation laws, demarcating urban spaces along racial lines.

This new racial order–eventually nicknamed the “Jim Crow” era–did not go unchallenged. One notable court case that resulted from the new laws ended up before the Supreme Court in 1896, Plessy v. Ferguson.

Homer Plessy was a 30-year-old shoemaker in June of 1892 when he decided to take on Louisiana’s Separate Car Act, delineating separate train cars for white and black passengers. Plessy’s act was a deliberate decision to challenge the legality of the new law. Plessy was racially mixed–seven-eighths white–and his very presence on the “whites-only” car threw into question the “one-drop” rule, the strict black-or-white definition of race of the late 19th-century US.

When Plessy’s case went before the Supreme Court, the justices decided that Louisiana’s Separate Car Act was constitutional by a vote of 7 to 1. As long as separate facilities for blacks and whites were equal–”separate but equal”–Jim Crow laws did not violate the Constitution.

Up until 1954, the US Civil Rights Movement challenged Jim Crow laws in the courts based on facilities not being equal, but that strategy changed with Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) when Thurgood Marshall argued that separate facilities were inherently unequal.

And then came the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955, and the sit-ins of 1960, and the Freedom Rides of 1961.

As more and more African American activists risked their lives to expose the harshness of Southern racial law and order in the wake of the Brown decision, the federal government, including the president, could no longer ignore segregation.

The Civil Rights Act

Five days after Kennedy’s assassination, Johnson announced his intention to push through a Civil Rights bill: “We have talked long enough in this country about equal rights. We have talked for one hundred years or more. It is time now to write the next chapter, and to write it in the books of law.” Using his personal power in the Congress to get the needed votes, Johnson secured its passage and signed it into law in July 1964.

The first paragraph of the act states as its purpose “To enforce the constitutional right to vote, to confer jurisdiction upon the district courts of the United States to provide injunctive relief against discrimination in public accommodations, to authorize the Attorney General to institute suits to protect constitutional rights in public facilities and public education, to extend the Commission on Civil Rights, to prevent discrimination in federally assisted programs, to establish a Commission on Equal Employment Opportunity, and for other purposes.”

The bill prohibited racial discrimination in public and outlawed discrimination in places of employment. To this end, the act created the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to investigate complaints of discrimination. The act ended the piecemeal strategy of integration by ending Jim Crow once and for all.

Effects

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not end the Civil Rights Movement of course. White Southerners still used legal and extralegal means to deprive black Southerners of their constitutional rights, and in the North, de facto segregation meant that often African American lived in the worst urban neighborhoods and had to attend the worst urban schools. But, in that it was a forceful stand on the part of the federal government for civil rights, it ushered in a new era in which Americans could seek legal redress for civil rights violations. The act not only led the way for the Voting Rights Act of 1965 but also paved the way for programs like affirmative action.

Article source: http://afroamhistory.about.com/od/civilrightsstruggle1/a/CivilRightAct1964.htm

In 1866, Congress passed the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, and the states followed in 1868. The Fourteenth Amendment overturned the Supreme Court decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857), which ruled that black Americans were not actually citizens of the United States. This amendment also tried to protect the civil rights of African Americans by imposing a penalty–the loss of congressional seats and electoral votes–on states that deprived black men of their voting rights. The text of the Fourteenth Amendment follows:

Section 1.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section 2.

Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age,* and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

Section 3.

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section 4.

The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section 5.

The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Article source: http://afroamhistory.about.com/od/slavery/a/Fourteenth-Amendment.htm

On November 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill making Martin Luther King Day a federal holiday as of January 20, 1986. As a result of this bill, Americans commemorate Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday on the third Monday in January. Few Americans are aware of the history of Martin Luther King Day and the long battle to convince Congress to establish this holiday in recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

John Conyers and MLK Day

Congressman John Conyers, an African-American Democrat from Michigan, spearheaded the movement to establish a MLK day. Representative Conyers worked in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s and was elected to Congress in 1964, where he championed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Four days after King’s assassination in 1968, Conyers introduced a bill that would make January 15 a federal holiday in King’s honor. But Congress was unmoved by Conyers’ entreaties, and though he kept reviving the bill, it kept failing in Congress.

In 1970, Conyers convinced New York’s governor and New York City’s mayor to commemorate King’s birthday, a move that the city of St. Louis emulated in 1971. Other localities followed, but it was not until the 1980s that Congress acted on Conyers’ bill. By this time, the congressman had enlisted the help of popular singer Stevie Wonder, who released the song “Happy Birthday” for King in 1981, and Conyers had organized marches in support of the holiday-in 1982 and 1983, respectively.

Congressional Battles over MLK Day

Conyers was finally successful when he reintroduced the bill in 1983. But even in 1983 support was not unanimous. In the House of Representatives, William Dannemeyer, a Republican from California, led the opposition to the bill, arguing that it was too expensive to create a federal holiday and estimating that it would cost the federal government $225 million annually in lost productivity. Reagan’s administration concurred with Dannemeyer’s arguments, but the House passed the bill with a vote of 338 for and 90 against.

When the bill reached the Senate, the arguments opposing the bill were less grounded in economics and more reliant on outright racism. Senator Jesse Helms, a Democrat from North Carolina, held a filibuster against the bill and demanded the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) make public its files on King, asserting that King was a Communist who did not deserve the honor of a holiday. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had investigated King throughout the late 1950s and 1960s at the behest of its chief, J. Edgar Hoover, and had even tried intimidation tactics against King, sending the civil rights leader a note in 1965 that suggested he kill himself to avoid embarrassing personal revelations hitting the media.

King, of course, was not a Communist and had broken no federal laws, but by challenging the status quo, King and the Civil Rights Movement discomfited the Washington establishment. Charges of Communism were a popular way to discredit people who dared speak truth to power during the 50s and 60s, and King’s opponents made liberal use of that tactic.

When Helms tried to revive that tactic, Reagan defended him. A reporter asked Reagan about the charge of Communist against King, and Reagan said that Americans would find out in around 35 years, referring to the length of time before any material the FBI gathers on a subject could be released. Reagan later apologized, and a federal judge blocked the release of King’s FBI files.

Conservatives in the Senate tried to change the name of the bill to “National Civil Rights Day” as well, but they failed to do so. The bill passed the Senate with a vote of 78 for and 22 against. Reagan capitulated, signing the bill into law.

The First MLK Day

King’s wife, Coretta Scott King, chaired the commission responsible for creating the first celebration of King’s birthday in 1986. Though she was disappointed at not receiving more support from Reagan’s administration, the result was over a week of commemorations beginning on January 11, 1986, and lasting until the holiday itself on January 20. Events were held in cities like Atlanta and Washington, D.C., and included a tribute at the Georgia State Capitol and the dedication of a bust of Dr. King at the U.S. Capitol.

Some Southern states protested the new holiday by including Confederate commemorations on the same day, but by the 1990s the holiday had become established everywhere in the United States.

Reagan’s proclamation of the holiday on January 18, 1986, explained the reason for the holiday: “This year marks the first observance of the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as a national holiday. It is a time for rejoicing and reflecting. We rejoice because, in his short life, Dr. King, by his preaching, his example, and his leadership, helped to move us closer to the ideals on which America was founded. . . . He challenged us to make real the promise of America as a land of freedom, equality, opportunity, and brotherhood.”

It required a long 15-year fight, but Conyers and his supporters successfully won King national recognition for his service to country and humanity.

Sources

• Campbell, Bebe Moore. “A National Holiday for a King.” Black Enterprise. January 1984: 21.
• Garrow, David J. Bearing the Cross: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. New York: Vintage Books, 1988.
• Nazel, Joseph. Martin Luther King, Jr.. Los Angeles: Holloway House Publishing, 1991.
• Reagan, Ronald. “Proclamation 5431 — Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1986.” 18 January 1986. Available online: http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1986/11886a.htm.
• Smitherman, Geneva. Word From the Mother: Language and African Americans. New York: Taylor Francis, 2006.

Article source: http://afroamhistory.about.com/od/africanamericanculture/a/History-Of-Martin-Luther-King-Day.htm

The origins of Black History Month lay in early 20th-century historian Carter G. Woodson’s desire to spotlight the accomplishments of African Americans. Mainstream historians left out African Americans from the narrative of American history up until the 1960s, and Woodson worked his entire career to correct this blinding oversight. His creation of Negro History Week in 1926 paved the way for the establishment of Black History Month in 1976.

Negro History Week

In 1915, Woodson helped found the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (today known as the Association for the Study of African American Life and History or ASALH). The idea for an organization devoted to black history came to Woodson as he was discussing the release of the racist film The Birth of a Nation. Discussing it with a group of African-American men at a YMCA in Chicago, Woodson convinced the group that African Americans needed an organization that would strive for a balanced history.

The organization began publishing its flagship journal–The Journal of Negro History in 1916, and ten years later, Woodson came up with the plan for a week of activities and commemorations devoted to African-American history. Woodson chose the week of February 7, 1926, for the first Negro History Week because it included the birthdays of both Abraham Lincoln (Feb. 12), celebrated for the Emancipation Proclamation that freed many American slaves, and abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass (Feb. 14).

Woodson hoped that Negro History Week would encourage better relations between blacks and whites in the United States as well as inspire young African Americans to celebrate the accomplishments and contributions of their ancestors. In The Mis-Education of the Negro (1933), Woodson lamented, “Of the hundreds of Negro high schools recently examined by an expert in the United States Bureau of Education only eighteen offer a course taking up the history of the Negro, and in most of the Negro colleges and universities where the Negro is thought of, the race is studied only as a problem or dismissed as of little consequence.” Thanks to Negro History Week, the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History began to receive requests for more accessible articles; in 1937 the organization began publishing the Negro History Bulletin aimed at African-American teachers who wanted to incorporate black history into their lessons.

Black History Month

African Americans quickly took up Negro History Week, and by the 1960s, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, American educators, both white and black, were observing Negro History Week. At the same time, mainstream historians had begun to expand the American historical narrative to include African Americans (as well as women and other previously ignored groups). In 1976, as the US was celebrating its bicentennial, the ASALH expanded the traditional week-long celebration of African-American history to a month, and Black History Month was born.

That same year, President Gerald Ford urged Americans to observe Black History Month, but it was President Carter who officially recognized Black History Month in 1978. With the federal government’s blessing, Black History Month became a regular event in American schools. By the opening decade of the 21st century, however, some were questioning whether Black History Month should be continued, especially after the election of the nation’s first African-American president, Barack Obama, in 2008. For instance, in a 2009 article, commentator Byron Williams suggested that Black History Month had become “trite, stale, and pedestrian rather than informative and thought provoking” and served only to relegate ” the achievements of African Americans to an adjunct status in American history.”

But others continue to argue that the need for Black History Month has not disappeared. Historian Matthew C. Whitaker observed in 2009, “Black History Month, therefore, will never be obsolete. It will always be in our best interest to pause and explore the meaning of freedom through the lived experiences of a people who forced America to be true to its creed and reaffirmed the American dream. Those who would eliminate Black History Month often miss the point.”

Woodson would no doubt be pleased by the expansion of the original Negro History Week. His goal in creating Negro History Week was to highlight African-American accomplishments alongside white American accomplishments. Woodson asserted in The Story of the Negro Retold (1935) that the book “is not so much that of Negro history as it is universal history.” For Woodson, Negro History Week was about teaching the contributions of all Americans and correcting a national historical narrative that he felt was little more than racist propaganda.

Sources

• “Carter G. Woodson: Father of Black History.” Ebony. Vol. 59, no. 4 (February 2004): 20, 108-110.
• Dagbovie, Pero Gaglo. The early Black history movement, Carter G. Woodson, and Lorenzo Johnston Greene. Champaign, IL: The University of Illinois Press, 2007.
• Mayes, Keith A. Kwanzaa: Black Power and the Making of the African-American Holiday Tradition. New York: Taylor Francis, 2009.
• Whitaker, Matthew C. “Black History Month Still Relevant for US.” The Arizona Republic. 22 February 2009. Available online: http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/viewpoints/articles/2009/02/21/20090221whitaker22-vi p.html
• Woodson, Carter G. The Mis-Education of the Negro. 1933. Available online: http://historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/misedne.html.
• __________. The Story of the Negro Retold. The Associated Publishers, Inc., 1959.

Article source: http://afroamhistory.about.com/od/blackhistorymonth/a/The-Origins-Of-Black-History-Month.htm