‘Surname’
Civil Rights Movement
While discussing about the civil rights movement most people describe only the events that took place between the 1950s and 1960s. Whilst it is true that most of the important legislations in support of anti-racial policies were passed during that period, the seeds of the movement were sown much earlier. The agitations witnessed and legislations passed during this period, were an outcome of many decades of efforts and struggles put forth by various factions. Though slavery was officially emancipated in the year 1865, the Blacks were mostly treated as ‘equal but separate’, with many states following what is popularly known as the ‘Jim Crow’ Laws. The organized fight for Black Civil Rights started with the formation of NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) in 1909. But it gained steam by the 1930s and lasted till 1960s, and these four decades witnessed major changes in the racial policies of the nation. This essay aims at analyzing why the government became more responsive towards the rights of the African Americans during this period and what events and/or factors brought about this change.
The Harlem Renaissance, which spanned from the year 1919 to the 1930s, played a significant role in redefining the identity of the African American people. Harlem Renaissance is a cultural movement which originated in a place called Harlem, a major African –American neighborhood in the New York City, and it for the first time portrayed Black people to be different from the established stereotypes of that era. It ridiculed the notions of ‘back to Africa’ and established the African Americans as a distinct but integral part of the American society. Many Black poets, singers, actors, writers and social activists contributed to this movement and together they initiated an unprecedented ‘border-crossing’, whereby the never before revealed inner rebellion and repressed emotions of the African Americans were showcased to the outer world. As Howard Zinn puts it, the centuries old controls that were imposed on the Blacks, made them suppress their feelings and they exhibited their secret thoughts by way of arts. Their blues reflected concealed anger and their happy flowing Jazz showed their inner rebellion. Even the self mocking and outwardly submissive Uncle Tom comic roles enacted by Black actors on stage, had a concealed anger and resentment beneath. (Zinn, 2010)
The anger was always there in black literature but in a masked fashion, what the Harlem renaissance of the 1930s did was to take the mask away and show the black people as they were – oppressed, angry and waiting for a change. Langston Hughes, a Black poet who was one of the early innovators of Jazz poetry, wrote
“I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,” (Hughes, 1945)
The effects of Harlem renaissance were felt well into the 1960s, and in a sense it showed the direction for the civil rights movement. It emphasized on integrationist approach and called for racial collaboration which was opposite to the spirit of the Jim Crow laws, which allowed Blacks equal rights but kept them segregated from the White population. Also it gave a face to the Black Nationalism and for the first time identified Black people as Black Americans rather than Africans. Thus, Harlem Renaissance marks a crucial stage in the civil Rights movement and made the Government take heed of the suppressed anger of the Black people.
The attack on Pearl Harbor and the resultant entry of United States in to the World War II had a unifying effect on the country. The war had an egalitarian impact on the American society, and projected America as a Champion of democracy to the world. The end of the war created a new world and also created a new American society. America was not isolated from the other countries anymore, and the United Nations was formed mainly to ensure humanitarian values are upheld throughout the world. The NAACP stated, “The government which raises its hands in shock and horror over the persecution of humanity on the basis of race in other countries, might as well take a moment and turn back and see its own back yard and it would see Hitlerism in its own land”. (Monroe, 2004) Coupled with the anti-fascist ideology of war many factors such as the Great migration, urbanization and enhanced literacy rate, which happened during the 1940s, had provided a racial tolerance to the American society.
These changes were reflected in the federal policies and court judgments too. President Roosevelt, put an end to the discriminatory hiring practices that were used to recruit military personnel during the WWII, mainly in response to a threat by Philip Randolph, a Black leader, to organize a massive protest March in Washington. An agitation of this kind in the capital, when the country was fighting oppression and tyranny elsewhere in the world would have come as a huge embarrassment to the Government. During the World War II the Supreme Court handled 6 different cases pertaining to racial issues, and mostly gave judgments that upheld racial equality. This was the first sign that the federal establishment was slowly attuning to the growing need of a racially collaborative society.
The final transformation in the way the federal machinery treated the racial relations came, through the landmark judgment of the Supreme Court, in the Brown Vs Board of Education case. The court ruled on May 17, 1954 that the segregation of public schools was unlawful, and declared that there should not be separate schools for White and Black Americans. This ruling in effect reversed the judgment given in 1896 in the Plessy v. Ferguson case, which allowed the segregation of educational facilities practiced by the States. During the 1950s entire race situation in the country was volatile, and there were many leaders fighting for equal rights both in peaceful and violent manners. The Blacks too were at boiling point and started to fight for their rights more vociferously.
All the judgments passed before this period on racial segregations drew inspiration, and example from the Plessy v. Ferguson case, thus confirming to the equal but separate social position of the Blacks. But what this judgment did was to establish that, if people are segregated based on their race, then this treatment cannot be termed as equal. The essence of the court verdict was that, though the separate schools were equal in facilities, just the separate treatment is enough to infuse a psychological harm on young Black children. This was a major blow for the Jim Crow law advocates and there were many outbursts against this law, with the Governor of Alabama, George Wallace, personally blocking a school door denying entry to two black students. (Tougaloo College, ND) The segregation policy has its root in the belief of the nineteenth century society on the concept of scientific racism, which advocates that Whites are racially superior to the Blacks. Through this judgment the Supreme Court had effectively denounced that theory, and showed to the public that segregation is morally condemnable and would be no longer protected by Law. The judgment paved way for more desegregation and opened the door for revisions in racial policies and practices, and thus holds a significant position in the Civil Rights movement.
The civil rights movement has been shaped and fuelled by many events and personalities, and today the nation has a more racially tolerant society than the past decades. The country has its first President of African origin and African Americans are well represented in almost all fields. This is not to say that the society is completely devoid of racial stereotypes, but it has come a great distance from the days of slavery and segregation. Today is definitively better than yesterday with a promise of an even brighter tomorrow.
Works Cited
- Zinn, Howard. A People's History of the United States: 1492 to Present. New York: HarperCollins, 2010. Print.
- Hughes, Langston. I, too, sing America. 1945. Web. November 24, 2013. Retrieved from http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15615
- Monroe, Michael J. Klarman James. From Jim Crow to Civil Rights: The Supreme Court and the Struggle for Racial Equality: The Supreme Court and the Struggle for Racial Equality. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Print.
- Tougaloo College. Civil Rights Movement Veterans. ND. Web. November 24, 2013. Retrieved from http://www.crmvet.org/tim/timhis63.htm#1963tuscaloosa
