The Civil Rights Movement
The Movements of the New Left, 1950-1975:
A Brief History with Documents by Van Gosse
Hannah Wilson
In the 1960s, America underwent a monumental change, and everything changed in terms of its culture, status of specific population categories, domestic and foreign policies, and many other aspects under the large-scale, massive, and irreversible influence of the New Left movements. The 1960s were obviously a highly revolutionary period in the US history, mainly due to the rise of many fundamental social movements such as feminists, civil rights protectors, anti-Vietnam war pacifists, and voting rights. For example, Gosse (2005) noted that “in 1968 for the first time, the majority of black Americans voted” (12). Today the US President is an African American - demonstrating the power of the Civil Rights movement. Each of these movements was very revolutionary by itself, but the combination of all those movements pushed the USA to a totally new page of its history, undermining the accustomed values and ways of living that existed before. Hence, the waves of massive movements for the rights of Black people, women, for the right of the American nation to peace, and other long upheld rights shattered the US order and transformed the US society into the one people know now. The thesis of the essay is ‘The most influential movement in the history of the United States was the Civil Rights movement, because the integration of people with dark and white skins had never progressed after the Civil War until the Civil Rights movement demanded change.’
In his strikingly comprehensive and detailed work The Movements of the New Left, 1950-1975: A Brief History with Documents, Gosse analysed the process of the New Left movements’ origination, as well as the nature of their impact on the USA and the reasons for such an impact. According to the author, the complex of New Left movements emerged as a natural public pursuit of re-establishing democracy and justice in its original form, as stipulated in the US Declaration of Independence. Cherished American values such as “inalienable” rights and equality of all people reminded fiction more than reality of the US social and political landscape (Gosse 2). Hence, the US population, both belonging to the oppressed and ignored social groups and mainstream one, grew increasingly discontent with such neglect towards the founding principles of American democracy.
Though all New Left movements possess immense significance in the US history, and all of them played their vital role in changing the US social and political policies, the Civil Rights movement produced the most profound impact on the structure of the US society. The Civil Rights movement ushered in a totally new era in the American history that started with the abolition of slavery. Unfortunately, the abolishing slavery alone did not solve the problem of racial inequality, oppression, and discrimination. A human right to freedom is one of the most basic rights inherent in every human being in every corner of the world, but the official policy of racial segregation prevented black Americans from visiting certain entertainment places, shop, occupying certain seats in buses, and even using the same public toilets as white Americans. But “Veteran NAACP activist Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man on December 1, 1955” and the world changed (Gosse 6). In 2014 the situation is very different. The progress of the Civil Rights movement in the USA is the most profound achievement of the New Left movements of that period.
Before the 1950s-1960s, black Americans faced segregation and discrimination in a variety of social, political, and professional domains, though holding official citizenship equal to any other white American. Therefore, it is reasonable that public discontent was gradually gaining magnitude in the American society in the 1950s, and intensified throughout the 1960s, ultimately turning into rallies and marches that the US political leaders could no longer ignore. Moreover, as one can see, the Civil Rights movement, as well as other New Left movements, was highly successful because “the importance they placed on the dignity of each individual and right of every American to full citizenship” (Gosse 1).
The rapport that the Civil Rights movement found among the US population may be well explained by the complicated history of slavery and white-black tensions in its territory. The United States is a country born out of a revolution – the War for Independence unleashed by the inhabitants of the British colonies tired of lawlessness of the British Empire lay the foundation of the USA as the world’s most advanced democracy. The basic precondition of that war was to grant freedom to all Americans, but the principles of freedom were undermined by flourishing slavery that persisted in the USA for long, and allowed white people to exploit black people as their property. After that, Americans freely expressed their will to abolish slavery and end the human torture in its territory, which resulted in the Civil War. Therefore, as the nation witnessed the absence of justice and equality even after the bloody Civil War and abolition of slavery, one may conclude that the US nation was indeed at the edge of collapse, with many political, social, and economic limitations posed to free African Americans considered equal by the Constitution but facing intense racial discrimination and segregation in real daily lives. Finally after the terrible bloodshed during the Selma, Alabama protests, even the President of the United States, Lyndon B. Johnson, became involved in the Civil Rights process. He spoke to the American Congress on March 15, 1965 urging the members to remember their mission “to right wrong, to do justice, to serve man” (Document 19, Gosse, 87).
The positive consequences on the status of African Americans can still be seen in the US policies in employment, domestic policy, foreign policy, access to education and healthcare, and other sectors of society. During the thirty years from 1960 to 1990 Congress applied Civil Rights laws to enhance the ability of African Americans to experience equal education and to qualify for federal assistance starting with the Civil Rights Act of 1966 (Gosse, 36). Another reason for which the Civil Rights movement was so massive and so successful in the USA, is that the USA has always been a melting pot hosting Americans, immigrants, business travellers, tourists, and other visitors staying permanently and temporarily in the US territory. Therefore, the heterogeneous US nation (with a large and increasing portion of African Americans) could not any longer exist according to the rules of white supremacy, favouring the provision of all resources and benefits to white Americans, whose portion was too tiny for the US population to be content with that state of affairs. Huge groups of the African American population were consistently denied their rights, facing violence and molestation, experiencing limited access to basic social resources such as housing, education, and healthcare decided to change the situation to their advantage (Gosse, 2005). The “Wake up, America” speech by John Lewis on August 28, 1963 called for using nonviolence to “fragment the South into a thousand pieces and put them back together in the image of democracy” (Document 14, Gosse, 77). John Lewis was the president of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) (Gosse 8).
The claims of black Americans during the rise of the Civil Rights movement were nothing extraordinary; they only asked for their rights to be observed. Therefore, this movement’s claims seeming so obviously reasonable to the pressing majority of Americans quickly found an agitated response throughout the country. The just, fair outrage that millions of Americans had accumulated for decades of the segregation policy was freed during demonstrations and rallies, showing to the world that the USA did not correspond to the vision of a democracy that it officially pursued. Intense media coverage of rallies, manifestations, and marches organized by Americans in search of new standards of democracy showed the dark side of the US democracy to the whole world, which was a very beneficial move in the period of the Cold War, when the USA was considered a role model of a democratic state protecting freedoms and rights of all its citizens. Thus, civil rights advocates of the 1960s were “speaking truth to power” under the close gaze of millions of international reporters’ video cameras (Gosse, 5). While the whole world was watching the process of regaining democracy in the USA, America had no other option but to transform in accordance with the needs and wishes of its nation, which was the only way to save its image of a democratic state.
The significance of Civil Rights movements’ purpose and mission can hardly be overestimated, both in the context of the 1960s and in the modern American society. However, documents compiled by Gosse are also very eloquent regarding the meaningfulness of Civil Rights protectors’ claims. For instance, the inspiring letter of Martin Luther King Jr. during his Birmingham jail imprisonment and the letter of Sally Belfrage titled Remembering Freedom Summer show how dedicated the civil rights advocates were to their mission and how strong their beliefs in righteousness of their struggle were (Gosse, 2005). Moreover, such documents as the ten-point program of the Black Panther Party for Self-defence and the speech of Stokely Carmichael and Charles V. Hamilton titled Black Power symbolize the rising consciousness of the black American community, which was instrumental in the final civil rights revolution in the USA (Gosse). The Black Panther movement wanted equal rights for blacks and to achieve that goal Carmichael explained that “group solidarity is necessary before a group can operate effectively from a bargaining position of strength in a pluralistic society” (Document 24, Gosse, 111).
Summing up the presented argument, one has to note that the epoch of New Left movements was a period of fundamental change in the US society, which occurred because the claims of revolutionaries were relevant and burning for the overwhelming portion of the US population. Women, black people, gay people, disabled individuals, and other categories of the US nation that were previously ignored and denied their natural rights made their voices sound louder in the political and social context of the USA, and made their struggle public for the global community, which guaranteed a quick and productive outcome of those movements’ struggle. The most significant movement with the most valuable legacy up to nowadays is the Civil Rights movement that ended discrimination and segregation of black Americans and established conceptually new standards of democracy and equality in the American society. The New Left revolutionary movements, especially the Civil Rights movement, show that people with a serious intent can change a nation. Gosse (38) reminds US a question posed by Martin Luther King still has relevance “Where do we go from here?”
References
Carmichael, Stokely. “Black Power” Washington, D.C. October 29, 1966.
Gosse, V. (2005). The movements of the new left, 1950-1975: A brief history with documents. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s.
Johnson, Lyndon B. “The American Promise: The Special Message to the Congress.” March 15, 1965. Washington, D.C. Address to Congress.
Lewis, John. “Wake Up America!” SpeechWashington D.C. August 28 1963
