What Does it Mean to See a Black Church Burning?
What Does it Mean to See a Black Church Burning?

Michele M. Simmsparris


Excerpted from, What Does it Mean to See a Black Church Burning? Understanding the Significance of Constitutionalizing Hate Speech, 1 University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law 127-151 (Spring 1998) (Citations and Footnotes Omitted)

A. A Historical Background of the Significance of Black Churches: Beyond a Monolithic Construct of African-American Religion and Religiosity

Notions of religious faith and freedom have shaped much of American political and social philosophy. For many Americans religion is not just a way of thinking, but a way of life. In African-American history, "the church" has long stood at the center of Black communities establishing itself as the pre-eminent source for religious enrichment and secular development.

To capture a sense of the shared historical experiences of African- Americans, in particular African-American Christians, the phrase "the Black Church" evolved. The phrase has developed into a term of art for expressing the centrality of Black churches in Black communities. Although the term, "the Black Church" isa bit misleading, it presents a tangible quality to the intricacies of racial and religious interstionality unique to African- American history. For many African-American Christians, despite their denominational differences, Black churches have always represented a triumvirate of religion, community, and home. Thus, in an attempt to convey the significance of Black Churches in Black communities, scholars have repeatedly asserted that "Black history and Black church history intersect[ed] at so many points as to be virtually identical." Hence, despite the presence of myriad factions of Black churches in America, the depiction of the monolithic Black Church is pervasive throughout African-American historiography as a matter of historical course.

Even though history illustrates many moments in which the social and political experiences of African-Americans either affected or were affected by Black churches, aspects of Black history and Black church histories in many ways remained distinct. In essence, the term "the Black Church" is a misnomer. The term "the Black church" implies that all Black churches share or have shared the same aspirations and strategies for creating cohesive African-American communities. This is far from true.

A deconstruction of the monolithic Black church begins with the acknowledgment of the innumerable differences found among Black communities and the reflection of those differences within their community churches. Black communities differed from region to region. They were divided along social lines, composed of persons from different economic levels, and maintained varying political philosophies. Black communities in the inner cities of the United States have traditionally differed from those in rural areas. Ultimately, the needs and concerns of the members of these varying communities were also dissimilar from area to area. Therefore, like all other Americans, social stratification was a reality of Black Americans. For African-Americans such stratification was affected by the wide range of attitudes toward race, class, gender, education and political affiliation. The social differences that countenanced each sub- community of the larger Black community was also reflected in the identities of Black Churches.

The diversity of Black communities was reflected in the variety of Black Churches. African-American community churches varied in denominational affiliations, theological practice, and regional location. In The Negro Church in America, the sociologist E. Franklin Frazier noted, "Methodist and Baptist denominations were separate church organizations based upon distinctions of color and what were considered standards of civilized behavior." Not only did Black churches differ culturally and ideologically, but each church also differed in the ways it evolved.

Many Black churches were created in response to racial segregation. Many African-American churches were established in response to African-American dissatisfaction with the teachings of "white churches." Some were established simply to bring varying forms of Christianity into Black communities which already had either one or several established Black churches. Consequently, the concerns of independent Black churches reflected the varying concerns of their congregants.

Nevertheless, despite their regional, denominational, and theological differences, Black churches maintained striking commonalities. Black churches were consistently at the social and religious centers of Black communities. The interwoven fabric of the secular and the ecclesiastical within many Black religious institutions created a base upon which African-Americans could organize politically and persist spiritually. Black churches were not only given to the teachings of Christianity but they were faithfully relied upon to address the specific issues which affected their members.

Since the establishment of the first independent African-American church in America in 1773, Black churches have flourished. Even though many African-American churches were created in reaction to racial discrimination and segregation, what developed was more than separate places to worship for African-Americans. Instead, churches became religious institutions devoted to addressing the needs of members of the Black community.



B. Understanding the Church as a Community

The Negro church was not only an arena of political life for the leaders of Negroes, it had a political meaning for the masses. Although they were denied the right to vote in the American community, within their churches, especially the Methodist Churches, they could vote and engage in electing their officers. The election of bishops and other officers and representatives to conventions has been a serious activity for the masses of Negroes . . . . For the Negro masses, in their social and moral isolation in American society, the Negro church community has been a nation within a nation.

In church-centered Black communities, the relationship between one's community and one's church was intimate. Far more than just a place to worship, the Black Church was a nation within a nation. The meshing of Black community life with the religious experiences of African- Americans precipitated the birth of the dichotomy between church and religion found within the construction of Black religions. For many African- Americans, church was not only a place to receive religious instruction on the doctrines of Christianity, church was a community in which to learn about one's world.

Black churches were organizational sites for social and political activities, centers for economic development and growth. As microcosms of the larger society, Black churches provided an environment free of oppression and racism for African-Americans. In Black Churches, African-Americans were consistently exposed to social, political, and economic opportunities which could be sought and had by all members equally.

The representational structure of African-American churches confirmed Black preachers as both religious and community leaders. The sermons of many Black preachers expounded messages of Christianity analogized to the daily experiences of African-Americans. Thematic expressions of overcoming oppression and "lifting while climbing," were first articulated in church sermons.

Using their authority as religious leaders, Black preachers incorporated the teachings of Christianity into political manifestos. Slavery, emancipation, and the continued struggle for civil rights, provided the con**** for analysis of Biblical stories such as the escape of the Jews from Egypt. The idea of "freedom through collective deliverance," as articulated in the Book of Exodus, gave African-Americans a sense of political and community direction through religious belief and expression. The notion of divine intervention which permeated the lessons of Exodus did not translate seamlessly into a positive mandate for African-Americans to overcome oppression. Yet, the teachings of African-American churches nurtured the motivations of Black people to oppose and overcome racial persecution. African-Americans' belief in divine intervention, coupled with a community spirit to struggle and to overcome social, political, and economic hardships, inspired many Black Church members.



C. Finding a Home in the Church

During the decades of slavery in America, slave associations were a constant source of concern to slave owners. For many members of white society, Black churches and religious meetings symbolized the ultimate threat to white existence. Nevertheless, African-American slaves established and relied heavily on their churches. "Religion offered a means of catharsis . . . African-Americans retained their faith in God and found refuge in their churches." However, white society was not always willing to accept the involvement of slaves in Christianity. As one slave recounted "[t]he white folks would come in when the colored people would have prayer meeting, and whip everyone of them. Most of them thought that when colored people were praying it was against them."

Religious exercises of slaves were closely watched to detect plans for escape or insurrection. African-American churches took on an air of militancy in the eyes of white Americans. Insurrections such as Nat Turner's in Virginia, born out of the religious inspiration of slaves, horrified white Americans. Understanding the potential end which could result from the religious experiences of African-American slaves, many white Americans opposed the participation of Blacks in Christianity.

Despite the social adversity that opposed their existence, Black churches were established, and served as integral parts ofBlack communities. According to E. Franklin Frazier, during times of slavery, and well after emancipation, "the [Negro] church gave support to [Negro] family life [and was] the most important agency of social control [among Negroes]." Insofar as whites could not understand and were afraid of Black religiosity, "the Negro church with its [unique] forms of religious worship was a world which the white man did not invade." Therefore, out of this history of separation and exclusion, Black Churches rooted themselves as the souls of the communities in which they stood.

After emancipation, as racial domination thrived in reconfigured forms, Black churches became virtually the only place for African-Americans to find refuge. As African-American Christians moved from slavery to emancipation their religious practices and houses of worship also changed. They moved away from the "hush-harbors" that they retreated to for solace as slaves, and built churches. Just as the prayer meetings which took place in slave "cabin room[s]" were devoted to countless pleas for deliverance from slavery, the sermons that were given in Black churches addressed the post-emancipation needs and concerns of members of Black communities.

Inevitably, Black churches became sources for Black empowerment. Black churches, such as H.H. Proctor's Congregational Church housed schools, employment bureaus, ****ters for the aged and orphans, and meeting places. "In 1886 [African-Americans] organized the National Baptist Convention, in an attempt to reduce the influence of white national bodies among blacks." Black churches worked collectively to deal with Black issues, especially racial discrimination in segregated schools, neighborhoods, and businesses.

As racially motivated violence and terrorism ran rampant across the country, Black churches were staunch in their resistance. In 1908, The Christian Index published the "Colored Methodist Bishops' Appeal to White America-1908." In their statement, church leaders responded to the surge of mob violence and lynchings occurring across the country, denouncing terrorism waged against Black persons and imploring the country to suppress the spread of anti-Black violence. As anti-Black terrorism proliferated into the twentieth century, Black churches grew increasingly vehement in their calls for castigation of racial violence. However the more involved Black Churches became in sparring against the racial intolerance and violence targeted against them, the more the churches and their members were chastised.

By the commencement of the Civil Rights era, Black churches were well established social and political power bases for African-Americans. The enormous presence of Black churches in African-American communities, naturally, sanctioned them with the political power to lead Black people in the movement for civil rights. Yet, Black Churches were torn on whether and how best to get involved in the movement. Some churches and church organizations were completely opposed to any involvement in the political struggle for civil rights. Yet, those that chose to participate did so fervently, organizing by rallies, protests, and marches, while teaching the lessons of Christianity and community involvement. Ultimately, racism made individual African-Americans the targets of racial violence. Racism plus the concentrated political power of African-Americans in Black churches confirmed African-American churches as the central targets for racial violence waged against the entire Black community.



D. Sometimes When There's Racial Hate . . . There's Fire

Extra-legal violence has been an effective means of communicating racial hatred throughout American history, especially as a method of social and physical control. Fire in particular was used not only to inflict physical harm upon disfavored persons in communities, but to send messages which threatened further harm to either persons or property. The pages of American-African history ******** an undeniable record of the racially motivated use of fire to either threaten or inflict harm upon African- Americans.

During the Civil Rights Movement, "the church functioned as the institutional center" for Black mobilization. Churches provided "an organized mass base and meeting place," for African-Americans to strategize their moves in the fight against racial segregation and oppression. As Black Churches became the epicenter of the social and political struggles for African-American equality, they increasingly became targets for racially motivated violence. Thus, a broad assault on members of a Black community could effectively take place by burning a Black church. The bombing and burning of Black churches translated into an attack upon the core of civil rights activism, as well as upon the larger Black community.

The most infamous example of church destruction, occurred on Sunday, September 15, 1963. When the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, was fire bombed, the explosion was felt by the entire Black community. Not only were four children killed in the attack and several people injured, but a community's sense of security within their church was forever shaken.

The burning of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church signified the depths to which racial hatred could fall. Like many other churches bombed before and after, the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was attended predominantly by African-Americans. Throughout the Civil Rights Movement, the Church was active in the struggle to desegregate southern public schools and supported the call for equal rights for Black people in America. Even though the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) was implicated in this crime, members of the KKK were not the only persons responsible for similar acts of terror throughout the country. Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident.

In January 1957, four Black Churches were bombed in Montgomery, Alabama. In April, two were burned in Bessemer, Alabama. In 1958, burned churches were reported in Birmingham and Memphis. In 1959, a church was reported to have been burned in Roscoe, Georgia. In 1963, a church was reported to have been bombed in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. In Vicksburg, Mississippi, two people were killed in a church that had been used to register for Black voters when it was bombed in 1964.

Starting in 1964, Meridian, Mississippi, was added to the list of places in which Black churches were attacked. In January 1968, two more Black churches were bombed in Meridian. On February 22, the New Hope Baptist Church, "site of a Head Start program and civil rights activities," was torched. On February 23, the parsonage of the Newell Chapel Methodist Church was finally burned after a previous failed attempt.

As a result of the violence, some churches were forced into social incapacitation. Members of the First Union Baptist Church in Meridian were so afraid of being bombed that they opposed using the church for a much needed Head Start Program. Thus, racially motivated arsons, though not successful in destroying the souls of Black communities, managed nonetheless to inflict a significant amount of harm on churches, their congregants, and surrounding communities. FN110] In the end, the message of racial hate was burned into the memories of African-Americans and revisits us every time one of our churches burn.

Black Church fires set by arsonists in the 1990s revivify images of Black people excluded from participating in the Christian faith, lynched by angry mobs, and watching their churches torched during the 1950s and 1960s. Images of anti-Black terrorism are so indelible that they are recreated as African-American churches burn in the 1990s. In places like Amite County, Mississippi, during the last year, the smoking remains of burned or burning Black churches have re-inscribed the message of racial hatred which permeated the 1960s.

In Amite County, Mississippi, racial hate is unquestionably apparent. Graffiti writings of scrawled racial epithets and swastikas on the walls of burned Black churches articulate the unrelenting presence of racism. It is not surprising that Amite County, once deemed one of the two most notorious "church burning capitals of the world," is again a major target for attack. In Amite County, "Black residents [here] have long been the victims of [other] racially motivated attacks--mailbox shootings, cross burnings, hooded Klansmen yelling racist slurs while riding through Black neighborhoods." Such incidents illustrate how far we have not come with regard to eradicating racial terrorism. Therefore, when the Springhill Freewill Baptist Church was burned in 1996, the flames rekindled the fear and outrage produced by the burning of Black Churches a generation earlier.

The arsons of the 1990s inspire fear based not only on what was learned in Black history books, but rather on the recollections of real experiences. Margaret Tobias, a current resident of Amite County, not only "witnessed church bombings of the 1960s, she survived an attempted arson on her home in 1965." Now, thirty years later, as member of the Springhill Freewill Baptist Church, Tobias is, again, a witness and victim of church desecration.

Among the most disturbing aspects of the burning of Black Churches today is the demolition of the comfortable myth that such acts of terrorism ended with the Civil Rights Movement. According to the late Rev. Dr. Mac Charles Jones, former Associate to the General Secretary for Racial Justice, National Council of Churches, "[o]ver the past four years (1992-1996) there have been more Black Churches burned than during the entire Civil Rights Movement." From January of 1995 through July of 1996, more than seventy Black and multiracial churches were burned. More churches were burned during that eighteen month period than during the previous five years combined. As one commentator wrote, the era of "night riders, cross burnings, church burnings, home burnings, and farm burnings" was thought to have passed. Instead the burnings of Black Churches across the country teach us that racial violence is an ugly fact of our American reality.

To burn a Black Church is to conjure up images of past and future fires set to harm members of Black communities. It is in this con**** of violence and the communication of violence that incidents of cross burning like that which was addressed by our nation's Supreme Court in R.A.V. must be understood. Con****ually the historically racist meaning of fire as a threat is understood by arsonists and victims alike. Consequently, whether fire is used to burn a cross or a church such expression must not be viewed solely as "speech," but rather as an incontrovertible threat.

Fundamental to the problem of racial terrorism is our government's willingness to constitutionalize hateful speech, which creates an environment that nourishes hatred against Black communities and results in burned churches. By the time a church is burned to the ground the harm has already been done, and in every case the harm is irreparable. Although some may argue that there is a clear difference between cross burning and church burning, given the history of the expressive meaning of both such argument would stand without merit. R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul vividly illustrates the consequences of inaction in the face of racial intolerance.

Black Churches Torched
Black Churches Torched


https://www.ncfbc.org/html/news.html#JUL2007

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Selective Chronology
Julian Bond

1900
July 24-27 Black homes and schools destroyed in New Orleans race riot.

August 12 Whites attack blacks in New York.

November 6 William McKinley reelected President; Theodore Roosevelt elected Vice-President.

1901
March 4 North Carolina’s George H. White Leaves Congress; last black member for more than 25 years.

September 6 President McKinley assassinated. Roosevelt succeeds him.

October 16 Booker T. Washington (BTW) dines with President Roosevelt at The White House, creating and uproar.

1903
W.E.B. Du Bois’ (WEBD’s) Souls of Black Folk is published, Helping to organize criticism of BTW.

1904
August 16 Paul Reed and Willis Cato seized from jailers at their murder trial In Statesboro, Georgia, and burned alive.

1905
July 11-13 A group of black intellectuals meets near Niagara Falls and adopts resolutions demanding racial equality.

1906
April 13 Clashes erupt after white civilians taunt black soldiers in Brownsville, Texas; three white men die. President Roosevelt dishonorably discharges the soldiers.

September 22-24 Twenty-one die in Atlanta race riot.

1908
White anti-black riot in Abraham Lincoln’s hometown, Springfield, Illinois, prompts concerned whites to call for a conference which leads to founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909.

November 3 William Howard Taft elected President.

1909
February 12 White liberals and black intellectuals, including Jane Addams, Mary White Ovington, WEBD, Oswald Garrison Villard, and John Dewey form the NAACP.

March 31 U.S. occupation of Cuba ends.

November 18 U.S. warships ordered to Nicaragua.

1910
April The National Urban League (NUL) is formed in New York.

1911
March 7 Twenty Thousand U.S. troops dispatched to Mexican border.

1912
November 5 Woodrow Wilson elected President.

1914
April 21 U.S. forces seize customs house at Vera Cruz, Mexico; Marines occupy the city.

June 28 Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand assassinated.

1915
January 14 Two hundred whites storm jail in Monticello, Georgia, and lynch four blacks, members of Daniel Barber family.

June 21 Supreme Court outlaws “grandfather clauses” used to deny blacks the franchise in Guinn v. United States.

December 4 Dormant Ku Klux Klan revived under new charter granted by Georgia.

1916
March U.S. troops enter Mexico in search of Pancho Villa.

May U.S. Marines land in Santa Domingo, remain until 1924.

November Woodrow Wilson reelected President.

1917
April 2 Jeannette Rankin of Montana becomes first woman seated in House of Representatives.

April 16 United States enters World War I. Three hundred thousand blacks will serve in the war; 1400 will be commissioned as officers.

July 1-3 At least 40 blacks killed in East St. Louis, Illinois, race riot.

July 28 NAACP organizes a silent march of 10,000 down Fifth Avenue to protest racism.

August 23 Black soldiers and white civilians clash in Houston, Texas; 17 whites, two blacks are killed. Thirteen blacks are later executed.

1918
February 19-21 Organized by WEBD, the first Pan-African Congress meets in Paris, concurrently with the Paris Peace Conference.

July 13- October 1 More than 25 race riots occur across U.S., leaving over 100 dead and thousands wounded. Eighty-three lynchings recorded in 1918.

November 11 World War I ends.

1920
August 1-2 Marcus Garvey’s (MG’s) Universal Negro Improvement Association’s (UNIA’s) National Convention meets in New York; MG speaks to 25,000 at Madison Square Garden

November 2 Warren G. Harding elected President.

1922-23
October to October An estimated 500,000 blacks leave the South. Klan violence increases. Oklahoma placed under martial law because of terrorist activity by Klan.

1925
May 8 A. Phillip Randolph (APR) organizes the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.

August 8 Forty Thousand Ku Klux Klansmen march down Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue.

1926
May 10 U.S. Marines land in Nicaragua.

1927
March 7 In Nixon v Herndon, the Supreme Court strikes down a Texas law excluding blacks from Democratic primaries.

December MG, convicted in 1925 for mail fraud, released from federal prison and deported.

1928
November 6 Herbert Hoover elected President. Illinois Republican Congressman Oscar DePriest elected, the first black since 1901.

1929
January 15 Martin Luther King Jr. (MLK) born in Atlanta.

October 29 Stock market crashes, beginning of Great Depression. Ten lynchings recorded in 1929.

1930
March 31 After President Hoover nominates North Carolina Judge John J. Parker to the Supreme Court, the NAACP leads a successful campaign against his nomination.

June 7 The New York Times announces that the word “Negro” will be spelled with a capital “N.”

1931
April 6 Nine black youths accused of raping two white women go on trial in Scottsboro, Alabama.

1932
November 8 Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) is elected President, promising a “New Deal” to fight the Depression.

1934
July Souther Tenant Farmers’ Union organized.

November 7 Black Democrat Arthur Mitchell defeats Rep. DePriest in Chicago.Elijah Muhammad-born Elijah Poole in Georgia in 1897- succeeds W.S. Fard as leader of the Nation of Islam.

1935
June 25 Joe Louis defeats Primo Carnera at Yankee Stadium.

1936
August 9 American Olympian Jesse Owens wins four Gold medals at the Summer Olympics in Berlin, embarrassing Adolph Hitler.

December 8 NAACP successfully files Gibbs v. Board of Education in Montgomery County, Maryland, equalizing white and black teachers’ salaries.

November 3 FDR reelected.

1937
March 26 William H. Hastie becomes the first black federal judge.

June 22 Joe Louis becomes the heavyweight champion by defeating James J. Braddock.

1938
December 12 In Missouri ex rel. Gaines the Supreme Court Rules states must provide equal, if separate, facilities within their boundaries.

1939
March Daughters of the American Revolution refuses Marian Anderson permission to sing at Washington’s Constitution Hall; Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes arranges her appearance on Easter Sunday at the Lincoln Memorial, where 75,000 gather to hear.

September 3 Great Britain and France declare war on Germany.

October 11 NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund is organized.

1940
February Richard Wright’s Native Son becomes a best seller.

March Hattie McDaniel becomes the first black to receive and Oscar for her role as “Mammy” in “Gone With the Wind.”

April Virginia Legislature adopts black composer James A. Bland’s “Carry Me To Old Virginny” as the state song.

May 26-June 4 British Expeditionary Forces retreat from Dunkirk.

June 10 MG dies in London.

September 27 FDR meets with black leaders to discuss discrimination in the military.

October 8 Senate kills anti-lynching bill.

October 9 White House declares War Department policy is “not to intermingle colored and white enlisted personnel in the same regimental organizations.”

October 16 Benjamin O. Davis Sr. makes Brigadier General, becoming the highest ranking black in the armed services.

October 25 FDR meets with Committee on Participation of Negros in the National Defense Program.

November 5 FRD reelected; Henry Wallace elected Vice-President.

1941
April 12 APR announces “plans for and all-out March of ten-thousand Negroes on Washington are in the making” to protest discrimination in the defense industries and the military.

April 28 Supreme Court rules that separate railroad facilities must be substantially equal.

May 1 March on Washington (MOW) Committee issues a formal call for a July 1 march.

June 13 New York Mayor Fiorella LaGuardia and Eleanor Roosevelt met with APR and MOW leadership.

June 15 FDR issues a memorandum saying “I shall expect the Office of Production Management to take immediate steps to facilitate the full utilization of our productive manpower.”

June 18 FDR meets with MOW Committee leaders.

June 22 Nazi Germany invades the Soviet Union.

June 25 FDR issues Executive Order 8802 establishing the Fair Employment Practices Commission (EEPC).

June 28 APR announces the MOW will be postponed.

October 20-21 FEPC holds its first hearings in Los Angeles.

December 7 Japanese attack Pearl Harbor; U.S. enters World War II December 8.

1942
March Fifty black organizations declare “that the Negro people were cool to the war effort because of continued racial discrimination.”

June 16 Eighteen thousand blacks pack a New York MOW rally.

June 26 Twenty-six thousand overflow Chicago MOW rally.

June Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) is organized by and interracial group in Chicago.

November 3 Democrat William L. Dawson elected to Congress from Chicago.

1943
May 12-August 2 Forty killed in race riots; troops called out in Mobile and Detroit.

1944
April 3 In Smith v Allwright the Supreme Court rules the white-only primary unconstitutional.

August 1 New York Democrat Adam Clayton Powell elected to Congress.

November 7 FDR reelected President.

December 13 Black women permitted to enter the Women’s Naval Corps (WAVES).

1945
March 12 New York establishes the first state FEPC

April 12 FDR dies; Harry S. Truman (HST) succeeds him.

May 7 Germany surrenders.

June United Nations Charter Approved.

July 16 First atomic bomb exploded.

August 6 Hiroshima destroyed by U.S. atomic bomb.

September 2 Japan surrenders; World War II ends. More than one million blacks served.

1946
February 7 Senate filibuster kills bill for permanent FEPC.

February Malcolm Little sentenced to ten years in Massachusetts prison for burglary.

June 3 In Morgan v Virginia the Supreme Court outlaws segregation in interstate bus travel.

December 5 HST names committee on Civil Rights to investigate racial injustice.

1947
April 9 CORE sends “Freedom Riders” on a Journey of Reconciliation through the upper South to test Morgan v Virginia.

April 10 Jackie Robinson joins the Brooklyn Dodgers.

October 29 HST’s President Committee on Civil Rights releases “To Secure These Rights.”

1948
January 12 In Sipuel v University of Oklahoma the Supreme Court rules a state must provide a legal education for blacks if it offers a legal education to whites.

March 31 APR tells a U.S. Senate Committee he will urge black youth to refuse induction in the armed services unless discrimination in the Selective Service System is ended.

May 3 In ****ley v Kraemer the Supreme Court rules restrictive housing covenants unenforceable.

June 9 Attorney Oliver Hill elected to the Richmond, Virginia, City Council.

July 14 Southerners walk out of the Democratic National Convention to protest a civil rights plank.

July 26 HST issues Executive Orders 9980 and 9981 creating a Fair Employment Board to end racial discrimination in federally employment and a President’s Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services.

November 2 HST elected President.

1950
June 5 In Sweatt v Painter the Supreme Court rules that equality in education requires more than identical physical facilities. In McLaurin v Oklahoma the Court rules that, once admitted to a previously all-white school, a black student cannot be segregated within the school.

June 27 U.S. enters the Korean War.

1951
February 2 Martinsville Seven executed in Richmond for raping a white woman.

April 24 University of North Carolina admits its first black student.

May 8 Willie McGee executed in Mississippi for raping a white woman.

May 24 Washington D.C., court outlaws segregation in District restaurants.

July 12 Illinois Governor Adlai Stevenson calls out the National Guard to suppress a riot against a black family who moved into an all-white neighborhood in Cicero, Illinois.

October 1 The 24th Infantry, the last all-black Army unity, deactivated.

December 25 NAACP leaders Harry T. and Harriet Moore assassinated in Mims, Florida.

1952
January 12 University of Tennessee admits black students.

August Malcolm Little released from Massachusetts prison.

November 4 Dwight D. Eisenhower (DDE) elected President; Richard M. Nixon (RN) elected Vice-President.

December 30 Tuskegee Institute reports 1952 was the first lynching-free year in seventy-one years.

1953
March 5 Jospeh Stalin dies.

May 7 French forces surrender at Dien Bien Phu in Vietnam.

June 8 In District of Columbia v John R. Thompson Co., Inc. the Supreme Court upholds desegregation of Washington’s restaurants.

June 19 Bus boycott protesting unequal treatment begins in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

June 27 Korean armistice signed.

June Dr. Walter Ridley becomes first black graduate of a University of Virginia professional school.

August 4 Riot against integrated housing begins in Chicago.

August 20 Soviet Union announces the explosion of a hydrogen bomb.

1954
May 17 In Brown v Board of Education the Supreme Court rules unanimously that segregated public schools are inherently unequal and unconstitutional, overturning 1896’s Plessy v. Ferguson.

June 29 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) sponsored coup overthrows the government of Guatemala.

July First “White Citizens Council” organized in Indianola, Mississippi.

July 21 U.S. refuses to sign Geneva Accord on Indochina.

September 7-8 Public schools in Baltimore, Maryland, and Washington, D.C., desegregated.

September Bobby Bland enters the University of Virginia Engineering School.

November 2 Black Detroit Democrat Charles Diggs elected to Congress.

October White Citizens Council chapter organized in Selma, Alabama.

1955
January 18 DDE established President’s Committee on Government Policy to enforce a non-discriminatory policy in federal hiring.

April 11 Roy Wilkins becomes the NAACP’s Executive Secretary.

May 7 NAACP leader Rev. George Wesley Lee killed in Belzoni, Mississippi.

May 31 In Brown II, the Supreme Court orders schools integrated “with all deliberate speed.”

July 22 Alabama enacts a “Pupil Placement Law” to circumvent school desegregation.

August 1 Georgia teachers are ordered by the State Board of Education to resign from the NAACP or face firing.

August 13 Political activist Lamar Smith killed in Brookhaven, Mississippi.

August 28 Fourteen-year old Emmett Till kidnapped and murdered in Money, Mississippi

November 25 Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) prohibits segregation in public vehicles and waiting rooms used in interstate travel.

October 10 Supreme Court orders Autherine Lucy admitted to the University of Alabama.

October 22 John Earl Reese killed in Mayflower, Texas, by nightriders opposed to black school improvements.

December 1 Rosa Parks arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus.

December 5 Parks convicted; a successful one-day boycott held to protest her arrest. MLK is elected leader of boycott organization, the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA).

1956
January 30 MLK home bombed in Montgomery.

February 1 MIA files lawsuit against bus segregation.

February 3 Autherine Lucy admitted to the University of Alabama.

February 7 Alabama students riot; Lucy suspended.

February 21 Montgomery grand jury indicts 115 boycott leaders. Bayard Rustin arrives in Montgomery to advise MLK.

February 28 Rustin, Stanley, Levison, Ella J. Baker organize “In Friendship” in New York to assist southern activists.

February 29 Lucy expelled for making “false” and “outrageous” statements about university officials.

March 11 Nineteen senators and 81 representatives in Southern Manifesto, promise to use “all lawful means” to reverse Brown v Board of Education.

March 22 MLK convicted of leading illegal boycott.

April South Carolina State College students boycott classes to protest official harassment of NAACP.

April 11 Singer Nat “King” Cole attacked on stage in Birmingham.

April 23 Supreme Court overturns South Carolina bus segregation law.

May 27 Florida A&M University students in Tallahassee begin boycott of segregated busses.

June 1 Alabama outlaws NAACP.

June 5 Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and others organize the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR) in Birmingham.

June 5 In Browder v Gayle three-judge district court rules Montgomery’s bus segregation is legal.

June 30 Tallahassee bus service suspended.

October 23 Hungarian uprising begins.

November 4 Soviet troops attack Budapest and crush Hungarian revolt.

November 6 DDE defeats Stevenson soundly.

November 13 Supreme Court affirms Montgomery bus segregation ruling.

December 20 MIA ends bus boycott.

December 23 Tallahassee boycott ends; city continues segregation.

December 25 Bomb destroys Shuttlesworth’s home.

December 26 Shuttlesworth, others arrested for breaking Birmingham’s bus segregation law.

December 27 Tallahassee bus segregation declared illegal.

1957
January 10-11 Sixty meet at Atlanta’s Ebeneezer Baptist Church to form “Southern Leadership Conference on Transportation and Nonviolence”; MLK is chosen Chairman.

January 23 Willie James Edwards forced by Klansmen to jump to his death from a railroad bridge in Montgomery.

February 14 MLK is elected President of Southern Negro Leadership Conference in New Orleans.

March MLK visits Ghana to attend independence ceremonies.

May 17 MLK addresses 15,000 at Prayer Pilgrimage in Washington at Lincoln Memorial.

June MLK meets Vice President RN. Blacks at Tuskegee, Alabama, begin boycott to protest gerrymander removing nearly all blacks from city limits.

August Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) hold first convention in Montgomery.

September 9 Civil Rights Act becomes law.

September 24-25 DDE orders federal troops into Little Rock to halt interference with integration of Central High School.

October 4 Soviet Union launches artificial satellite Sputnik.

1958
January Baker sets up SCLC offices in Atlanta.

January 31 U.S. launches satellite Explorer

February 12 SCLC begins “Crusade for Citizenship”

May Rev. John Tilley becomes SCLC Executive Director.

June 23 MLK, Roy Wilkins, APR and NUL’s Lester Granger meet with DDE

July 15 DDE sends U.S. Marines to Lebanon

August 19 NAACP Youth Council members in Oklahoma city begin lunch counter sit-in demonstrations.

September 3 MLK arrested in Montgomery.

September 20 MLK stabbed while autographing Stride Toward Freedom in New York.

October 12 Atlanta synagogue bombed.

1959
April 15 Tilley resigns; Baker replaces him on temporary basis.

April 25 Mack Charles Parker, accused of rape, is taken from his jail cell and lynched in Poplarville, Mississippi.

September 7 U.S. Civil Rights Commission asks DDE to appoint federal registrars in areas where blacks are denied vote.

December Fidel Castro’s revolutionaries overthrow Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista.

1960
February 1 Four Greensboro students stage sit-in at Wollworth’s Department store.

February 17 Alabama grand jury indicts MLK for tax evasion.

March National Liberation Front (NLF) steps up was against U.S. backed Diem regime in South Vietnam.

March 3 Vanderbilt University expels James Lawson for sit-in participation.

March 7 Felton Turner of Houston beaten and hung-upside down in a tree, initials KKK carved on his chest.

March 19 San Antonio becomes first city to integrate lunch counters.

March 20 Florida Governor Leroy Collins calls lunch counter segregation “unfair and morally wrong.”

April 8 Weak civil rights bill survives Senate filibuster.

April 15-17 Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) organized at SCLC-sponsored conference at Shaw University, Raleigh, North Carolina.

April 19 Nashville civil rights lawyer Z. Alexander Looby’s home bombed.

April 21 1960 Civil Rights Act becomes law.

May 5 Soviet Union announces it has shot down a U.S. U-2 spy plane.

May 28 All white Alabama jury acquits MLK.

June 24 MLK meets Senator John F. Kennedy (JFK).

June 28 Rustin resigns from SCLC after condemnation by Rep. Powell.

July SCLC volunteer Robert Moses, traveling for SNCC, meets Amzie Moore in Mississippi Delta.

July 31 Elijah Muhammad calls for an all-black state. Membership in Nation of Islam estimated at 100,000.

August Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker replaces Baker as SCLC’s Executive Director.

September North Vietnam backs NLF against U.S. backed Diem regime.

October 19 MLK, fifty others arrested at sit-in at Atlanta’s Rich’s Department Store.

October 26 MLK’s earlier probation revoked; transferred to Reidsville State Prison.

October 28 After intervention from Robert F. Kennedy (RFK), King is free on bond.

November 8 JFK defeats RN, inning by 119,000 votes out of 68,800,000 cast.

December In Boyunton v Virginia, Supreme Court prohibits segregation in waiting rooms and restaurants serving interstate bus passengers.

1961
January 11 Riot suspends two black students desegregating University of Georgia.

January 18 DDE’s farewell address warns against “acquisition of unwarranted influence…by the military-industrial complex.”

January 31 CORE’s Tom Gaither, nine students arrested in Rock Hill, South Carolina.

March 13 CORE announces Freedom Ride.

April 17 CIA trained Cuban exiles unsuccessfully invade Cuba.

May 4 CORE Freedom Ride begins from Washington D.C. to New Orleans to test Boynton v Virginia.

May 14 Freedom Riders attacked by mobs in Anniston, Alabama and Birmingham

May 17 Nashville students take up Freedom Ride.

May 20 Riders assaulted in Montgomery.

May 21-22 Riders besieged in Montgomery church; RFK sends federal marshals.

June-August Justice Department initiates talks with civil rights groups, foundations on beginning Voter Education Project (VEP).

July SCLC begins citizenship classes; Andrew J. Young hired to direct the program. Moses arrives in McComb.

September James Forman becomes SNCC’s Executive Secretary.

September 23 ICC, at RFK’s insistence, issues new rules ending discrimination in intersate travel, effective December 1, 1961.

September 25 Voter registration activist Herbert Lee killed in McComb, Mississippi.

October SNCC workers Charles Sherrod and Cordell Reagon arrive in Albany, Georgia.

November 17 Albany Movement formed

December 1 Albany “Freedom Riders” arrested.

December 11-15 Five hundred arrested in Albany.

December 16 MLK arrested in Albany

December 18 Albany truce; MLK leaves town.

1962
January 18-20 Student protests over sit-in leaders’ expulsions at Baton Rouge’s Southern University, the nation’s largest black school, close it down.

February 26 Segregated transportation facilities, both interstate and intrastate, rules unconstitutional by Supreme Court.

March SNCC workers sit-in RFK’s office to protest jailings in Baton Rouge.

March 20 FBI installs wiretaps on Levison’s office.

April 3 Full racial integration of military reserve units, except the National Guard, ordered by the Defense Department

April 9 Corporal Roman Duckworth shot by a police officer in Taylorsville, Mississippi.

June Leroy Willis becomes first black graduate of the University of Virginia College of Arts and Sciences.

June Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara visits South Vietnam, says, “We’re winning this war.”

June SNCC workers establish voter registration projects in rural Southwest Georgia.

July 10-August 28 SCLC renews protests in Albany; MLK in jail July 10-12 &July 27-August 10.

September 9 Two black churches used by SNCC for voter registration meetings burn in Sasser, Georgia.

September 30-Oct.1 Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black orders James Meredith admitted to Ole Miss. Meredith enrolls; riot ensues. French photographer Paul Guihard and Oxford resident Ray Gunter are killed.

October Leflore County, Mississippi, supervisors cut off surplus food distribution in retaliation against voter drive.

October 23 Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) begins Communist Infiltartion (COMINFIL) investigation of SCLC.

October 14-28 Cuban Missile Crisis

November 7-8 Edward Brooke selected Massachusetts Attorney General, Leroy Johnson Georgia State Senator, Augustus Hawkins first black from California in Congress.

November 20 RFK authorizes wiretap on Levison’s home telephone.

November 20 JFK upholds 1960 campaign promise to eliminate housing segregation with “stroke of a pen”.

1963
January SNCC’s Moses, six others, sue RFK and J. Edgar Hoover, FBI director, for failure to enforce laws demanding protection of civil rights workers

January 9-10 SCLC meets in Dorchester, Georgia, to plan Birmingham campaign.

January 28 Harvey Gantt enrolls in Clemson College

February SNCC workers begin project in Selma.

February 6 MLK and Walker meet in Birmingham with ACMHR Board.

February 28 SNCC worker Jimmy Travis shot outside Greenwood, Mississippi.

March 5 Mayoral results delay Birmingham campaign until run-off.

April 2 Albert Boutwell defeats Eugene “Bull” Connor for Mayor of Birmingham.

April 3 SCLC organizes ACMHR begin Birmingham protests.

April 12-20 MLK writes “Letter From Birmingham City Jail”

April 23 Baltimore postal worker and CORE volunteer William Moore killed in Atalla, Alabama, while on a march from Baltimore to Jackson, Mississippi.

May Buddhist revolt begins against Diem regime in South Vietnam.

May 2-7 SCLC organizes children’s demonstration in Birmingham.

May 8 SCLC suspends demonstrations.

May 10 ACHMR and SCLC sign Birmingham desegregation agreement.

May 31 Danville, Virginia, demonstrations begin.

June 11 Alabama Governor George C. Wallace fails to halt admission of black students at University of Alabama; JFK federalizes National Guard and promises additional civil rights legislation.

June 12 Mississippi NAACP Field Secretary Medgar Evers in assassinated in Jackson, Mississippi.

June 12 After night rioting, SCLC suspends demonstrations in Savannah, Georgia.

June 21 Danville grand jury indicts SNCC workers for “inciting the colored population to acts of violence against the white population.”

June-August Civil rights protests in almost every American city.

July 12 Modified martial law declared in Cambridge, Maryland

July 22 MLK and other civil rights leaders meet JFK to discuss March on Washington. Burke Marshall, RFK and JFK tell King to end relationship with Jack O’Dell and Levison.

July 22 FBI requests wiretaps on New York home of SCLC lawyer Clarence Jones; RFK approves.

August 2 Savannah desegregation agreement reached.

August Three SNCC workers and CORE worker indicted for inciting insurrection in Americus, Georgia. Federal grand jury in Macon indicts nine Albany Movement leaders and SNCC worker for conspiracy to obstruct justice.

August 28 Two hundred and fifty thousand at March on Washington as MLK gives “I Have A Dream” speech.

September 15 Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church bombed; four girls are killed. Later that day, a white youth shoots and kills 13-year-old Virgil Ware.

October 21 RFK approves wiretap on MLK’s home, New York and Atlanta SCLC offices

October 22 Two hundred and fifty thousand school children boycott Chicago’s segregated schools.

November 2 U.S. sanctioned coup in South Vietnam leads to Diem’s overthrow and murder

November 22 JFK assassinated in Dallas

December 3 MLK meets President Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ)

December 23 FBI holds Washington meeting to discuss discrediting MLK.

1964
January 5-7 FBI conducts microphone surveillance of MLK’s room at Washington’s Willard Hotel; 14 other “bugs” are used against him between January, 1964 and November, 1965

January 27 FBI installs “misur” (microphone surveillance) at MLK’s Milwaukee hotel room.

January 31 Louis Allen, witness to September 25, 1961 Herbert Lee slaying, killed in McComb.

January-February James Bevel and Diane Nash draft plan for massive Alabama right-to-vote demonstrations.

March 12 Malcom X announces withdrawal from the Nation of Islam.

March 28-April 4 SCLC demonstrations in St. Augustine, Florida

April 26 Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) founded in Jackson.

Spring Alabama Governor Wallace enters Democratic Presidential Primaries in Maryland, Wisconsin and Indiana.

June 13 Summer volunteers begin training in Oxford, Ohio

June 21 CORE worker Mickey Schwerner, volunteer Andrew Goodman & CORE volunteer James Chaney disappear near Philadelphia, Mississippi.

July 2 1964 Civil Rights Act-integrating public accommodations-becomes law.

July 7 FBI installs three additional “technical surveillances” at Atlanta SCLC office.

July 11 Ku Klux Klanmen shoot and kill Lt. Colonel Lemuel Augustus Penn near Colbert, Georgia

July 12 The lower half of Charles Eddie Moore’s body and the headless body of Henry Hezekiah Dee pulled from Mississippi River near Tallulah, Louisiana; FBI believes they were murdered by Klansmen May 2

July 18-August 30 Racial disturbances sweep urban America

July 29 SCLC, NAACP, and NUL agree to demonstrations moratorium until after the presidential election; SNCC and CORE reject moratorium.

July Walker leaves SCLC; Young becomes Executive Director

August 2-3 North Vietnamese boats allegedly attack U.S. ships in Gulf of Tonkin; LBJ orders retaliatory attack.

August 4 Bodies of Schwerner, Goodman, and Chaney are found in an earthen dam near Philadelphia, Mississippi.

August 7 House (416-0) and Senate (88-2) pass “Gulf of Tonkin Resolution,” approving U.S. action in Southeast Asia

August 22-27 MFDP contests seating of all-white regular Democrats at Atlantic City Convention.

August 28 Rioting breaks out in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

August 30 LBJ signs Economic Opportunity Act of 1964

September 6 14-year-ole Hearbert Oarsby’s body pulled from the Big Black River near Canton, Mississippi, dressed in CORE tee-shirt.

September 11 SNCC delegation visits Guinea, West Africa.

September 25 LBJ says “We don’t want our American boys to do the fighting for Asian boys. We don’t want to…get tied down in a land war in Asia.”

September 28-30 SCLC Convention endorses LBJ.

October 14 MLK wins Nobel Peace Prize

October SNCC’s John Lewis and Don Harris meet with Malcolm X in Nairobi.

October Nikita Krushchev falls from power in Soviet Union.

November 3 LBJ defeats Barry Goldwater with 61% of the popular vote.

November 18 Hoover calls MLK “the most notorious liar in America.”

1965
January 2 MLK,SCLC join Selma vote campaign.

January 5 MLK discovers FBI blackmail letter and tape.

February 1-5 MLK in Selma jail.

February 3 Malcolm X speaks in Selma

February 6 Viet Cong attack U.S. base at Pleiku; LBJ orders bombing of North Vietnam.

February 9 MLK discusses need for voting legislation with Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, Vice President Hubert Humphrey and LBJ.

February 18 State troopers attack marchers in Marion, Alabama, wounding Jimmie Lee Jackson

February 21 Malcolm X assassinated at New York’s Audubon Ballroom.

February 26 Jackson dies; Bevel proposes Selma to Montgomery March.

March 2 LBJ orders continuous bombing of North Vietnam.

March 7 Police, trooper attack marchers at Selma’s Edmund Pettus Bridge.

March 8 Three thousand five hundred U.S. Marines land at Da Nang.

March 9 MLK leads marchers to site of March 7 attack, turns around.

March 11 Rev. James Reeb dies after attack by Selma Whites.

March 15 LBJ announces voting rights legislation

March 16 SNCC Montgomery marchers attacked by mounted police.

March 22-25 Selma to Montgomery march. Detroit housewife Viola Liuzzo murdered as she drives marchers back to Selma.

April 17 Twenty-five thousand march against was in Washington; SNCC’s Moses speaks.

April 28 LBJ sends Marines to Dominican Republic

June 2 Black deputy sheriff Oneal Moore killed by nightriders near Varnado, Louisiana.

July 18 Willie Brewster killed by nightriders in Anniston, Alabama.

August 20 Seminary student Jonathan Daniels killed by deputy in Hayneville, Alabama.

June-September SCLC runs SCOPE program, registering voters in 51 Southern counties.

July 28 LBJ announces 50,000 additional U.S. troops will go to Vietnam.

August 6 Voting Rights Act becomes law.

August 11-16 Watts riot in Los Angeles;35 die

August 12 MLK calls for negotiated end to Vietname war; offers to act as negotiator.

October 15-16 Nationwide anti-war demonstrations held.

Oct-Dec. Bevel establishes SCLC presence in Chicago.

1966
January 3 Student civil rights activist Samuel Younge killed in dispute over wites-only restroom in Tuskegee, Alabama.

January 3 North Carolina civil rights attorney Floyd McKissick succeeds James Farmer as Director of CORE.

January 6 SNCC condemns U.S. policy in Vietnam as neocolonialist aggression.

January 7 MLK announces Chicago Freedom Movement.

January 10 Georgia legislature refuses to seat SNCC staff member Julian Bond.

March 22 Seven SNCC workers arrested in anti-apartheid protest at South African Consulate in New York.

May 16 Stokeley Carmichael succeeds Lewis as Chairman of SNCC

June 6 James Meredith shot while on “March Against Fear” in Mississippi.

June 7-26 MLK, Carmichael, McKissick and others continue Meredith’s march. SNCC’s Willie Ricks leads cries for “Black Power”

June 10 Ben Chester White killed by Klan in Natchez, Mississippi

July 1-9 CORE’s national convention endorses “Black Power.”

July 5 LBJ criticizes “Black Power.” Roy Wilkins calls it “a reverse Ku Klux Klan.”

July 12-15 West side riot in Chicago.

July 18-23 Cleveland riot.

July 30 Clarence Triggs slain by nightriders in Bogalusa, Louisiana.

July 30-August 25 Chicago Freedom Movement demonstrations

August Eighty member police strike force raids Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, SNCC office.

August 26 Chicago agreement ends protests

October 14 MLK refuses to sign statement condemning “Black Power”

November 14-16 at SCLC staff retreat, MLK urges shift toward socialism.

December 5 Supreme Court unanimously rules Bond must be allowed to take his seat in Georgia legislature.

1967
February 25 MLK delivers first public attack of war in Vietnam

February 27 NAACP activist Wharlest Jackson killed by bomb after promotion to a “white” job in Natchez, Mississippi.

March 25 MLK and Dr. Benjamin Spock lead anti-ear march in Chicago.

April 4 Two hundred thousand attend Spring Mobilization against the war; MLK speaks. Four hundred thousand march in New York April 15.

April 9 Carmichael and SNCC’s George War arrested in Nashvile for inciting to riot, SNCC office raided

May 11 National Guard fires on black student protest at Jackson State, killing civil rights worker Benjamin Brown.

May 12 H. Rap Brown succeeds Carmichael as SNCC Chairman

May 16 Police fire “several thousand rounds” on dormitories at Texas Southern University;481 arrested.

July LBJ authorizes increase in U.S. Vietnam forces from 480,000 to 525,000

July 12-15 Riot in Newark leaves 26 dead; in Detroit July 23-27, 43 dead

July H. Rap Brown arrested on federal charges of inciting Cambridge riot; Dayton, Ohio, charges with “criminal syndication;” Maryland indicts him on arson charge .He is arrested in New York for carrying a weapon across state lines while under indictment.

July 27 LBJ appoints National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders

August 26 FBI extends Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) to “Black Nationalist Hate Groups” including SCLC

October 2 Thurgood Marshall becomes first black Supreme Court Justice.

November 30 Senator Eugene McCarthy announces his candidacy for the Democratic Presidential nomination

1968
January 15-16 SCLC staff meets to prepare for Poor People’s Campaign

January 16 Lucius D. Amerson takes office in Macon County, Alabama, first black Southern sheriff since Reconstruction.

January 21 North Vietnamese troops attack U.S. base at Khe Sahn

January 23 North Korea seizes the USS Pueblo

January 31 Viet Cong guerrillas and North Vietnamese regulars launch the Tet offensive.

February 8 South Carolina State students Samuel Ephesians Hammond, Delano Herman Middleton and Henry Ezekial Smith killed, three wounded by South Carolina law enforcement officials firing at protesters.

February 12 Memphis sanitation workers strike for higher pay and union recognition.

February 23 Memphis police break up march of sanitation workers

February 29 Kerner Commission, named by LBJ to investigate riots, condemns white racism in U.S.

March 4 FBI plans to disrupt Poor People’s Campaign

March 12 McCarthy wins 42% of the vote in New Hampshire primary.

March 16 RFK announces he will be a Presidential candidate.

March 18 MLK speaks to Memphis sanitation workers and promises to lead a support march.

March 28 Sanitation workers march turns violent

March 31 LBJ says he will not run for reelection

April 4 MLK assassinated in Memphis. Ralph Abernathy succeeds him as SCLC President.

April 5-9 Widespread rioting across the U.S.; 39 die

April 9 MLK buried in Atlanta

April 10 Congress passes Civil Rights Act.

April 15 Chicago Mayor Richard Daley orders police to “shoot to kill”

April 16 Memphis sanitation workers win recognition, call off strike

May 12 Poor People’s Campaign opens in Washington D.C.

June 5 RFK shot in Los Angeles hotel.

June 6 RFK dies

June 17 Supreme Court rules against discrimination in the purchase or lease of property.

June 24 Police close down Poor People’s Resurrection City.

July 16 Poor People’s Campaign ends.

November 5 RN elected president, defeating Humphrey and Wallace. Democrat Shirley Chisholm defeats Republican James Farmer, becoming the first black women ever to serve in Congress. Eighty blacks elected across the South

https://www.outreach.olemiss.edu/Free...line.html#1900