Professor taylor focuses on the 1954 u. S. Supreme Court Decision in brown v. Board of education, the integration of a high school in little rock, arkansas, and the 1960 sit in at a lunch counter in greensboro, North Carolina. Folks, welcome to this class in africanAmerican History. Were going Movement Origin our discussion of the Civil Rights Movement tonight. For those of you in this room who know who i am, but for others im Quintard Taylor and im a professor of history, American History at the university of washington. Ok, well get started. Last time last week we talked about world war ii and one of the things that i tried to emphasize was the fact that ordinary people were becoming much more militants or militant or aggressive in defending their civil rights. Im going to continue that theme tonight and, indeed, i think its even more so the case in the 1950s and 1960s that ordinary people became the engines of the Civil Rights Movement. We tend to think about the Civil Rights Movement as Martin Luther king and fanny hammer and largerthanlife figures. But i would argue that the civil the Civil Rights Movement was also made up up by ordinary people, including, as he will find out tonight, a lot of College Students. A lot of College Students. In fact, in some ways the driving force of the Civil Rights Movement came from people who were probably no older than you in this room. I want you to remember that. College students were the main force in terms of the Civil Rights Movement. Ok. I want us to keep that in mind when talk about the evolution of this movement. Ill begin the lecture by discussing the decade of the 1950s because the 1950s really provide, i think, the impetus for what will be the what most historians call the grand Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. There are three episodes. Episode number one is brown. The brown decision in 1964. Brown v board of education. Well say a little more about that later on. Episode number two is the montgomery bus boycott. Of course, that boycott was important for a variety of reasons not only the fact that it catapulted Martin Luther king to fame but also because it was the First Successful movement in the deep south that actually challenged racial segregation. Then, of course, there was the Central High School desegregation crisis in little rock, arkansas. Everybody probably has heard of little rock. Youre generally familiar with what went on. What ill talk about tonight is the fact that all three of these episode, especially little rock , were going to, in effect, lay the foundation for what would become the more active Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Each of these episodes indicated profound changes in Race Relations and in black progress. And as ive argued all throughout this class, when we talk about black progress and Race Relations were not talking about black people gaining new rights, were talking about africanamericans seeing thing seeing the rates the rights that they lost in the 1870s finally restored. In other words when we talk about vote rights, blacks were essentially trying to get back thing rights that were supposed to be guaranteed by the 15th amendment that was ratified finally in 1870. Let me show a couple of slides that reflect on what i call this rising militancy and trying to change the narrative of the civil rights struggle. First of all, militancy is the keyword, the watch word. Africanamericans throughout the country either inside the naacp or beyond the naacp were much less tolerant of the racial order after 1946. In other words, the war itself had made people impatient with racial segregation and Racial Discrimination. No longer would africanamericans simply wait for the laws to change, now they would force that change. Secondly, the 1940s, especially in the 1950s indicated that the federal government would increasingly use its authority and its power even in the form of troops if necessary to defend black rights. I love this photograph. It is evocative in so many ways. First of all, technically its u. S. Forces, u. S. Army forces defending the freedom riders bus near the mississippi alabama quarter in 1961. 1961. Der in and some of you know about the freedom riders and well at least mention them in passing. But i think whats more interesting about this and the subtext that people dont know virtually all of these young men and they were young men, probably between the ages of 18 and 22, almost all of these young men were southern boys but they were also members of the u. S. Army and they were sworn to defend the constitution and in this instance they were sworn to defend black people who were protesting for their civil rights. There are a couple of other images that i want to show because they are evocative of the role of the federal government and the way in which that role became, if you will, popular at least in the north in the 1950s and 1960s. You probably dont remember this episode, but this is ruby baits. This is actually a Norman Rockwell painting of ruby baits. She was a young africanamerican girl whose parents sued to have her integrated to a school, ironically in the ninth ward of new orleans, the ward thats now overwhelmingly black. At the time it was white. Ruby baits, her struggle was captured by Norman Rockwell in this very famous painting. But i want to pull this up. This is the actual photograph of ruby baits. Why is this important . This is the federal government defending the rights of blacks. In this instance, defending the rights of a little girl. This is powerful. This is evocative. This is reflecting the changes taking place in American Society and particularly the attitudes. Of the three episodes that i mentioned earlier, the brown decision is by far the most important. The brown decision reflects on two very important changes that had taken place in the 1940s and the 1950s. First, i want to pull this image up. Theres a change in the courts. Now im showing here the u. S. Supreme court. Interestingly, this is the Supreme Court in 1954, it was all white and all male. And that was, you know, that was pretty well the norm at that time. But whats more interesting is that that Supreme Court will rule in 1954 unanimously in favor of racial, the end of racial segregation in the Public Schools in the south. What does that mean . It means that the Supreme Court is moving in a particular direction but it also means at least i argue that it also reflects that a whole host of other courts were going to follow suit and they were going to issue orders or they were going to make decisions that would help to break town the to break down the wall of segregation. Ill take this a little bit farther. I argue that its the courts that were the one arm of government at that particular time that were most committed to making sure that the rights of africanamericans were respected. And ill let you in on a little secret. You may already know this. There is absolutely no way the congress of the United States would have taken a similar state similar step like this in 1954. And theres no way, in fact, that the president of the United States, president dwight eisenhower, would have taken that step without the prompting by the courts. Now, part of this is almost obvious. The Supreme Court is appointed. The appointments are for life. The appointments of the federal judges in the south are for life. As a result they are in some ways insulated from public opinion. In ways that the congress and the president are not. The congress and the president certainly were not embracing of civil rights at that particular moment as the Supreme Court was and is other courts were. As other courts were. And i make this argument. Had it not been for those courts, had it not been for the courts, i doubt if we have much to say about the Civil Rights Movement. In other words, they played a crucial role in terms of laying the foundation for what would come in the 1960s. But i suggested there are other changes taking place as well. One of those changes was in the naacp itself. The National Association for the advancement of colored people as we talked about in this class, the National Association for the advancement of colored people in some ways lost its energy, lost its drive, lost determination in the 1930s, partially because it was attacked by the communists and the left. We talked about scotsboro. You know the significance of the scottsboro case. Even though the communists didnt get those young men off, the very fact the communists were more assertive and aggressive in terms of challenging for their freedom put the naacp in the shadow, out of which it found itself very difficult to emerge. By 1940, certainly by 1942, 1943, the naacp was reemerging as the major Civil Rights Organization in the country. It was beginning to, if you will, regain the militancy it had in its first two decades. Part of that is because of the war itself. Part of it is because world war ii, of course, brought large numbers of africanamericans out of the south and as they went to these various other cities they often joined the naacp. Ill give you and example here, a local example. This is the naacp dinner at the Mount Zion Baptist church in seattle in 1945. Whats important is not that these people were celebrating and having a great time at the dinner. , in is important is that 1940, there are only 140 members of the naacp in seattle. By 1945, there were over 3,000. Over 3,000. This kind of growth is pretty well typical, reflective of the evolution of naacp chapters in a number of cities across the country. This was happening in the north. What was happening in the south was even more dramatic. In the south, essentially, the naacp for the first time became a Major Organization to contend with. Our best estimate is that , between roughly 1940 and 1946, naacp membership in the south increased from about 25,000 to over 400,000. 25,000 to over 400,000. Now this is not just about numbers. It is not just about the growing ranks of the naacp. Its also about whats happening within the organization itself the 1940s theres going to be an increase, a dramatic increase in the number of lawsuits filed by naacp local chapters, local branches. In other words whats happening here is that the National Leadership of the naacp is in many ways being pushed by the people at the bottom. The National Movement is increasingly becoming a movement thats driven by ordinary people in various naacp chapters across the country, and as youre going to see this will have profound implications in the 1950s and 1960s. During the 1940s, and we talked about some of this before, 1940s, the naacp local chapters, local chapters were going to engage in a whole host of lawsuits. They were is going to file a whole host of lawsuits against Racial Discrimination. Let me give you one example here. Well, well start with this one. The restrictive covenants. We talked about restrictive covenants before in this class and im not going to because the cameras are rolling i wont ask you to kib them but essentially you know the problem with restrictive covenants. You know that they were a major force in terms of keeping africanamericans in the ghettos in the urban north and in some places in the south as well. And i would say in the 1930s , there was a Small Movement of naacp types in los angeles to challenge restrictive covenants. That Small Movement became a larger movement. It eventually spread beyond los angeles, and by the 1940s, the Supreme Court by 1948, the Supreme Court would finally rule against restrictive covenants. This is not the naacp leadership from the top down saying we have to deal with restrictive covenants. These are local people, people in local branches beginning with l. A. Who are saying that we have to challenge restrictive covenants and eventually the naacp National Leadership got on board. Now, they got on board in a big way. They provided significant lawyers. They provided financial support. But the impetus for this came from the bottom up. It came from the naacp branches in los angeles and elsewhere. Theres Something Else thats going on by the 1940s as well im sorry, i got this out of order. These are the boilermakers. I dont know if you remember our discussion of boeing, but in portland, the big struggle, the big political struggle was among the boilermakers, the black boilermakers who were discriminated against. The naacp in portland led the campaign to get Racial Justice for the boilermakers. Let me repeat that. The naacp led, the local naacp , led the campaign to get Racial Justice for the boilermakers. In fact, there were going to be at least three lawsuits that would eventually end discrimination by the boilermakers in portland and elsewhere. But let me suggest that the naacps composition is changing. It is growing as an organization and much more militant in terms of its willingness to challenge the status quo. Particularly the people at the bottom are growing militant. There is also a change of the top that is going to be crucial in the long run. And 1942oughly 1938 the naacp will secure a number of new attorneys and these attorneys will be critical in terms of winning cases for the organization. I am going to focus on three of them, the three on the screen. In some ways these attorneys were the people who were going naac the legalthe style of the naacp. Charles houston. I do not know how many of you are familiar with charles architectut he is the of the modern Civil Rights Movement or the legal phase. He is the man who planned the legal strategy that would eventually result in brown v. Board of education. Charles houston was the dean of Howard University law school at the time. Graduate,o a Harvard Harvard law school graduate. He was the first africanamerican to edit the harvard law review. There was a great deal of emphasis on barack obama being the first person to run the harvard law review. Headk obama was elected to the harvard law review, but the first africanamerican selected was charles houston. Charles houston was a brilliant legal strategist and he set the direction and tone for the naacp throughout the 1930s and into the 1940s. His cousin, william macy, was the second black to edit the harvard law review. He would work for the naacp in 1940 and be involved in a number of signification is. The third person is the one i am sure you are most firmly with. That is Thurgood Marshall. How many have heard of Thurgood Marshall . Ok, ok. You are already familiar with Thurgood Marshall. Marshalls cases interesting. He wanted to go to the university of Maryland Law School and could not because he is africanamerican. He settled on going to Howard University law school and it is there he met charles houston. He came under the tutelage of charles houston and the rest is history. Because of houston marshall would devote the rest of his career to the civil rights litigation. , hastings, andn marshall would win almost as many cases for the naacp as most of the leading lawyers of the naacp had done in the previous 15 years. They were remarkably successful, especially marshall. Lead to his being on the Supreme Court eventually. Things that has to be said is the irony of all of this is that houston, hasty, and marshall would be successful with the naacp at least in part because there was nowhere else to go. The best black lawyers today would do what . They would go into corporate law, they would work in a variety of legal areas. 1945, the best black lawyers did civil rights law. They did it because that is what they wanted to do, but also because other areas were closed. The discrimination against them by many law firms would lead them to be involved in the kinds of activities that would help change american, and particularly africanamerican, life. Marshall is the one that would chart the legal strategy that would lead to brown. That was very simple, or at least im good to supply five. [laughter] the culprit is racial segregation, but one cannot confront segregation directly in 1940. One has to confront the edges of segregation. What the lawyers attempted to do was try and look for, if you will, the weak spots. The edges of segregation. What is the edge of segregation . And boards. Hools they would attempt to desegregate schools and places that were on the border between the u. S. South and u. S. North. What is another edge of segregation . Graduated go after schools b