Civil Rights

  • Segregation in Armed Forces

    Segregation in Armed Forces
    President Harry Truman issues executive order 9981 to end segregation in the Armed Forces
  • Ending Segregation in public schools

    Ending Segregation in public schools
    Brown v, Board of Education, a consodilation of five cases into one, is decided by the Supreme Court, effectively ending racial segregation in public schools. Many schools, however, remained segregated.
  • Rosa Parks refusing to give seat on a bus.

    Rosa Parks refusing to give seat on a bus.
    Rosa Parks refuses to give her seat to a white man on a Montgomery, Alabama bus.
  • Little Rock Nine

    Little Rock Nine
    Nine black students known as the “Little Rock Nine,” are blocked from integrating into Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. President Dwight D. Eisenhower eventually sends federal troops to escort the students, however, they continue to be harassed.
  • Civil Rights Act

    Civil Rights Act
    Eisenhower signs the Civil Rights Act of 1957 into law to help protect voter rights. The law allows federal prosecution of those who suppress another’s right to vote.
  • Sit-ins

    Sit-ins
    Four college students in Greensboro, North Carolina refuse to leave a Woolworth’s “whites only” lunch counter without being served. Their nonviolent demonstration sparks similar “sit-ins” throughout the city and in other states.
  • Lyndon B. Johnson

    Lyndon B. Johnson
    President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law, preventing employment discrimination due to race, color, sex, religion or national origin. Title VII of the Act establishes the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to help prevent workplace discrimination.
  • Assassination of Malcolm X

    Assassination of Malcolm X
    Black religious leader Malcolm X is assassinated during a rally by members of the Nation of Islam.
  • Voting Rights Act

    Voting Rights Act
    President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to prevent the use of literacy tests as a voting requirement. It also allowed federal examiners to review voter qualifications and federal observers to monitor polling places.
  • Martin Luther King is assassinated

    Martin Luther King is assassinated
    :Martin Luther King, Jr. is assassinated on the balcony of his hotel room in Memphis, Tennessee. James Earl Ray is convicted of the murder in 1969.