Zusammenfassung der Ressource
1960-1992 'Dream or nightmare?'
- Economic and Social
problems for Northern
Blacks in the 1960s
- The mass movement of AAs from the North meant
that the unskilled jobs (which was all that they could
do) were declining in numbers. Automation in the
1950s meant even less jobs. Yet they still kept
coming to escape segragation. 1970s: 1/2 of blacks
lived out of the South.
- With fewer jobs, there
was an increase in
black discrimination.
Great unemployment ->
great poverty.
- The segragation of schools as of location wasn't
affected by the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and many
were still trapped in the vicious cycle of poor
education -> poor employment.
- Malcolm X 1960-1965
- Northern blacks weren't benifitted by King's
work as he fought for freedom from
segragation, whilst in the North the focus
was on social problems that the Christian
non-violence approach didn't affect.
- X focused on the economic
and social conditions of the
North.
- By 1960 Malcolm X was a prominent leader
who's deprived background and message
associated with the poor northern blacks.
He felt that they shouldn't beg the white
man, like NAACP and SCLC did, but stood
for a 'black superiority'.
- Like Garvey, he saw AAs as
Africans, not Americans, but
rejected the 'back to Africa' as it
was impractical.
- He believed that whites were
inherently racist and could never
value blacks as equals.
- He didn't care of what whites though of him and even ignored praise
from whites, as he felt that they really couldn't truly care for blacks.
- He was a prominent member of the Nation of
Islam until 1963, where he left because he spoke
on political issues and criticised the leader Elijah
Muhammed, who had restricted his civil rights
platform.
- Elijah Muhammed called for
seperate homelands for AAs.
But X discovered that he didn't
uphold the morals he demanded
of his followers. (Corrupt like Garvey?)
- Saw no role of women in the movement.
- After being dismissed in 1963, X traveled Asia and Africa
finding white Muslims, making him begin accepting
co-operating with other parts of the civil rights movement,
but he was assassinated in 1965 by NoI. His ideas were still
influential for years.
- He rejected the non-violent approach of King, but he didn't
advocate violence just self-defence, particularly to protect
women.
- MLK in 1966-68
- King began to realise that whites weren't responding
to his campaigns and for the civil rights movement to
really work, he must adress the social and economic
problems in the North, caused by the American political set up.
- King's campaign in Chicago 1966: He focused on the de facto
segregation in education, employment and housing, but found
less black support than in the South, as well as more clever and
evasive local officials. The SCLC were pelted by stones and
verbally abused. Although highlighting the housing problem,
nothing was solved.
- If he didn't solve these issues, he knew that the violence and rioting of the
period would always undermine his non-violent approach. He began ideals
like the Poor People's March in 1968 to protest poverty. However, he always struggled
to keep his impatient followers peaceful. -> Following his death, the approach
of non-violence died too and all was left was the random violence.
- However, this march failed and even offended some of those who had previously been
sympathetic to the AA cause, especially since the growing militancy of Black Power had
prevented much of America from supporting the civil rights.
- He never doubted his view of non-violence.
- SCLC remained after MLK's death, through a
climate of militancy and black power, but in the
late 70s their confrontational style of
campaigning was less effective. The
consecutive leaders like Abernathy and Lowery
still upheld MLK's values.
- The Vietnam War 1950s-1975
- King spoke out against this in 1967 as it
opposed his religious beliefs, but also
because it diverted funds and attention
away from civil rights, which was seen as
possible to be strengthened.
- This took black civil rights off of the front of
magazines, and no major legislation passed
during this period besides the 'Fair Housing Act
of 1968'
- This was that no radical discrimination
could be used when selling, renting or
mortgaging a property. This was passed
as a result of MLK's death in 1968.
- Black Power development after
X's death
- Some saw King as a 'tool of the white
man' and believed that blacks should be in
control of their own destiny.
- Many like SNCC and CORE questioned the
non-violent approach as it hadn't yet yielded
much social and economic progress.
- Yet for SCLC supporters, this black power
seemed a step backwards, that militancy
and violence ruined all that was built up in
the movement.
- Some rejected help from whites altogether, like
Stokely Carmichael, who organised the SNCC
1964-1966 and became chair in 1966. He was
very extreme toward violence towards white
society. He joined the Black Panthers in 1967.
- 1965-1968 was a period of serious, violent rioting.
- It had re-asserted the idea of being
proudly black, with emphasis on their
black culture, rather than intargrate
with whites.
- Changes what the question of AA civil rights really are.
- The Black Panthers 1966
- Wanted to end the white capitalist control
and police brutality. They had economic
demands and were influenced by Black
Power and Malcolm X.
- Violent shoot-outs with the police occurred.
- They developed a 10 point programme, which demanded for
some of the similar demands of the civil rights movement, but also
some distinctly radical ones that even bordered on racist feeling
towards whites. Like all blacks being exempt of jail and military service.
- Highlights how broken the movement was, as they
are divided but also because of how members of
peaceful groups like SNCC were joining up.
- Richard Nixon and Affirmative Action 1968-1974
- Nixon took a firm line with law and order and
hence acted strongly against groups like the
Black Panthers.
- He did make some civil rights
initiatives but nothing really
happened in the latter years of
his Presidency.
- Nixon's policy of 'affirmative action' was to
ensure that AA had equal opportunities in areas
that they were previously discriminated,
particularly education and employment. This
involved making up for the discrimination in the
past too. A 'helping hand' was better than a 'hand out'.
- It was controversial, even amongst
civil rights campaigners as it
'violated their principle of equality'.
- Nixon also hoped for trade unions
to become divided, hence
weakened, by the topic.
- Contractors would
set targets for hiring
minorities.
- Nixon also had a political
agenda, hoping to build
potential Republican votes.
- Congress, the Presidency and Supreme Court for once were
all supporting one another. 'Griggs v. Duke Power Company
1971' was where supreme court ruled that the intelligence
tests that this power company had for employees was unfair
to AAs because of their previous educational discrimination.
- Desegragation of Schools
- 'Bussing' was used as a radical way to
force the desegragation of schools and by
1972 Southern schools were better
integrated than the North!
- The NAACP took further legal action
concerning desegragation
- But although high support to begin with, towards
the 1974 support began to wane.
- Bussing, which was often unpopular,
declined, as where it was upheld the whites
would move to all-white suburbs and where it
wasn't, segragation began to return.
- Desegragation of higher education was
difficult, moany colleges were
predominantly black or white. 1971: 1/3
of blacks were in their predominantly
black colleges, but 90% in the Southern
states.
- Presidents
- Ford (1974-77) continued Nixon's ending of
'bussing' but he did little and 90% of blacks
voted for his Democratic rival Carter for the
1976 election, fully turning the political
aliiegance of the past years.
- Carter 1977-81 lacked the popular support
to bring change, the economic stability
and the support of Supreme Court as to
continue civil rights measures.
- 1978 University of California v. Baake, was
where Supreme Court ruled that the white
boy Baake had been denied from the
University because of his race.
- Reagan (1980-89) was famously negative
towards civil rights. Reagan opposed the
legislation and his actions seen as his attempt at
opposing 'affirmative action'. He tended to be
opposed of welfare and employment programmes
altogether.
- During the early 80s, there was an economic
slowdown, so his attack on welfare really hit
the black community, especially since that in
1980 blacks were the highest recipients of Aid
for Families with dependent children, food
stamps and housing benifits.
- The 1988 Civil Rights Restoration Act: This
deemed that all federal funds could only be
distributed if the recipients were complying with
all aspects of civil rights legislation. Congress
was hence very liberal towards civil rights at
the end of the period. Reagan even attempted
to veto this.
- Bush 1989-92 was also hard on
blacks, he vetoed bills that
challenged job discrimination as a
means of a 'quota', which later still
became law.
- Political and Economic Changes
- The Voting Rights Act created an immediate and
dramatic increase in black voters, particularly in the
South. The NAACP continued to work on getting black
voters registered in states where there were still
few. Yet by 1976 it was slightly lower where under
60% of eligible blacks were registered.
- Following black voting,
there was an increase to
African Americans being
elected into public office in
federal and state positions
in the South.
- These were mostly Democrats, the party that
previously had been for 'white supremacy',
which now depended on the black vote. The
change seems almost so sudden since so
recently 'Bull' Connor was a leading member of
office.
- It was less common in the North
and hence could be more difficult.
Financial and political constraints
were what held them back. There
were low turnouts of black votes,
suggesting that poorer blacks still
were alienated from a political
system that offered them nothing.
- Majors in large cities had to avoid alienating
their white coalition partners and political
involvement didn't inheritently produce better
conditions for AAs.
- The NAACP's legal style continued for the
rest of the period, however leaders like
Hooks in 1977 were questioned to be out of
touch of the poor blacks and by 1977
membership dropped to a low of 200,000.
- Jesse Jackson in the 1980s
- In the 1980s he became a leader of the
movement, leading back to his support and
close relationship with King and SCLC. He even
founded his own organisation PUSH to secure
thousands of jobs for African Americans in the
1970s.
- His Christian styles and presentation were reminiscent of King.
- He attempted to become the Democrat Presidential
nominee twice in 1984 and 1988 as he wished to
persuade the disillusioned blacks to have faith in the
political system. He aimed to connect the radical
black power supporters and the others.
- Hoped to unite various races into a coalition called the
'rainbow coalition' alongside the liberal Democrat whites
disillusioned by the political system.
- He showed the importance of the black vote.
- He was criticsed for supposedly being a 'throwback' to the old
style of black ministers instructing their flock with no choices.
Although he did represent a success of a black man reaching
a high point, it was later hoped for a proportional
respresentation of blacks in politics as a whole. Bill Clinton
when running for election in 1992 wanted to make his
administration 'look like America'.
- Bifurcation of the
black Community
in the 1980s
- In the 1980s, the wealthy
middle-class blacks were
becoming more prosperous and
the poor blacks were getting
worse. They became un-united
like they had been previously
as they developed different
social and political attitudes.
- Cuts in welfare and a
growing drug trade
seperated the social
environments of blacks
and no longer did they
share the suffering with
a group identity.
- The wealthier blacks were leaving the ghettoes and
hence leaving the poor and uneducated with no-one
to articulate their views and problems.
- The Rodney King Affair 1991
- Rodney King was an AA man severely beaten by
police when he resisted arrest from drunk driving.
This was caught on video and despite this, an all
white jury in 1992 freed the policemen from
charges of serious assault.
- Protest arose through race riots in the city and
this showed that rioting was still a threat to law
and order from racial grievances, and hence
shows that the debates surrounding black civil
rights were still passionate in 1992.