What Started it all…

Missy LjujicMike ChaulkinNate HoernkeReggie Adams

Tony PucelMiranda willGrant Scott

Black Society and the Arts• During the times that racism against blacks and

segregation were the norm, the black society expressed their feelings about the situation through the arts.– African American poets like Langston Hughes,

Countee Cullen, Gwendolyn Bennett, and Margaret Walker created poems about their dreams for equality and their own encounters with racism.

– Richard Wright created the autobiography Black Boy, in which he talks about how white people controlled what he did and thought and his realizations that it was all wrong and must be changed.

What do you think?

1. Get into groups of 3 to 4.2. Read both poems.3. Answer the questions!4. We will talk about the worksheet after.

*Becoming Communist

• Many African-Americans, including Richard White himself, joined the Communist party.– The Communist party paid special attention to

race inequality.– They defended the blacks in court • The Scottsboro case, where blacks were sent to jail

because of southern injustice during the Great Depression.

Becoming Communist Cont.• Examples of African American Communists:– Hosea Hudson: Helped unemployed blacks– Angelo Herndon: A party organizer in Atlanta.

Joined the party because he was sick of being treated poorly and like how whites and blacks worked together in harmony in the party.• Organized Unemployment Councils in 1932 which got

rent relief for the poor. Both blacks and whites worked together to give $6,000 dollars to these people.• Herndon ended being arrested and charged for

violating a Georgia statute against insurrection. He spent 5 years in prison.

*The WW2 Dilemma

• Both blacks and whites fought overseas (some tension reduces)– But, there was still segregation in the military and

blacks were paid less money that whites in military jobs.

• Blacks were promised that they would be treated better when they got back, but it was the opposite.

Truman• Wanted to calm down the anger these black

soldiers had.• He was also dealing with communism and

containment at the time.– Truman didn’t like the fact that many blacks were

becoming communist (He hates communism).

• He wanted America’s capitalist society to out beat communism and win back the hearts of blacks, so….

Truman Cont.• In 1946 Truman created the Committee of Civil Rights.– They ended voting discrimination and suggested

laws for ending racial discrimination elsewhere.• This was created to not only give blacks rights, but to..– Increase consciousness– Improve economy (Discrimination was costly: Since

blacks were not allowed into buildings that white people went into, the amounts of shops, schools, ect. greatly increased. )

• Truman also desegregated the military to end anger among the black soldiers.

*Supreme Court Actions

• The Court started calling people out on racial acts that were unconstitutional.– Ex. Whites preventing blacks from voting in the

primaries.

• The court struck down on the “Separate but Equal” doctrine in 1954– Blacks and whites weren’t really equal when it came

to materials and education. The NAACP brought this up to the Court and one year after, the Court demanded that schools be integrated.

Rebellion!• Blacks began to rebel In the early 1960s.– The famous Rosa Parks case.– She influences others to begin boycotting bus

lines. A lot of white violence and arrests rose, but eventually, segregation the buses was outlawed.

• Blacks rebelled peacefully– Sung Christian Hymns– Martin Luther King: one of the main black leaders

of the time whom stressed that blacks be nonviolent.

Other Non-Violent Protests• CORE (Congress of Racial Equality)– Set up buses that went southern state to southern

state that carried both blacks and whites. (“Freedom Rides”) These rides gained worldly attention.

– Riders were beaten by protestors and buses were set on fire.

– FBI agents did jack squat. They, along with the southern state’s police forces, just sat there and let the protestors beat the freedom riders in the beginning, but towards the end, police forces began to arrest them.

*Non-Violent Protests

• Lunch counter sit-ins (Greensboro)– Only whites were able to sit at the lunch counters

of restaurants in the south.– Blacks began breaking this rule, which lead to

lunch counters being de-segregated. This started in Greensboro, N. Carolina, but soon began to happen elsewhere.• Although the blacks never resorted to violence, there

was definitely violence against them.

*A Children’s Crusade…• Children as young as 9 years old began

marching and protesting through the southern streets in Albany, Georgia, 1961.

• Along with the children, members of the SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) also marched and protested especially for the right to vote.

• Police officers arrested these people and used clubs, police dogs, tear gas, and high powered water hoses on them.

The Other Side

• Some blacks were violent:– Robert Williams: (Black leader of the NAACP in

Monroe, N. Carolina) Told blacks that it was ok to resort to violence and guns.

What do you think?

• Which side would you stand with?

Violent Peaceful Action Or Action

Why?

Source

• Zinn book