National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis, Tennessee, USA

Sep 2, 2022 | Historical Site, Museum, USA: Tennessee

The National Civil Rights Museum exhibits trace the history of the civil rights movement in the United States from the 17th century to the present.

National Civil Rights Museum: 450 Mulberry St, Memphis, Tennessee, USA

The museum is built around the former Lorraine Motel, which was the site of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968; King died at St. Joseph’s Hospital.

The “Jim Crow” laws are “separate but equal.”

Three paths were chosen to demolish the “Jim Crow” laws: race first, accommodation, and integration & access.

Brown versus Board of Education says “Separate but Equal” is illegal.

The Bus Boycott

Mug shots of boycott participants arrested fro violating and anti-boycott law.

Martin Luther King was hired as the spokesman.

Black students used sit-ins to show protest.

Malcom X urged black people to strengthen their own communities by improving black schools and developing black businesses.

Protesting separated bus seating arrangements for white and black

All this was a big headache for the government.

How the Soviet Union used American racism to its advantage.

Organizing for more black votes for government elections in Mississippi state.

The Freedom Singers

Let the school children do protest marches

All these black protests and commotions caused John Kennedy to side with the civil rights movement.

The march on Washington, DC

Get more black people to vote

The Southern states left the Democrat party and became a member of the Republican party because the Democrat party passed the Civil Rights Act.

Campaigning for Black Voting Rights.

Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870 and gave the black people their right to vote. Yet states still found ways to circumvent the Constitution and prevent blacks from voting. Poll taxes, literacy tests, fraud and intimidation all turned African Americans away from the polls. Until the Supreme Court struck it down in 1915, many states used the “grandfather clause ” to keep descendents of slaves out of elections. The clause said you could not vote unless your grandfather had voted — an impossibility for most people whose ancestors were slaves.

Many brave and impassioned Americans protested, marched, were arrested and even died working toward voting equality. In 1963 and 1964, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. brought hundreds of black people to the courthouse in Selma, Alabama to register. When they were turned away, Dr. King organized and led protests that finally turned the tide of American political opinion. In 1964 the Twenty-fourth Amendment prohibited the use of poll taxes. In 1965, the Voting Rights Act directed the Attorney General to enforce the right to vote for African Americans.

President Lyndon B. Johnson’s speech

Right after the Civil War, many black politicians were in government seats. However, when the states made it harder for black people to vote, black politicians were eliminated …