Yr 12 Modern

History Change in the Modern World: US

Civil Rights: 1945 - 1968
Set 6: 1966 -1968

Dr Martin Luther King Jr., 1964

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Contents

Black Power 5

Martin Luther King: The Final Years 15

Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr 20

Martin Luther King: What historians say 27

President Lyndon Baines Johnson 32

Bibliography 35

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Black Power
In this set we will look at the rise of the Black Power movement, at the
struggle against de facto discrimination in the North and at the
assassination of Martin Luther King. We will consider the beliefs, aims
and methods of Martin Luther King and compare and contrast them with
those of Malcolm X.

Black Power
Like no other ideology before, the [Black Power] movement shaped black
consciousness and identity and left an immense legacy that continues to inform
the contemporary American landscape.
Perceived mostly as a violent, urban episode that followed the rural, non-
violent Civil Rights Movement, the Black Power movement, which lasted only
ten short years, had a more significant impact on issues of identity, politics,
culture, art, and education than any prior movement.
Reaching beyond America’s borders, it captured the imagination of
anticolonial and other freedom struggles and was also influenced by them.
Similarly, Black Power aesthetics of natural hair and African- inspired fashion,
and the concept that black was beautiful, resonated worldwide.
[Link]

The Black Power movement was about the political, economic and
cultural empowerment of black Americans. While it is difficult to give
an exact definition of Black Power some of its key elements were
racial unity, self-help and black pride. Many of its proponents rejected
non- violence as a strategy, some questioned the value of
interracialism and wanted some form of separatism, others felt that
whites had no direct role to play in the civil rights movement.
Within the civil rights movement itself there were divisions, some of
them about style rather than substance. The early civil rights movement
had worked hard to build white support through non-violent direct
action. In contrast, a central characteristic of Black Power was its
militant, uncompromising, sometimes anti-American rhetoric.1

Black Power Activists

Young black civil rights activists who were impatient with the slow
progress being made in civil rights were attracted to the Black Power
Movement. This could be seen in the change of direction taken by both
SNCC and CORE. In 1965 SNCC president John Lewis, a supporter of
non-violent direct action, was replaced by Stokely Carmichael.
Carmichael was an experienced civil rights activist; he had been on the
Freedom Rides and involved in Freedom Summer.
Increasingly he had become disillusioned with the slow pace of change.
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CORE president James Farmer was replaced by Floyd McKissick who
also took a militant stand in response to the slow progress of reform and
the failure to fight the endemic de facto discrimination in employment,
housing and education in major cities.

1Simon Hall: The NAACP, Black Power, And The African American
Freedom Struggle, 1966–1969
[Link]
6563.2007.00174.x

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James Meredith and the March Against Fear
In June 1966 James Meredith2 set
out on a solitary protest march
from Memphis, Tennessee to
Jackson, Mississippi. His aim was
to demonstrate that blacks could
walk with dignity and exercise their
freedom without fear of terror or
abuse.
On the second day of the march
Meredith was ambushed and shot.
He survived, but was unable to
continue his march.
Martin Luther King (SCLC), Floyd McKissick
(CORE) and Stokely Carmichael (SNCC), with groups of their
supporters, took up the march from where Meredith had been hit.
They named it The James Meredith March Against Fear.
From the beginning there were tensions. NAACP representatives
withdrew from the march over the presence of an armed black group;
supporters of CORE and SNCC eschewed 3non-violence and resented the
participation of white marchers. Divisions grew and King threatened to
withdraw unless CORE and SNCC
committed to a non-
violent, interracial
march.
Things came to a head in
the town of Greenwood.
After a confrontation with
state troopers, Carmichael
was arrested. On his release
the next day he addressed
the crowd:
This is the twenty-seventh
time I've been arrested. I
ain't going to jail no more.
The only way we gonna
stop them white men from
whupping us is to take
over. We've been saying
Freedom for six years and
we ain't got nothin'. What
we gonna start saying
now is Black Power.

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This was the first time the phrase
black power was used by a civil rights
leader in a public forum. It McKissick, King and Carmichael lead the March.
drew an immediate
positive response from
many of the black marchers and was picked up and became the focus of
the media covering the walk. For the remainder of the march the cries
of Freedom Now (from SCLC supporters) mingled with cries of Black
Power.

2 James Meredith was at the centre of the Ol’ Miss crisis in 1962 when he became the first
African American student to enrol at the University of Mississippi.
3 Eschew: deliberately avoid using

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The March Against Fear ended in Jackson, Mississippi on June 25, 1966.
While counted a success, (along the route, 4077 African Americans
registered to vote) it marked a deep division within the civil rights
movement and saw many activists take a different and more militant
approach in the struggle for equality.

Black Power: perspectives/attitudes

Black Power is hard to ‘pin down’ because it meant different things
to different people and groups. Here are some contemporary

I
perspectives on/attitudes to Black Power.
n an October 1966 speech, CORE president Floyd McKissick
defined Black Power as having six major characteristics: political
power, economic power, an improved Negro self-image,
development of militant leaders, enforcement of Federal laws, and
creation of
a black consumer block.
In the same speech he noted that one of the most important
problems facing Negroes today is that of forming a self-image in a
white society. …Every image is white in this society, even when
you go into the church and pray to Christ, you look up and sure
enough he's white too.

I n July 1966 NAACP president, Roy Wilkins spoke out against

Black Power: No matter how endlessly they try to explain it, the
term ‘Black Power’ means anti-white power . . . it has to
mean ‘going-it-alone.’ It has to mean separatism. Wilkins saw it
as a reverse Mississippi, a reverse Hitler, a reverse Ku Klux
Klan.
The NAACP did not disagree … so much over ends …but over the means to
attain it4

I n his 1967 book Black Power: The Politics of Liberation in

America, Stokely Carmichael explained Black Power as a call
for Black people in this country to unite, to recognize their
heritage, to build a sense of community. It is a call for Black
people to begin to define their own goals, to lead their own
organizations. It is a call to reject the racist institutions and values
of this society.
At times however, Carmichael’s rhetoric was viewed as
threatening and confronting. For example, in a Chicago speech in
July 1966 he commented: We have to go out and find our young
Blacks who are cutting and shooting each other and tell them that
they are doing the cutting and shooting to the wrong people

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 M artin Luther King did not condemn Black Power, he saw it as
a call to manhood, an emotional response to the anger and
hopelessness felt by many young blacks, and
he supported its attempts to build racial pride and refute the notion that
black is evil and ugly5
He did, though, call the slogan an unwise choice, and took issue
with both the anti-white connotations of the phrase and with the
provocative comments of some Black Power leaders.

I n a July 1966 address to the annual NAACP Conference, Vice

President Hubert Humphrey noted that racism is racism –
and there is no room in America for racism of any

4 Quoted in S Lawson Running for Freedom p.123

5 Quoted in S Lawson Running for Freedom p.128

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 colour. and we must reject calls for racism whether they come
from a throat that is white or one that is black Reported in NYT July

I
7, 1966.

n a 1966 statement President, Lyndon Baines Johnson stated we

are not interested in Black Power, and we're not interested in
white power, but we are interested in American democratic
power with a small 'd'
Significant Democrat party losses in the mid-term elections of
November 1966 signified a white backlash against the rioting in
Northern cities and the demands of more extreme Black Power
advocates.
Exercise 1
a. What were the goals of the Black Power movement?

b. In what ways are the beliefs of Malcolm X reflected in the Black Power
movement?

c. What evidence is there of concerns about the Black Power

movement? What was the basis of the concerns?

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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d. What was Martin Luther King’s attitude to the Black Power movement?

Impact of the Black Power Movement

We will look now at the impact of the Black Power movement on the civil
rights movement and US society.
Black Pride
Black Pride was a key element in Black Power ideology and its
impact was substantial and enduring. Black Pride was marked by a
growing
consciousness of, and pride in, African
identity and heritage.
Black Pride manifested itself in many ways:
in fashion, in music, in art, in education, in
political involvement. Black activists at
universities called for black studies and
black history programs; black people began
calling themselves black or Afro American
(later African American) rather than negro
or coloured; young African Americans
stopped straightening their hair and
whitening their skin and began wearing
African inspired fashions such as the
dashiki and the buba. The widespread ‘take-
up’ of the term Black is Beautiful reflected
these changing attitudes.

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In music, soul singers such as Aretha
Franklin and James Brown expressed black
pride and autonomy in their songs
and in literature black authors published James Brown. His 1968
stories and poems celebrating African hit song was Say it Loud
– I’m black and I’m
heritage. Proud became a civil
rights anthem

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New Groups
The ideas of Black Power resonated in black ghettos, and new civil
rights groups, inspired by Black Power ideas, sprang up in Northern
cities.
New groups included the Black Panther Party, the League of
Revolutionary Black Workers, Congress of African People and the US
(United Slaves) Organisation. Of these, we will look in more detail at
the Black Panther Party.

Political Impact
The political impact of the Black Power movement was two-edged. On
the positive side, the growth of black pride saw increased political
participation by black Americans. In Mississippi African American voter
registration figures soared in the years following the Civil Rights Act of
1965. And in the South the number of blacks elected to government
positions climbed from fewer than 25 in 1964 to over 700 by 1970. As a
black observer travelling in Mississippi commented: It is so good to
realise that we are casting aside the feelings of inferiority and shame
and realising what a strong people we are.6
On the negative side, Black Power ideology led to the decline of
SNCC and CORE. It contributed also to a white backlash fuelled by
provocative statements from Black Power advocates and the
apparent move away from non-violence.
Both groups were initially fully committed to interracial co-operation
and to non-violence. As membership became increasingly
disillusioned with the slow
progress of racial equality the
groups moved to a militant and
exclusionary strategy in line with
Black Power thinking.
In December 1966 SNCC barred
whites from membership (many
had already left). In 1967 Stokely
Carmichael left SNCC to join the
Black Panther Party. The new
chairman, H ‘Rap’ Brown
continued the militant and
sometimes provocative strategy of
the group and SNCC continued to
lose both support and financial
backing.
CORE, also, lost momentum and from non-violence and
support when it moved away

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Stokely Carmichael: SNCC chairman 1966 - 68
began to adopt the principles of Black Nationalism. In 1968 CORE
barred whites from membership.
Increasingly isolated from the mainstream, civil rights groups as well
as from whites, by the end of the decade SNCC had virtually
disappeared and CORE was in serious disarray7.

6 Quoted in S Lawson, Running for Freedom p.124

7 S Lawson, Running for Freedom p.123

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The white backlash was reflected in:
the failure of the Civil Rights Act 1966, primarily because it
barred racial discrimination in the sale and rental of all housing;
the substantial loss of Democrat seats in the 1966 midterm elections;
1966 opinion polls, e.g. a Louis Harris Poll showed that 75 percent
of whites thought that African Americans were moving too fast,
compared to 50 percent two years before.
Congress passing legislation that denied anti-poverty funds to
people who incited or participated in riots.

A Wider Movement
The Black Power movement reached beyond the USA and raised
awareness amongst other oppressed peoples across the world. In the
Caribbean it inspired the founding of an Afro- Caribbean movement. In
Barbados activists formed the People’s Progressive Party and in
Bermuda the Black Beret group was launched. In Britain, Black Power
movements formed in response to Stokely Carmichael’s visit to Britain
in July 1967.

1968 Olympic Games, New Mexico

At the 1968 Olympic Games held in New Mexico, US sprinter Tommy Smith
won the 200 metres gold medal, and his teammate Jon Carlos, the bronze.
Australian Peter Norman won the silver medal.
At the medal ceremony, as the US flag was raised and the national anthem
played, Smith and Carlos raised their gloved fists in a Black Power salute.
All three
medallists wore Olympic Project for Human Rights8 badges.
Smith and Carlos were widely criticised for
their action. Peter Norman was not selected
for the 1972 Olympics despite having
qualified. His decision to wear the Olympic
Project for Human Rights badge cost him his
athletics career. When Norman died in 2006,
Smith and Carlos were pallbearers at his
funeral.
In 2012, the Australian Parliament formally
apologized to Peter Norman for the treatment
he received when he returned from Mexico.
MP Andrew Leigh, in moving the motion for
an apology, called Norman’s gesture a
moment of heroism and humility that
advanced international awareness for racial
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inequality
Fifty years on, in 2018, the Australian
Olympic Committee awarded Peter Norman
its highest honour, the Order of Merit.

8OPHR was an American organization established in October 1967. Its aim was to protest
against racial segregation in the United States and elsewhere and racism in sports in
general.

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Exercise 2
a. Define Black Pride and outline the ways it manifested itself in the black
community

b. What evidence is there of a white backlash against the Black Power

movement?

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The Black Panthers
The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was founded in Oakland, California in
late 1966 by Huey P Newton and Bobby Seale. Black Panther chapters
(branches) opened in 38 cities including New York, Chicago, Detroit and San
Francisco. At its height the party had 5,000 members and in 1969 its magazine,
The Black Panther, sold 139,000 copies. Newton and Seale laid out a 10 point
program listing what the Black Panther Party wanted. Central to their demands
was equality in education, housing, employment and civil rights.
The Panthers operated in city ghettos where they set up programs to meet
community needs. Programs included free breakfast programs for children,
free ambulances, free medical clinics, tutoring programs and free clothing
drives.
The Panthers believed in armed self-defence and carried guns openly.
Believing that residents in many city ghettos were unfairly targeted by police,
armed Black Panthers would follow police patrols through the ghettos to
protect against police brutality.
The Black Panther gun culture and its public
calls for the violent overthrow of the US
government led to an FBI investigation and
the use of undercover agents to disrupt the
organisation. By 1971, this, and other
problems, saw the Panthers numbers and
influence decline.
Historians are divided on the legacy of the
Black Panthers. Historian Joe Rice argues that
the Black Panthers fulfilled an important need
for social justice in local communities and that
their influence should be studied at a local
level. Professor Robert Norrell sees them as a
murderous group led by petty criminals. Paul
Alkebulan suggests that the survival programs
are the true legacy of the Black Panther Party
and showed how its members were visionary
activists who wanted to create a new world.
Adam Fairclough argues that …its support in
the African American community was limited.

Bobby Seale and Huey Newton

Exercis
e3
a. Was there more to the Black Panther Party than its violent and
confrontational image?

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 b. This is a cartoon from a 1969 Black Panther newspaper. Describe
the ways it illustrates the impact of Black Power on the civil
rights movement.

beautiful,
beautiful
! sniff

My God! Anarchy!

The “Free Huey” sign refers to Black Panthers

co-founder Huey Newton, in prison in 1969 for
killing a policeman, a charge that was later
dropped.

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Martin Luther King: The Final Years
In this section we will look at new directions taken by Martin Luther
King in the two years before he was assassinated. In the words of the
New York Times it was the story of a leader who was facing discord
among the various factions pushing for racial justice; testing the waters
with a new initiative for poor people; witnessing persistent support for
segregation; and facing the ultimately fatal violence of people who
opposed civil rights.

Chicago Campaign
With the passing of the Civil Rights Act 1965, King and the SCLC
turned their focus to the racism and discrimination faced by African
Americans in city slums in the north.
On 7 January 1966, Martin Luther King and the SCLC announced plans
for the Chicago Freedom Movement, with the goal of achieving fair
housing practices. In addition, SCLC launched Operation Breadbasket, a
project under the leadership of Jesse Jackson, aimed at abolishing racist
hiring practices by companies working in African American
neighbourhoods.
In late January, King and his family moved into an apartment in a
Chicago slum to raise awareness of poor living conditions for the
city’s African Americans.
Our own children lived with us in Lawndale, and it was only a few days before
we became aware of the change in their behavior. Their tempers flared, and
they sometimes reverted to almost infantile behavior. During the summer, I
realized that the crowded flat in which we lived was about to produce an
emotional explosion in my own family. It was just too hot, too crowded, too
devoid of creative forms of recreation. There was just not space enough in the
neighborhood to run off the energy of childhood without running into busy,
traffic-laden streets. And I understood anew the conditions which make of the
ghetto an emotional pressure cooker.

Chapter 28: The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr edited by Clayborne Carson

On July 10, 1966 King held a rally at Soldier’s Field attended by 30,000
people He told the rally, We are here because we’re tired of living in rat-
infested slums. … We are tired of being lynched physically in Mississippi
and we are tired of being lynched spiritually and economically in the
North.
At the end of the rally, King and his supporters marched to the City
centre where King taped a set of demands to the door of City Hall9. The
demands called for an end to police brutality and discriminatory real-
estate practices, increased Negro employment, and a civilian review
board for the police department like that in New York City.
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Unrest grew in Chicago. Two days after the rally there were four days of
race riots on Chicago West Side. On August 5, Martin Luther King led a
march of black demonstrators through an all- white neighbourhood.
Bottles and bricks were thrown at them, and King was struck by a rock.
Afterwards he noted: I’ve been in many demonstrations all across the
south, but I can say that I have never seen – even in Mississippi and
Alabama – mobs as hostile and as hate-filled as I’ve seen here in Chicago.
In late August, Chicago mayor, Richard Daley, reached a negotiated
agreement. Demonstrations would end and in return public housing, with
limited height requirements would be built.

9 Shades of the action of Martin Luther in 1517

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Additionally, the Mortgage Bankers Association agreed to make
mortgages available regardless of race.
Despite the agreement, Chicago city officials took no concrete steps to
address housing issues. In March 1967 King commented: It appears
that … the public agencies have [reneged] on the agreement and have
… given credence to [those] who proclaim the housing agreement a
sham and a batch of false promises.
There is disagreement about how successful the Chicago campaign was.
While the City failed to follow through with its agreement, the campaign
is credited with being one of the inspirations for the Fair Housing Act
passed by the U.S. Congress in 1968.
Historian Clayborne Carson, writing of the Chicago Freedom Movement,
commented: the fact that these problems still exist are not King’s fault. It
is also the failure of those of us who have outlived him and King himself
realised that it was the first step in a 1,000-mile journey.

Aides keep Martin Luther King Jr. down to protect against further attacks
after he was hit by a rock Aug. 5, 1966, in Chicago.
(Chicago Tribune)

Exercise 4
What does King mean when he says We are here because we’re tired of
living in rat-infested slums. … We are tired of being lynched physically in
Mississippi and we are tired of being lynched spiritually and
economically in the North? What different challenges did the SCLC face
in the North?

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Vietnam
On August 7, 1964, the US Congress passed the Tonkin Resolution
giving President Johnson unlimited powers to oppose “communist
aggression” in Southeast Asia. The Resolution marked the beginning of
an expanded military role for the United States in Vietnam. In early
1965 Johnson started heavy bombing of North Vietnam and in March,
began sending US combat troops to Vietnam.
Martin Luther King spoke of his opposition to the war as early as 1965
declaring that millions of dollars can be spent every day to hold troops
in South Vietnam and our country cannot protect the rights of Negroes
in Selma but it was on April 4 1967 that he publically and formally
addressed the issue.
Declaring my conscience leaves me no other choice, King described
the war’s harmful effects on both America’s poor and Vietnamese
peasants. He insisted that it was morally imperative for the United
States to take radical steps to halt the war through nonviolent means.
We are taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society
and sending them 8,000 miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast
Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem.
and of the Vietnamese people he said:
They watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million acres of their
crops. They must weep as the bulldozers roar through their areas preparing
to destroy the precious trees. …. So far we may have killed a million of
them, mostly children.
The immediate response to King’s speech was largely negative with major
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newspapers criticising his speech and the NAACP accusing King of linking
two separate issues. Despite the criticism, King continued to attack the
war on both moral and economic grounds.
Economically, the Vietnam War was to affect Johnson’s War on Poverty.
In 1964 Johnson had declared that he wanted to create a Great Society
by introducing social welfare laws that would make America a more
equitable and just society. Inevitably, the escalation of the war in
Vietnam

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meant fewer resources for his social welfare program. As historian
Clayborne Carson noted: The whole idea of paying for guns and butter
at the same time: That becomes Johnson's dilemma. How is he going to
afford the war abroad and the war against poverty at home at the same
time?
King’s stand on the Vietnam War led to strained relations between King
and President Johnson. Andrew Young, SCLC executive director and
close friend and confidante of Martin Luther King, in a 1970 interview
noted that King and his supporters had, by 1967, lost faith in Johnson.
They did not doubt his commitment to civil rights but felt he had gotten
himself trapped and was basically blind to what was going on around
him.
Exercise 5
a. On what grounds did Martin Luther King oppose the Vietnam
War? Do you agree with this view?

b. That becomes Johnson’s dilemma. What, according to Clayborne

Carson, was the dilemma Johnson faced?

Poor Peoples’ Campaign

In November 1967, Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference (SCLC) met and decided to launch a Poor
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People’s Campaign. King believed that the poor of America would
never have full and equal citizenship until they had economic security.
Through nonviolent direct action, King and SCLC hoped to focus the
nation’s attention on economic inequality and poverty.

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The plan was for protestors from poor communities, African American,
white, Native Americans, Hispanic and other minorities to gather in
Washington D.C. in May/June 1968 and demonstrate daily in support of
anti-poverty legislation that would help the poor get jobs, health care
and decent housing.
The campaign was held as planned but without King’s leadership and
presence. Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee
on April 4th 1968.

Martin Luther King and the FBI

The FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) was created in 1909 by the
Federal Justice Department to investigate federal crime. J Edgar Hoover
served as Director of the FBI from 1924 until his death in 1972. Under the
FBI’s counterintelligence program King was subjected to various kinds of
FBI surveillance that produced alleged evidence of extramarital affairs,
though no evidence of Communist influence.
The FBI began surveillance of Martin Luther King in December 1955
during the Montgomery Bus Boycott. King remained under surveillance
until his assassination in April 1968.
The FBI initially monitored King under its Racial Matters Program, which
focused on individuals and organizations involved in racial politics.
In 1962 the FBI switched focus to King’s alleged ties with communism under
the FBI Communist Infiltration Program which was designed to investigate
groups and individuals subject to Communist infiltration and in October
1963, on the advice of J Edgar Hoover, Attorney-General Robert Kennedy
authorised wiretaps of King’s home phone and of SCLC offices.
In August 1967, the FBI created a program against Black Nationalist–Hate
Groups, which targeted SCLC, King, and other civil rights leaders. King was
identified as a target because the FBI believed that he could become a messiah
who could unify black nationalists should he abandon his supposed ‘obedience’
to ‘white liberal doctrines’ (nonviolence) and embrace black nationalism.
In the last few months of King’s life, the FBI intensified its efforts to discredit
him and to “neutralize” SCLC.
Adapted from:
[Link]
pedia/federal-bureau- investigation-fbi

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Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr
In March, 1968, sanitation workers in Memphis Tennessee went on strike
for better pay and working conditions. A local clergyman, Rev. James
Lawson, asked his friend Martin Luther King for support. King (though
immersed in preparations for the Poor Peoples’ March on Washington)
went to Memphis and on March 18 addressed a large rally. Ten days
later he returned to lead a march in support of the strike. To King’s
dismay the march descended into violence, looting broke out and police
shot and killed a 16-year-old African American.
On April 3rd, King returned to Memphis, determined to lead a peaceful
march. Exhausted when he arrived, King asked Ralph Abernathy to take
his place at a planned mass meeting that night. At the meeting
Abernathy sensed the disappointment of the hundreds who had come to
hear King speak so he rang King and persuaded him to attend.
Martin Luther King’s speech that night, the last he was to deliver, was
almost completely off the cuff. In the speech King called for unity,
boycotts and non-violent protest in the struggle for just wages and
working conditions. Towards the end of his speech King recalled the
1958 attempt on his life when he was stabbed with a letter opener that
nearly penetrated his aorta, leaving him “a sneeze away”10 from death.
He began the final part of his speech with the words And I want to say
tonight, I want to say that I am happy that I didn't sneeze and he then
enumerated some of the milestones he would have missed if he had
sneezed. In a prophetic end to his speech, King said:
We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me
now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop. .…I’ve seen the Promised
Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that
we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land! ...I’m not worried about
anything. I’m not fearing any man! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the
coming of the Lord!
Witnesses said King had tears in his eyes as he took his seat. “This
time it just seemed like he was just saying, Goodbye, I hate to leave,”
James Jordan reflected.

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rightsPage

in the USA 1945-1968
Jesse Jackson, Martin Luther King, Ralph Abernathy on balcony of Lorraine Hotel, Mem
1010 One of the 2 policemen who came to King’s aid said Don’t sneeze, don’t even speak.

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
April 4th 1968
In Memphis, King was staying in Room 306 of the Lorraine Hotel. On
the evening of April 4th King and Ralph Abernathy were to dine with a
local clergyman. At about 5:55 they stepped out on to the balcony from
their room and chatted with people in the courtyard below.
At 6:01 pm, as he stood on the balcony, King was mortally wounded by a
bullet that entered the right side of his face, fractured his jaw and
severed vital arteries. He was rushed to St. Joseph Hospital, where
emergency surgery proved futile. At 7:05 pm King was officially
pronounced dead.

Reaction
America was stunned by the news of King’s assassination. In the
following days there was rioting, arson and looting in more than 100
cities. In all, some 27,000 people were arrested, about 3,500 were
injured, and more than 40 were killed. Some 6,100 people were
arrested and more than 1,000 were injured in Washington DC alone. In
Chicago there were some 125 fires and 11 deaths. In Baltimore more
than 5,000 federal troops patrolled the city in an attempt to forestall
arson. Only after police forces around the country had been reinforced
by some 58,000 U.S. National Guard and Army troops did the violence
subside.
King’s death resulted in the temporary suspension of the 1968
presidential campaign. The Academy Awards ceremony was postponed.
Businesses, schools, and other public buildings were closed. President
Johnson declared April 7 a national day of mourning. The next day King’s
widow, Coretta Scott King, led thousands in a march in Memphis
commemorating her husband and supporting the striking sanitation
workers. 11

Fair Housing Act, 1968

In 1966 President Johnson had attempted to pass a Fair Housing Act but
it failed to get through the Senate. According to historian Robert Dallek,
Johnson seized upon the regrets over King’s assassination to pressure
Congress to pass the Act.
On April 5th Johnson wrote to the House Speaker, imploring Congress to
guarantee a basic American right — the right of a man to secure a home
for his family regardless of the colour of his skin. Invoking12 King’s death
he wrote Last night America was shocked by a senseless act of violence.
A man who devoted his life to the nonviolent achievement of rights that
most Americans take for granted was killed by an assassin’s bullet.
The Civil Rights Act 1968 (more commonly known as the Fair Housing
Act) was signed into law on April 11th 1968. The Act prohibited
discrimination in housing based on race, colour, religion and national
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
origin by landlords, real estate companies, cities, insurance companies
and lending institutions, including banks. It prohibited discrimination in
advertising, zoning,
construction and outlawed the practice of redlining and racial
discrimination through restrictive covenants and deeds.

11 Adapted from: [Link]

12 Invoke: call on (someone or something) for inspiration

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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Funeral
Martin Luther King Jr’s funeral was held on April 9th in Atlanta. Ralph
Abernathy delivered the eulogy and after the service,
King’s casket was
carried by a mule-
drawn wagon for 6 km
through downtown
Atlanta to Morehouse
College (the university
he had attended).
On route the
procession was joined
by bystanders and
may have swelled to
as many as 100,000
people.
King was buried in
South View cemetery,
Atlanta. His gravestone
reads: Free at last, free
at last, thank God
Almighty I’m free at
last

James Earl Ray

The shot had come
from a boarding house
opposite the Lorraine
Motel. Fingerprints on
a rifle found at the
boarding house were
those of James Earl
Ray, an escapee from
Mississippi State
Penitentiary. Two
months later James
Earl Ray was arrested
at London’s Heathrow
Airport as he
attempted to buy a ticket to Brussels.
Ray was extradited to Memphis on July 19 and on March 10 1969 he
pleaded guilty to the murder of Dr King, so avoiding a possible death
sentence. He was sentenced to 99 years in the Brushy Mountain State
Penitentiary in Tennessee.

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Three days after his sentencing Ray attempted to recant his
confession, claiming he was the victim of a conspiracy. State and
Federal courts held investigations but found nothing in Ray’s
arguments to persuade them to overturn his guilty plea.
Controversy still surrounds the assassination. When Ray died in prison in
1998 Coretta King commented: America will never have the benefit of
Mr. Ray’s trial, which would have produced new revelations about the
assassination…as well as establish the facts concerning Mr. Ray’s
innocence

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Exercise 6:
a. In his final speech, Martin Luther King said I’ve seen the
Promised Land13. I may not get there with you. But I want you to
know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land!
...

What did Martin Luther King mean by the Promised Land?

b. Why do you think conspiracy theories about King’s

assassination gained some credence14?

c. Why would the passing of the Fair Housing Act have been
important to Martin Luther King?

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
13 A biblical reference. In the modern context it is used to refer to the liberation of a people.
14 credence: acceptance of something as true

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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c. What is your response to the inscription on Martin Luther
King’s gravestone? What would be your inscription?

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Exercise 7
Read this piece from the New York Times, April 4 2018 and use it to
answer the questions that follow.
Martin Luther King Jr: 50
Years Later, His Battles Live
On
In his last years, the Rev. Dr Martin Luther King was grappling with many
issues: workers’ rights, a sprawling protest movement, persistent
segregation and poverty.

Martin Luther King Jr. remains frozen in time for many Americans. Seared into
our consciousness is the man who battled Southern segregation.
We see him standing before hundreds of thousands of followers in the
nation’s capital in 1963, proclaiming his dream for racial harmony. We see
him marching, arms locked with fellow protesters, through the battleground
of Alabama in 1965.
But on the 50th anniversary of his death, it is worth noting how his
message and his priorities had evolved by the time he was shot on that
balcony at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis in 1968. …
He was battling racism in the North then, not just in the South. He was pushing
the government to address poverty, income inequality, structural racism and
segregation in cities like Boston and Chicago. He was also calling for an end to
a war that was draining the national treasury of funds needed to finance a
progressive domestic agenda.
…
“Policy makers of the white society have caused the darkness; they created
discrimination; they structured slums; and they perpetuate unemployment,
ignorance and poverty,” Dr. King said in 1967, referring to bias in zoning,
public budgets and employment.
His marches into northern white neighborhoods touched off a backlash
among white leaders and residents who had supported similar tactics in
the south. His popularity plummeted.
His call for an interracial coalition to demand “jobs or income now” was
greeted skeptically by some of his supporters and by members of the Black
Power movement.
His call for an end to the Vietnam War outraged President Lyndon Johnson,
lawmakers and others. Even some of his aides doubted the wisdom of that
decision and his plan to mobilize a poor people’s campaign.
He was far more visionary than those around him, said Clayborne Carson,
the director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
at Stanford University.

Rachel L. Swarns: New York Times, April 4, 2018

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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a. What King/SCLC campaigns are referenced in the article?

b. … it is worth noting how his message and his priorities had

evolved by the time he was shot on that balcony at the Lorraine
Motel in Memphis in 1968.
In what ways did Martin Luther King’s message and priorities evolve?

c. How do you account for this evolution/change?

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Martin Luther King: What historians say
We will look now at how historians have assessed Martin Luther
King’s role in the civil rights movement.
Exercise 8
a. Read through these accounts and highlight the strengths that historians
have identified.

[His] leadership was not confined to fine speeches. In private meetings, King
was generally quiet. He listened while others argued, often angrily and at
length, and then he would calmly sum up the debate and identify a way forward.
From the outset of his career … King had a remarkable ability to get people
who would otherwise be constantly feuding to work together. …
While King rarely relaxed in public… his conspicuous gravitas 15commanded
respect. …. The media quickly spotted his ability to articulate the moral
dimensions of the struggle in ways that appealed to moderate public
opinion, especially away from the South. He made it easier to accept
change.
Although King cultivated a coalition of people of 'good will', he learned that he
needed more than simply moral suasion to overturn segregation. He recognised
that local leaders in the South would be more likely to give concessions if the
movement generated sufficient economic pressure, through boycotts and
downtown protests, and through precipitating mass arrests.
By the Birmingham campaign of 1963, King had also learned that the White
House might intervene, provided non-violent protests created a crisis that
threatened to get out of control and to damage US international standing in a
Cold War context. As a leader, King had to end the possibility of 'business as
usual'. He had to threaten racial catastrophe, while simultaneously holding out
the promise of racial peace. He needed compelling images of the nightmare, as
well as the dream.…
White leaders valued King's ability to wind down campaigns as much as they
dreaded his ability to escalate them. For the same reason, however, some
African Americans regarded King with a heightened mistrust.…
The charge was levelled that his SCLC was a 'hit-and-run' outfit that exploited
local communities and then abandoned them, once the desired media attention
had been secured. …[But] as he explained to SNCC activists in Selma, Alabama,
in 1965, one had to consider how to end a campaign as well as how to
commence it. The brutal treatment of black protesters, and their white allies,
by Alabama authorities forced voting rights legislation onto the Congressional
agenda. But unrelenting campaigning in Selma, King sensed, was likely to
produce more deaths, black retaliation, and a worsening political climate for
change.…

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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There were many leaders in the civil rights struggle, but Martin Luther King
was more than just the most conspicuous of them, and more than just an
eloquent speaker. His non-violence inspired some support, but it also appealed
vitally to neutrals in a way that negated more conservative voices. No one else
matched his leadership of targeted, orchestrated campaigns that strengthened
national political strategy.
Dr Peter J Ling: Martin Luther King’s Style of Leadership.
[Link]

15 dignity, seriousness; causing feelings of respect and trust in others:

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Martin Luther King Jr. died with no more than one half of his dreams fulfilled.
He died despairing of his inability to advance the seemingly distant
achievement of his unfulfilled ones rather than celebrating the attainment of
those he and his movement colleagues had seen realized between 1956 and
1965. The freedom struggle had made black legal equality a constitutional and
legislative reality, but those victories in turn illuminated how much of black
inequality in American life could not be remedied simply by the enforcement of
statutory equality and true protection of Southern African-Americans' right to
vote.
David Garrow, quoted in: [Link]

The fact that he has more prestige than power; the fact that he not only
criticizes whites but explicitly believes in their redemption; his ability to arouse
creative tension combined with his inclination to shrink from carrying
demonstrations to the point where major bloodshed might result; the
intellectual simplicity of his philosophy; his tendency to compromise and exert
caution, even his seeming indecisiveness on some occasions; the sparing use he
makes of going to or staying in jail himself; his friendship with the man in the
White House - all are essential. to the role he plays, and invaluable for the
success of the movement. It is well, of course, that not all civil rights leaders are
cut of the same cloth - that King is unique among them. Like Randolph, who
functions very differently, King is really an institution. His most important
function, I believe, is that of effectively communicating Negro aspirations to
white people, of making non-violent direct action respectable in the eyes of the
white majority. In addition, he functions within the movement by occupying a
vital center position between its 'conservative' and 'radical' wings, by
symbolizing direct action and attracting people to participate in it without
dominating either the civil rights movement or its activist wing. Viewed in this
context, traits that many activists criticize in King actually function not as
sources of weakness, but as the foundations of his strength.
Clayborne Carson: [Link]
_charismatic_leadership_in_a_mass_struggle.pdf

Stephen Lawson on the SCLC, the Black Church and Martin Luther King
In 1957 the SCLC was formed to co-ordinate local black protest movements
that emerged to challenge racial bias in the South. Black ministers directed
the organisation. …
In effect the SCLC functioned as “the political arm of the black church” …the
founders of the Conference chose non-violent resistance as their primary means
of combating white supremacy. This meant the black masses would be
mobilised in their local communities to confront directly the sources of their
oppression. More than any other institution, the Black Church could provide an
independent base from which to stage demonstrations and furnish the moral
and social support necessary to nurture collective action.
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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Martin Luther King stood out to lead it (SCLC). He had a special ability to
give voice to the immediate concerns of ordinary black folks and to place
their goals and aspirations within a larger national and international
movement for freedom.
King’s … total commitment to nonviolence as a religious and ethical
principle did not make King politically soft-minded. … he backed up his
moralistic appeals with practical acts of coercion.
Ecumenical arguments alone would never lead blacks to freedom; the
application of power was essential to changing racist behaviour and the
underlying institutions that supported it.
Stephen Lawson: Running for Freedom Wiley Blackwell 2015

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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b. From the quotations you have underlined, comment on each
historian’s views of Martin Luther King’s leadership. Be sure to
identify which historian you are commenting on.

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
c. How successful was Martin Luther King in achieving his aims as
a civil rights leader? Why did he face some mistrust from within
the civil rights movement?

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
President Lyndon Baines Johnson
On November 22, 1963, two hours and eight minutes after the
assassination of President John F Kennedy, Lyndon Baines Johnson was
sworn in as 36th President of the USA.
During his presidency (1963 – 1969) Johnson accomplished significant
advances in civil rights in America.
In 1964 Johnson engineered the passing of the Civil Rights Act 1964,
legislation that gave the federal government the power to
desegregate public
accommodations, fight
against workplace
discrimination, speed up
public school
desegregation, mediate
racial disputes, and
restrict several other
discriminatory practices.
On August 6, 1965
Johnson signed the Civil
Rights Act 1965. This
legislation authorized the
federal government to
step in to safeguard the
right of African Americans
to register to vote and
cast their ballots.
In combination, these Acts
effectively struck down
the Jim Crow laws that
operated in Southern
states and brought an end
to state-based actions that
prevented African
Americans from
registering to vote.
Johnson, in August, 1964 President Lyndon Johnson signing the Civil Rights
Act of 1964 into law, with Martin
launched his war on Luther King, Jr., looking on.
poverty by signing the
Economic Opportunity
Act, which
established the Office of Economic Opportunity to oversee a number of
educational, training, and employment programs. Johnson's vision for a
Great Society included more safeguards for civil and voting rights,
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
funding for education, programs for urban renewal, Medicare, crime
prevention and consumer protection.16
On June 13th 1967 Johnson appointed Thurgood Marshall to the US
Supreme Court. Marshall was the first African American to sit as a
Supreme Court Justice. He served for 24 years.
Johnson’s Fair Housing Act 1968, passed in the shadow of the
assassination of Martin Luther King, prohibited discrimination in
housing based on race, colour, religion and national origin.

16 adapted from: [Link]

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
As we have seen, Johnson’s increased commitment to the Vietnam War
led to an estrangement between Johnson and Martin Luther King.

Lyndon Baines Johnson: Comments

Days after Kennedy’s murder, Johnson displayed the type of leadership on
civil rights that his predecessor lacked … He made the bold and exceedingly
risky decision to champion the stalled civil- rights bill. It was a pivotal
moment: without Johnson, a strong bill would not have passed.
Michael O’Donnell April 2014 at
[Link]
for/358630/

President Johnson was known for his vision of a Great Society to end poverty,
reduce crime, improve the environment, and advance civil rights.

[Link]

As the 36th President of the United States (1963-1969), Lyndon Johnson

championed ground-breaking civil rights legislation.
[Link]

What had Johnson actually achieved? He played an important role in ending de

jure segregation. His 1965 Voting Rights Act transformed Southern politics and
gave African Americans the chance to vote without fear; it also saw more
African Americans enter politics. Johnson’s Education Acts sped up the process
of school desegregation, which had lagged after the initial BROWN decision and
also helped African American colleges. Johnson had not only passed the 1964
Civil Rights Act but had also been instrumental in the 1957and 1960 Acts; all
three had given African Americans more political and economic opportunities.
Black unemployment had decreased by 34% and in that way he had contributed
to his dream of a “Great Society”.
However, Lyndon Johnson did not solve all [problems] as most African
Americans continued to live in poor housing and suffer above average
unemployment. His Great Society programmes soon became unpopular with
local politicians, who resented federal intervention and ordinary Americans
who disliked the redistribution of resources needed to combat poverty.

Sarah Heasman, London University: [Link]

movement-in-america-1945-to- 1968/lyndon-johnson/

Exercise 9: Briefly outline Lyndon Johnson’s major

contributions to the civil rights movement.

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
 U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson talks with civil rights leaders in his White
House office in Washington, D.C., Jan. 18, 1964.

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Bibliography
Carson C et al (eds.) Eyes on the Prize: Civil Rights
Reader Penguin 1991 Francis D: Years of the
Dream Heinemann 1987
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[Link]
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framed/?utm_term=.262ba24f8f7a
Lawson, S: Running for Freedom, Wiley Blackwell, 2015
Lawson, Steven F: Freedom Then, Freedom Now: The Historiography
of the Civil Rights Movement The American Historical Review Vol. 96,
No. 2 (Apr., 1991), pp. 456-471 [Link]

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
in the USA 1945-1968
Murdoch T, O’Connell P, Rosanowski: Black Civil Rights in the USA 1954-
1970, Longman Paul, 1987

Newell K, Salmond J (eds) The Civil Rights Movement in the American

South La Trobe University 1992
Payne C M: I’ve Got the Light of Freedom Uni. Of California Press, 1991

S Mirams, Civil Rights in the USA Nelson 2014

Simon Hall: The NAACP, Black Power, And The African American
Freedom Struggle, 1966–1969
[Link]
6563.2007.00174.x

(All websites accessed between January and August 2018)

Yr 12 Modern History: Set 6: Change in the Modern World: Civil rights Page
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