The Civil Rights Movement

The Civil Rights Movement | Chapter 1 Preface

Long before the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s was making headlines, the black response to oppression and racial inequality was well under way. Indeed, while the failed promise of emancipation in the latter half of the nineteenth century gave rise to Jim Crow—a series of laws and customs that segregated and disfranchised blacks—it also compelled a host of individuals to launch efforts to assert their constitutional rights and improve their standing in society. Near the turn of the century, for example, the outspoken crusader Ida B. Wells grappled with one of the leading...

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