civil rights movement

1. The national effort made by black people and their supporters in the 1950s and 1960s to eliminate segregation and gain equal rights. The first large episode in the movement, a boycott of the city buses in Montgomery, Alabama, was touched off by the refusal of one black woman, Rosa Parks, to give up her seat on a bus to a white person. A number of sit-ins and similar demonstrations followed. A high point of the civil rights movement was a rally by hundreds of thousands in Washington, D.C., in 1963, at which a leader of the movement, Martin Luther King, Jr., gave his “I have a dream” speech. The federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 authorized federal action against segregation in public accommodations, public facilities, and employment. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed after large demonstrations in Selma, Alabama, which drew some violent responses. The Fair Housing Act, prohibiting discrimination by race in housing, was passed in 1968. After such legislative victories, the civil rights movement shifted emphasis toward education and changing the attitudes of white people. Some civil rights supporters turned toward militant movements (see Black Power), and several riots erupted in the late 1960s over racial questions (see Watts riots). The Bakke decision of 1978 guardedly endorsed affirmative action.

Example Sentences

For economy’s sake, let’s skip forward nearly a century to the early years of the civil rights movement and another signal use of federal power.

From Salon

The law went into effect July 1, the same day Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction issued a directive requiring all public schools to teach the Bible and the Ten Commandments – specifically, as he told PBS News Hour, “the role the Bible played in American history, dating back pre-Constitution . . . all the way up through Martin Luther King Jr. and civil rights movement.”

From Salon

Till's lynching and the subsequent activism of his mother Mamie Till-Mobley helped galvanise the civil rights movement in the US.

From BBC

Nearly 60 years removed from the high water mark of the Civil Rights movement, its aims have not been met.

From Salon

It was the FBI that fostered conflicts and divisions both among Black activists and between the Civil Rights Movement and white allies.

From Salon