How successful had the civil rights movement been by the late 1960's?

In 1954 the US Supreme Court declared segregation in schools as illegal, but most southern states kept their schools segregated well into the 1960s. In the early 1960s James Meredith was turned away from a good white university, it wasn’t until 1962 after many protests and demonstrations that he was finally allowed a place in the Mississippi University. In 1964 the Civil Rights Act called for fair educational opportunities for all, but this could not change the stubborn minds of the southern people who thought that the two communities should be kept separate, in five states there was not one single desegregated school. Even by 1970 most blacks could not make use of the newly improved educational opportunities due to poorer early education. Integration in schooling was difficult because the whites and blacks lived in different areas, therefore it made more sense for them to go to separate schools. A busing policy was set up to try and get a mixed race of students in the classroom in the 1960s, but by the 1970s the busing policy was shown to be socially and logically too expensive to carry on and so had to be finished leaving the problem still there. Another area where the blacks had an unfair disadvantage was the fact that university was too expensive and many of the blacks were poor, as they could not get well paid jobs as they had not had a very good education.

During the 1960s not many improvements were made in the way of job opportunities, although the civil rights act once again was set up to try and outlaw discrimination in employment. The blacks started to promote the black industry and by the 1970s many blacks had started to be employed for well skilled and trained jobs on the federal government job crops scheme, costing $255 million a year; the government started to help the blacks but the scheme was set up so that black people could only buy produce from other blacks as this was their own choice, but unlike segregation it was supposed to be fair.  But it was not all positive; many blacks disapproved of separation in business as it was like segregation and restricted black business as there were not as many blacks as whites (only 10% in USA). Also due to a lack in education blacks often had less well paid, less skilled work and when the Vietnam war broke out more blacks than whites were sent out to fight for ‘their country’. In 1976 the situation had still not improved, 10% of blacks earned under $3000 whereas only 3% of whites did, and even though 32.5% of whites earned over $20,000 only 14% of blacks earned the same amount.

The housing and health facilities did not change dramatically but in 1964 Johnson’s Economic Opportunities opened new prospects in housing. Although $1 billion was put into the project, by the 1970s 11.6% of black Americans had not got enough money to pay any rent, and 1/3 of blacks were below the poverty line compared to the 1/10 of whites. This poverty lead to poorer health, in the central ghettos where a lot of the black community lived, disease spread easily, unlike the suburbs where mostly whites lived. The whites could afford private health care as well, unlike the blacks who suffered from a poorer education and so lower paid jobs, this meant that most blacks could only use emergency health care, making the situation even worse. Even though the Civil Rights Act of 1964 made it illegal for blacks and whites to be unequal in housing opportunities this did not help much as the blacks still did not earn enough for decent housing and facilities.

Although many people started to accept the ‘black way of life’ some didn’t and others fought against it. Cassius Clay, a superb boxer won the boxing Olympic in 1960 and became an accepted sportsman. Black fashion and music became popular in the whites community, artists such as Tina Turner and Diana Ross became famous and valued all over the world, but not everyone welcomed the black talent as they were jealous, proud and still discriminated against blacks. Not all famous black Americans were embraced, when Muhammad Ali (formerly known as Cassius Clay) refused to join to fight in the Vietnam War he was stripped of his boxing title and when two black Americans held the black power sign on the podium at the Olympics they couldn’t get a job for years afterwards and were also stripped of their medals. The Christian Americans found it difficult to understand the Black Muslim ideas and so riots started e.g. The Birmingham riots, violent groups such as the ‘Black Panthers’ confused both whites and blacks as the blacks were no longer seen as the poor, innocent Christians but instead cruel, forceful Muslims that used violence instead of peaceful methods. Another aspect that disadvantaged the acceptance of the black way of life was the Vietnam War. All the money that was supposed to be helping black opportunities was put into the war instead, but during the war blacks started to become equal in some respects; for example, young black men became respected as leaders and generals and races mixed without discrimination on the battle field, as ‘one mans blood is as good as anothers’.

Protesting helped to force the government to take action and help the black people of America. Both peaceful and violent protest was used to try and help the blacks Civil Rights, many of the peaceful protests were organized by Martin Luther King. King was from a middle classed family and so already had a good education, but was a black leader who tried to win the black people of America their Civil Rights. There were many peaceful protests, mainly in the early 1960s, but one of the most famous was the Washington March of 1963. 200,000 people turned up to support the campaign; but not all protest was peaceful, in the mid-1960s some blacks became impatient and bored of being hurt and trampled down by the whites and so started to fight back. A man called Malcolm X was said to be the leader of an extreme Black Power Movement, he lead a group of supporters and took part in violent protest. By the late 1960s nearly all protesting was violent and after Kings’ Assassination, his work started to die out.  Throughout the 1960s the Vietnam War was getting worse, more expensive and more and more blacks were becoming involved.

There was quite a lot if improvement in the blacks civil rights in the time leading up to 1970.  The main reason that the Civil Rights improved during this time was the fact that blacks all over the country started to stick up for what they believed in; took part in protests, started to become famous sports people, singers etc. This helped for the white to accept the black community and so pay more attention to the laws when they were passed. Once again the media attention helped to promote the black ideas through Muhammad Ali, Martin Luther King and other famous blacks. This put pressure on the government (as well as the active protesting) and so they had to try to sort out the Civil Rights. There are still problems today in America when it comes to black Civil Rights. Although many improvements were made many still occur and the problem is not yet sorted, surprisingly some aspects got worse in the 1960s but by 1970 the first step of a long, spiral staircase had been climbed.