Students will analyze how, following major legislative victories, the movement shifted its emphasis to address continuing injustices more directly.
Essential Knowledge
8.A. Before his 1968 assassination, Martin Luther King Jr. became more focused on the underlying causes of racial oppression. His speeches and writings focused increasingly on economic inequality, the need for structural reforms, and challenges to the American war in Vietnam.
8.B. The movement did not end with King’s assassination. African Americans continued to organize for the same civil and human rights they had been fighting for throughout U.S. history. As the Black Power movement grew, efforts turned toward the development of the Black Arts Movement, the election of Black officials and the building of Black institutions like Black labor unions.
8.C. Major civil rights organizations had national reach. Some of the NAACP’s oldest and most active chapters were in cities outside the South. CORE shifted its emphasis from organizing in the South to prioritizing work on housing, jobs and police violence in cities across the country.
8.D. This work toward equality and justice is ongoing, and today many movements fighting economic injustice and police violence trace their roots directly to this era.
Related Resources
- [8.A.] Students should consider Martin Luther King Jr. beyond his widely quoted works. Although he is most well known for the March on Washington and his “I Have a Dream” speech (available from NPR), much of his activism focused on putting that dream into action. After the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, King shifted his focus to a call for economic equality in Northern cities like Chicago, as well as locations in the South. Educators teaching this more complex history can find ideas and resources in the LFJ Teaching Hard History podcast episode “Teaching the Movement’s Most Iconic Figure” and in the Zinn Education Project’s “Hidden in Plain Sight: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Radical Vision.”
- [8.A.] Students can also review the text of “The Chicago Plan” for a primary source illustrating this era of King’s activism.
- [8.A.] Students should learn about the Memphis, Tennessee, sanitation workers’ strike and the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. The documentary At the River I Stand, available through the Zinn Education Project, offers students an accessible and engaging introduction to the strike and its aftermath.
- [8.A.] To better understand King’s last campaign, students can discuss several resources from the LFJ text library. They might begin by reviewing the photograph of striking workers holding “I Am a Man” signs and then explore the firsthand account from “StoryCorps: Memphis Sanitation Workers’ Strike.” Finally, they can listen to—or read the transcript of—“StoryCorps: Dr. King’s Final Speech,” a recorded conversation about the address King delivered the night before he was assassinated. And they can read that famous speech, “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop.”
- [8.B.] To understand how artists connected the growing Black Arts Movement with the political, social and economic concerns of the Civil Rights Movement, students can read an excerpt of the essay “The Black Arts Movement” by Larry Neal.
- [8.B.] The 1972 New York Times article “Black Unionists Form Coalition: Organization Will Work for McGovern but Will Not Disband After Election” describes Black laborers’ frustration with the mainstream labor movement and the 1972 formation of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU).
- [8.B.] To learn more about the CBTU, explore the organization’s website, especially the page A Sleeping Giant Awakens.
- [8.B.] For examples of efforts to elect Black officials, students can learn about the 1972 National Black Political Convention, where Shirley Chisholm announced her candidacy for U.S. president. The Digital Public Library of America’s resource “The National Black Political Convention and Shirley Chisholm” includes primary sources reporting on the convention. To better understand the goals of the convention, read the “Gary Declaration,” available through BlackPast.
- [8.C.] For an example of the work of the movement beyond the South, review some of the resources from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s March on Milwaukee Civil Rights History Project, which includes primary sources concerning NAACP protests against school segregation and housing discrimination.
- [8.C.] To learn more about CORE’s national work, students can research the organization’s presence in Seattle. The University of Washington’s Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project has a website detailing CORE and the Central Area Civil Rights Campaigns that includes oral histories, primary documents and other resources for exploring the work of the movement in the Pacific Northwest. Students can also learn about CORE’s work in New York.
- [8.C.] The Brooklyn Public Library’s resource Brooklyn Connections: Civil Rights in Brooklyn provides primary sources and questions to support student learning about this history.
- [8.D.] For an example of how the 1950s and 1960s era of the movement continues to inspire activism, review the 21st-century Poor People’s Campaign. Exploring the campaign’s website, students can learn about its goals, the connection to its 1968 precursor and the strategies activists are using to fight economic inequality.
- [8.D.] For insight on how the movement inspires activists protesting police brutality today—and how movement veterans see their work connecting to current activism in support of Black lives—students can read the 2020 USA Today article “They Overcame Police Dogs and Beatings: Civil Rights Activists From 1960s Cheer On Black Lives Matter Protesters Leading New Fight.”
