“Martin Luther King Jr. Remembered”

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“Martin Luther King Jr. Remembered” video clip

Death of Martin Luther King Jr.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., leader of the American Civil Rights Movement, was assassinated on 4 April 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee while lending support to a sanitation workers' strike. He was shot by James Earl Ray at approximately 7:05 P.M. Ray's bullet struck King as he was standing on his balcony at the Lorraine Motel; King died approximately one hour later. Although no television cameras were in the vicinity at the time of the assassination, television coverage of the event quickly followed.

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The Black Panthers

Frustrated activists in Oakland, California, responded to Stokely Carmichael’s “black power” theories and formed the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. The Black Panthers, armed and clad in black, operated basic social services in the urban ghettos, patrolled the streets, and called for an armed revolution. Although the Black Panthers did provide valuable support to the community, their embrace of violence prompted a massive government crackdown on the group, leading to its dissolution in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Additional Information on Black Panther Party for Self-Defense

Interview Video with Malcom X

Black Power

Despite Malcolm X’s untimely death, his original message of race separation (instead of integration) lived on and inspired many students in the SNCC, who also expressed dissatisfaction with the gains made through peaceful protests. Although the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act were landmark laws for the civil rights movement, young activists such as Stokely Carmichael felt they had not done enough to correct centuries of inequality. In 1967, Carmichael argued in his book Black Power that blacks should take pride in their heritage and culture and should not have anything to do with whites in the United States or anywhere else. In fact, Carmichael even promoted one plan to split the United States into separate black and white countries.

Summary of Black Power

The Voting Rights Act of 1965

Violent opposition to the Freedom Summer campaign convinced Martin Luther King Jr. that more attention needed to be drawn to the fact that few southern blacks were actually able to exercise their right to vote. Springing into action, King traveled to the small town of Selma, Alabama, in 1965, to support a local protest against racial restrictions at the polls. There, he joined thousands of blacks peacefully trying to register to vote. Police, however, attacked the protesters on “Bloody Sunday,” killing several activists in the most violent crackdown yet. The same year, an outraged Lyndon B. Johnson and Congress responded by passing the Voting Rights Act to safeguard blacks’ right to vote. The act outlawed literacy tests and sent thousands of federal voting officials into the South to supervise black voter registration.

The Voting Rights Act of 1965

Summary of Act

March on Washington

Kennedy and the March on Washington

The violence during the Birmingham protest shocked northerners even more than the violence of the Freedom Rides and convinced President John F. Kennedy to risk his own political future and fully endorse the civil rights movement. Meanwhile, in 1963, King and the SCLC joined forces with CORE, the NAACP, and the SNCC in organizing the March on Washington in August. More than 200,000 blacks and whites participated in the march, one of the largest political rallies in American history. The highlight of the rally was King’s sermonic “I have a dream” speech.

To listen to speech of "I have a dream" click Link

Text of "I have a dream" Link

The Birmingham Protest

The overwhelming public support from the North for Freedom Riders prompted Martin Luther King Jr. to launch more peaceful protests, hoping to anger die-hard segregationists. In 1963, King focused all of his energy on organizing a massive protest in the heavily segregated city of Birmingham, Alabama. Thousands of blacks participated in the rally, including several hundred local high school students who marched in their own “children’s crusade.” Birmingham’s commissioner, “Bull” Connor, cracked down on the protesters using clubs, vicious police dogs, and water cannons. King was arrested along with hundreds of others and used his time in jail to write his famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail” to explain the civil rights movement to critics.

"Letter from Birmingham Jail"