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"