Through this quiz, and the answers that appear after each question, you can learn some of the history of the Civil Rights Movement that is all too often omitted from the textbooks. Teaching for Change designed this quiz for teachers and parents to challenge assumptions, deepen understanding, and inspire further learning about the Civil Rights Movement. It is based on the publication, Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching. The quiz also contains questions that help set the context for the Civil Rights Movement and link to today.
The quiz, used as a whole or one question at a time, can serve as a springboard for discussions and research. Please take the quiz, share it, and send us your feedback.
Developed by Jennifer Arrington and David Levine. Updated by Neha Singhal. (c) Teaching for Change.
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As your “reward,” take a minute to listen to a clip of the 250,000 participants at the March on Washington. As Bayard Rustin reads the 10 central demands, the crowd responds with a resounding affirmation. Thanks to the WGBH Open Vault, you can listen to their voices here.
I pledge my heart and my mind and my body unequivocally and without regard to personal sacrifice, to the achievement of social peace through social justice.
Rustin: How do you pledge?
Crowd of 250,000: I so pledge.
Let’s all pledge, along with the 1963 marchers, that when we share the story of the Civil Rights Movement, we will include the voices that are too often drowned out when the history is reduced to “I Have a Dream.”
You can begin by sharing this quiz with students, friends, and colleagues.
Which of the following was the overarching goal of the Civil Rights Movement?
Correct
Answer: Equality, empowerment, and democracy
Different leaders and activists often held differing views about both tactics and ultimate visions of a just society, and the evolution of the freedom struggle meant that people’s perspectives changed over time. But leaders as diverse as Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X realized that it would take fundamental economic, social, and political changes to create a United States in which all people were truly free.
Different leaders and activists often held differing views about both tactics and ultimate visions of a just society, and the evolution of the freedom struggle meant that people’s perspectives changed over time. But leaders as diverse as Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X realized that it would take fundamental economic, social, and political changes to create a United States in which all people were truly free.
The crucial element enabling progress in winning civil rights was:
Correct
Answer:Grassroots activism and organizing.
Doug Smith and Sandy Leigh participate in voter registration canvassing, 1964. Photo (c) Herbert Randall. McCain Library and Archives, USM.
Fannie Lou Hamer and Ella Baker address participants at a rally for the MFDP to be seated at the 1964 DNC. (AP Photo)
Gloria Richardson facing off the National Guard, Cambridge, Maryland, May 1964. Photo by Fred Ward
CORE pickets Penny’s Department Store in Berkeley, Calif., December, 1963.
Inspiring leaders, large mass demonstrations, and eventually federal civil rights legislation and enforcement all contributed to changes toward greater equality, but grassroots organizers laid the essential foundation of the movement. Largely unacknowledged in textbooks, they performed the unglamorous, painstaking, and often dangerous work of building trust, commitment, and collective action toward local victories.
The leaders were ordinary women and men–sharecroppers, domestics, high school students, beauticians, independent farmers–committed to organizing the civil rights struggle house by house, block by block, relationship by relationship.
The young organizers who were the engines of change in the state were not following any charismatic national leader. Far from being a complete break with the past, their work was based directly on the work of an older generation of activists, people like Ella Baker, Septima Clark, Amzie Moore, Medgar Evers, Aaron Henry. These leaders set the standards of courage against which young organizers judged themselves; they served as models of activism that balanced humanism with militance.
While historians have commonly portrayed the movement leadership as male, ministerial, and well-educated, Payne finds that organizers in Mississippi and elsewhere in the most dangerous parts of the South looked for leadership to working-class rural Blacks, and especially to women. Payne also finds that Black churches, typically portrayed as front runners in the civil rights struggle, were in fact late supporters of the movement.
Standing on My Sisters’ Shoulders. Film. By Joan Sadoff, Robert Sadoff, and Laura Lipson. 2002. 60 minutes. Documentary film on women in the Civil Rights Movement. While focused on Mississippi, it is useful for shining on a light on the people’s history of the Movement and in particular the role of women.
Civil Rights Movement Veterans website. Created by Veterans of the Southern Freedom Movement (1951-1968), this is where (as they explain), “we tell it like it was, the way we lived it, the way we saw it, the way we still see it. With a few minor exceptions, everything on this site was written, created, or spoken by Movement activists who were direct participants in the events they chronicle.
Doug Smith and Sandy Leigh participate in voter registration canvassing, 1964. Photo (c) Herbert Randall. McCain Library and Archives, USM.
Fannie Lou Hamer and Ella Baker address participants at a rally for the MFDP to be seated at the 1964 DNC. (AP Photo)
Gloria Richardson facing off the National Guard, Cambridge, Maryland, May 1964. Photo by Fred Ward
CORE pickets Penny’s Department Store in Berkeley, Calif., December, 1963.
Inspiring leaders, large mass demonstrations, and eventually federal civil rights legislation and enforcement all contributed to changes toward greater equality, but grassroots organizers laid the essential foundation of the movement. Largely unacknowledged in textbooks, they performed the unglamorous, painstaking, and often dangerous work of building trust, commitment, and collective action toward local victories.
The leaders were ordinary women and men–sharecroppers, domestics, high school students, beauticians, independent farmers–committed to organizing the civil rights struggle house by house, block by block, relationship by relationship.
The young organizers who were the engines of change in the state were not following any charismatic national leader. Far from being a complete break with the past, their work was based directly on the work of an older generation of activists, people like Ella Baker, Septima Clark, Amzie Moore, Medgar Evers, Aaron Henry. These leaders set the standards of courage against which young organizers judged themselves; they served as models of activism that balanced humanism with militance.
While historians have commonly portrayed the movement leadership as male, ministerial, and well-educated, Payne finds that organizers in Mississippi and elsewhere in the most dangerous parts of the South looked for leadership to working-class rural Blacks, and especially to women. Payne also finds that Black churches, typically portrayed as front runners in the civil rights struggle, were in fact late supporters of the movement.
Standing on My Sisters’ Shoulders. Film. By Joan Sadoff, Robert Sadoff, and Laura Lipson. 2002. 60 minutes. Documentary film on women in the Civil Rights Movement. While focused on Mississippi, it is useful for shining on a light on the people’s history of the Movement and in particular the role of women.
Civil Rights Movement Veterans website. Created by Veterans of the Southern Freedom Movement (1951-1968), this is where (as they explain), “we tell it like it was, the way we lived it, the way we saw it, the way we still see it. With a few minor exceptions, everything on this site was written, created, or spoken by Movement activists who were direct participants in the events they chronicle.
During the Reconstruction Era (1865-1877), which of following events did NOT occur in the South?
Correct
Answer: The federal government provided each male, freed from slavery, with forty acres and a mule.
While African Americans were owed reparations for the wealth they generated during centuries of enslavement, even the modest request of 40 acres and a mule was not provided. The repercussions of this lack of reparations remain today with the wealth gap based on race.
Often people taking this quiz select the answers about elected officials, assuming there were no African Americans elected to the U.S. Senate nor Congress until the modern Civil Rights Movement. Historical accounts have often downplayed the accomplishments of Reconstruction and black civic engagement during that era. However, armed with the right to vote, black men elected hundreds of black legislators to state offices (as well as the 16 who served in the U.S. Congress), despite the harassment and violence against blacks that preceded elections. The new black politicians passed ambitious civil rights and public education laws.
John Roy Lynch
For example, in 1870, John Roy Lynch joined the first group of black representatives elected to Mississippi’s state legislature. He was 22 years old. By age 25, Lynch was the first African American from Mississippi to sit in the House of Representatives. Merely 10 years prior, Lynch had been enslaved. Lynch spent the last years of his life trying to correct the negative view of Reconstruction that prevailed in the U.S. by the early 1900s. In 1913, he wrote The Facts of Reconstruction, an autobiographical defense of the period. It wasn’t until 1987, more than a hundred years after Lynch’s last term in Washington, that Mississippi elected another black representative to the U.S. Congress.
Freedom Road. By Howard Fast. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1995.
Incorrect
Answer: The federal government provided each male, freed from slavery, with forty acres and a mule.
While African Americans were owed reparations for the wealth they generated during centuries of enslavement, even the modest request of 40 acres and a mule was not provided. The repercussions of this lack of reparations remain today with the wealth gap based on race.
Often people taking this quiz select the answers about elected officials, assuming there were no African Americans elected to the U.S. Senate nor Congress until the modern Civil Rights Movement. Historical accounts have often downplayed the accomplishments of Reconstruction and black civic engagement during that era. However, armed with the right to vote, black men elected hundreds of black legislators to state offices (as well as the 16 who served in the U.S. Congress), despite the harassment and violence against blacks that preceded elections. The new black politicians passed ambitious civil rights and public education laws.
John Roy Lynch
For example, in 1870, John Roy Lynch joined the first group of black representatives elected to Mississippi’s state legislature. He was 22 years old. By age 25, Lynch was the first African American from Mississippi to sit in the House of Representatives. Merely 10 years prior, Lynch had been enslaved. Lynch spent the last years of his life trying to correct the negative view of Reconstruction that prevailed in the U.S. by the early 1900s. In 1913, he wrote The Facts of Reconstruction, an autobiographical defense of the period. It wasn’t until 1987, more than a hundred years after Lynch’s last term in Washington, that Mississippi elected another black representative to the U.S. Congress.
Freedom Road. By Howard Fast. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1995.
Question 4 of 14
4. Question
Which of the following states had the largest Ku Klux Klan membership in the early 1920s?
Correct
Answer: Oregon
Racism in regions beyond the South has often been overlooked. During the 1920s, the KKK flourished in many Northern states and enjoyed a surprisingly respectable status. Confederate veterans first established the Klan in Pulaski, Tennessee at the end of the Civil War. The Klan opposed Reconstruction initiatives that extended voting rights to Blacks, as well as other measures that protected black economic and political rights.
The second, more widespread Klan was established during World War I, in the context of the glorification of the KKK in D.W. Griffith’s silent film, “The Birth of a Nation,” and such actions as Woodrow Wilson’s re-segregation of D.C. federal employees. The new Klan grew to six million members at its peak in the 1920s, spreading to several regions of the United States and even reaching Canada. It gained political respectability within mainstream political institutions, with many Klan members serving in state legislatures.
Racism in regions beyond the South has often been overlooked. During the 1920s, the KKK flourished in many Northern states and enjoyed a surprisingly respectable status. Confederate veterans first established the Klan in Pulaski, Tennessee at the end of the Civil War. The Klan opposed Reconstruction initiatives that extended voting rights to Blacks, as well as other measures that protected black economic and political rights.
The second, more widespread Klan was established during World War I, in the context of the glorification of the KKK in D.W. Griffith’s silent film, “The Birth of a Nation,” and such actions as Woodrow Wilson’s re-segregation of D.C. federal employees. The new Klan grew to six million members at its peak in the 1920s, spreading to several regions of the United States and even reaching Canada. It gained political respectability within mainstream political institutions, with many Klan members serving in state legislatures.
During most of the 20th century, African Americans were prevented from voting by:
Correct
Answer: All of the above
LEFT: A. Philip Randolph at the Freedom School Convention in Meridian, Miss. RIGHT: Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, Lauderdale County Meeting at First Union Baptist Church, Meridian. Both photos by Mark Levy.
After the Civil War, many African Americans took grave risks to exercise the right to vote, encountering relentless and multifaceted white resistance. While there were important pockets of black voting strength in the South (primarily in urban areas) during Reconstruction, it was not until the mid-1960s that the Civil Rights Movement was able to decisively turn the tide against black disenfranchisement.
One of the best ways to learn about the grassroots work of the Civil Rights Movement is to read the accounts of voter registration campaigns, including the role of Freedom Schools. Here one can learn about the strength and determination of the people who risked their lives to exercise their legal right to vote.
More information
Gracie Hawthorne, volunteer for the 1964 Freedom Summer campaign to register voters in Mississippi. Photo by Herbert Randall.
“SNCC: The Battle-Scarred Youngsters.” A report from the front lines of the civil rights battle in Greenwood, Mississippi–a very dangerous place to be. By Howard Zinn in The Nation, October 5, 1963. Written in response to the March on Washington, this article provides chilling interviews with young activists who had been jailed for promoting the democratic practice of voting. Read online here.
Civil Rights Movement Veterans website. This website is created by Veterans of the Southern Freedom Movement (1951-1968). It is where, as they explain, “we tell it like it was, the way we lived it, the way we saw it, the way we still see it. With a few minor exceptions, everything on this site was written, created, or spoken by Movement activists who were direct participants in the events they chronicle.
Education and Democracy. Online description of the role of Freedom Schools in the campaign for voting rights. Includes full Freedom School curriculum.
Incorrect
Answer: All of the above
LEFT: A. Philip Randolph at the Freedom School Convention in Meridian, Miss. RIGHT: Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, Lauderdale County Meeting at First Union Baptist Church, Meridian. Both photos by Mark Levy.
After the Civil War, many African Americans took grave risks to exercise the right to vote, encountering relentless and multifaceted white resistance. While there were important pockets of black voting strength in the South (primarily in urban areas) during Reconstruction, it was not until the mid-1960s that the Civil Rights Movement was able to decisively turn the tide against black disenfranchisement.
One of the best ways to learn about the grassroots work of the Civil Rights Movement is to read the accounts of voter registration campaigns, including the role of Freedom Schools. Here one can learn about the strength and determination of the people who risked their lives to exercise their legal right to vote.
More information
Gracie Hawthorne, volunteer for the 1964 Freedom Summer campaign to register voters in Mississippi. Photo by Herbert Randall.
“SNCC: The Battle-Scarred Youngsters.” A report from the front lines of the civil rights battle in Greenwood, Mississippi–a very dangerous place to be. By Howard Zinn in The Nation, October 5, 1963. Written in response to the March on Washington, this article provides chilling interviews with young activists who had been jailed for promoting the democratic practice of voting. Read online here.
Civil Rights Movement Veterans website. This website is created by Veterans of the Southern Freedom Movement (1951-1968). It is where, as they explain, “we tell it like it was, the way we lived it, the way we saw it, the way we still see it. With a few minor exceptions, everything on this site was written, created, or spoken by Movement activists who were direct participants in the events they chronicle.
Education and Democracy. Online description of the role of Freedom Schools in the campaign for voting rights. Includes full Freedom School curriculum.
Question 6 of 14
6. Question
Which of the following is TRUE of Rosa Parks, the woman who helped spark the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 after being arrested for defying the city’s bus segregation laws?
Correct
Answer: As Secretary of the local NAACP chapter and leader of its Youth Group, she had a long history of activism before her action that began the bus boycott.
At the time of the boycott, the 43-year-old Ms. Parks already had several run-ins with bus drivers because she opposed the law requiring African Americans to enter the bus from the back, yet pay in the front. In fact, the driver on December 1, 1955 who called the police had previously thrown her off the bus for refusing to enter through the back door. In addition to her NAACP activities, Ms. Parks was involved in trying to desegregate Montgomery’s schools and had attended an interracial meeting at Tennessee’s Highlander Folk Center, a social justice leadership training school that played a key role in the labor and Civil Rights Movements.
Answer: As Secretary of the local NAACP chapter and leader of its Youth Group, she had a long history of activism before her action that began the bus boycott.
At the time of the boycott, the 43-year-old Ms. Parks already had several run-ins with bus drivers because she opposed the law requiring African Americans to enter the bus from the back, yet pay in the front. In fact, the driver on December 1, 1955 who called the police had previously thrown her off the bus for refusing to enter through the back door. In addition to her NAACP activities, Ms. Parks was involved in trying to desegregate Montgomery’s schools and had attended an interracial meeting at Tennessee’s Highlander Folk Center, a social justice leadership training school that played a key role in the labor and Civil Rights Movements.
After Rosa Parks was arrested, the Montgomery Bus Boycott was first set in motion when:
Correct
Answer: The Women’s Political Council, under the leadership of Jo Ann Robinson, distributed 35,000 leaflets urging 42,000 black residents of Montgomery to boycott public transportation.
The crucial roles of women, grassroots organizers, and rank-and-file citizens in the Civil Rights Movement are often minimized or left out of U.S. history books. Under the leadership of Jo Ann Robinson, a college English professor, the Montgomery Women’s Political Council began organizing against segregated buses in 1949. This lay the groundwork to mobilize the boycott quickly after Rosa Parks was arrested. NAACP leader and labor organizer E.D. Nixon bailed Ms. Parks out of jail and convened a meeting of ministers the first night of the boycott to provide leadership. At that meeting, the ministers formed the Montgomery Improvement Association and elected the 27-year-old Martin Luther King Jr. as its leader.
During the 381-day boycott, thousands of African Americans walked to work. The movement depended on the many people who organized fundraising activities, car pools, and coordinated taxi service.
King’s oratory and leadership helped sustain the movement, but its victory was built on the daily contributions of many unsung activists.
Answer: The Women’s Political Council, under the leadership of Jo Ann Robinson, distributed 35,000 leaflets urging 42,000 black residents of Montgomery to boycott public transportation.
The crucial roles of women, grassroots organizers, and rank-and-file citizens in the Civil Rights Movement are often minimized or left out of U.S. history books. Under the leadership of Jo Ann Robinson, a college English professor, the Montgomery Women’s Political Council began organizing against segregated buses in 1949. This lay the groundwork to mobilize the boycott quickly after Rosa Parks was arrested. NAACP leader and labor organizer E.D. Nixon bailed Ms. Parks out of jail and convened a meeting of ministers the first night of the boycott to provide leadership. At that meeting, the ministers formed the Montgomery Improvement Association and elected the 27-year-old Martin Luther King Jr. as its leader.
During the 381-day boycott, thousands of African Americans walked to work. The movement depended on the many people who organized fundraising activities, car pools, and coordinated taxi service.
King’s oratory and leadership helped sustain the movement, but its victory was built on the daily contributions of many unsung activists.
What role did the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) most consistently play with regards to the Civil Rights Movement?
Correct
Answer:They collected information, spied on civil rights leaders (including Martin Luther King, Jr.), and spread misinformation.
Click image to see larger version.
The FBI, under J. Edgar Hoover, had a long history of investigating organized efforts by African Americans, including the 1940s March on Washington Movement.
“Hoover saw the civil rights movement from the 1950s onward and the anti-war movement from the 1960s onward, as presenting the greatest threats to the stability of the American government since the Civil War,” he says. “These people were enemies of the state, and in particular Martin Luther King [Jr.] was an enemy of the state. And Hoover aimed to watch over them. If they twitched in the wrong direction, the hammer would come down.”
In the fall of 1963, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy approved wiretaps on all of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s telephones. The FBI even wrote threatening letters to King with the aim of coercing King to step down from his position as the head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).
James W. Loewen notes in Lies My Teacher Told Me: “In August 1963 Hoover initiated a campaign to destroy Martin Luther King, Jr., and the civil rights movement. With the approval of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, he tapped the telephones of King’s associates, bugged King’s hotel rooms, and made tape recordings of King’s conversations with and about women. The FBI then passed on the lurid details, including photographs, transcripts, and tapes, to Sen. Strom Thurmond and other white supremacists, reporters, labor leaders, foundation administrators, and, of course, the president…King wasn’t the only target: Hoover also passed on disinformation about the Mississippi Summer Project; other civil rights organizations such as CORE and SNCC; and other civil rights leaders, including Jesse Jackson.”
Learn more.
Millsaps students protesting death of JSU student and civil rights worker Benjamin Brown. Photo shot by the Commission with numbers identifying individual students.
Tracked in America. This website explores the historical context and stories of individuals who have been targets of U.S. government surveillance during the 20th century. It includes timelines, interviews, and primary documents.National Security Archive. Online access to declassified U.S. documents.
Answer:They collected information, spied on civil rights leaders (including Martin Luther King, Jr.), and spread misinformation.
Click image to see larger version.
The FBI, under J. Edgar Hoover, had a long history of investigating organized efforts by African Americans, including the 1940s March on Washington Movement.
“Hoover saw the civil rights movement from the 1950s onward and the anti-war movement from the 1960s onward, as presenting the greatest threats to the stability of the American government since the Civil War,” he says. “These people were enemies of the state, and in particular Martin Luther King [Jr.] was an enemy of the state. And Hoover aimed to watch over them. If they twitched in the wrong direction, the hammer would come down.”
In the fall of 1963, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy approved wiretaps on all of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s telephones. The FBI even wrote threatening letters to King with the aim of coercing King to step down from his position as the head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).
James W. Loewen notes in Lies My Teacher Told Me: “In August 1963 Hoover initiated a campaign to destroy Martin Luther King, Jr., and the civil rights movement. With the approval of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, he tapped the telephones of King’s associates, bugged King’s hotel rooms, and made tape recordings of King’s conversations with and about women. The FBI then passed on the lurid details, including photographs, transcripts, and tapes, to Sen. Strom Thurmond and other white supremacists, reporters, labor leaders, foundation administrators, and, of course, the president…King wasn’t the only target: Hoover also passed on disinformation about the Mississippi Summer Project; other civil rights organizations such as CORE and SNCC; and other civil rights leaders, including Jesse Jackson.”
Learn more.
Millsaps students protesting death of JSU student and civil rights worker Benjamin Brown. Photo shot by the Commission with numbers identifying individual students.
Tracked in America. This website explores the historical context and stories of individuals who have been targets of U.S. government surveillance during the 20th century. It includes timelines, interviews, and primary documents.National Security Archive. Online access to declassified U.S. documents.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed in 1968, exactly one year to the day after he gave a speech on:
Correct
April 4, 1967. Dr. King at Riverside Church in NYC. Photo by John C. Goodwin.
Answer: the Vietnam War
On April 4, 1967, exactly one year before his assassination, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech in New York City on the occasion of his becoming co-chairperson of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam (subsequently renamed Clergy and Laity Concerned).
Titled “Beyond Vietnam,” it was his first major speech on the war in Vietnam—what the Vietnamese aptly call the American War. King linked the escalating U.S. commitment to that war with its abandonment of the commitment to social justice at home. His call for a “shift from a ‘thing-oriented’ society to a ‘person-oriented’ society” and for us to “struggle for a new world” has acquired even greater urgency than when he issued it decades ago.
The speech concludes:
Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo and unjust mores and thereby speed the day when “every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight and the rough places plain …” Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter—but beautiful—struggle for a new world.
April 4, 1967. Dr. King at Riverside Church in NYC. Photo by John C. Goodwin.
Answer: the Vietnam War
On April 4, 1967, exactly one year before his assassination, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech in New York City on the occasion of his becoming co-chairperson of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam (subsequently renamed Clergy and Laity Concerned).
Titled “Beyond Vietnam,” it was his first major speech on the war in Vietnam—what the Vietnamese aptly call the American War. King linked the escalating U.S. commitment to that war with its abandonment of the commitment to social justice at home. His call for a “shift from a ‘thing-oriented’ society to a ‘person-oriented’ society” and for us to “struggle for a new world” has acquired even greater urgency than when he issued it decades ago.
The speech concludes:
Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo and unjust mores and thereby speed the day when “every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight and the rough places plain …” Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter—but beautiful—struggle for a new world.
Who took steps to petition the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to investigate charges that the United States was violating not just the civil rights, but also the human rights, of African Americans?
Correct
Answer: Malcolm X
Malcolm X at the United Nations in 1963. Photo by Robert Haggins.
In July of 1964 Malcolm X attended the second meeting of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). He presented a petition asking,
In the interest of world peace, we beseech the heads of the independent African states to recommend an immediate investigation into our problem by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.
According to UN procedures, a nation can request a human rights investigation of another country on behalf of the people whose rights have been violated.
The African heads of state discussed the proposition at the OAU summit but failed to bring the case before the UN based in part by pressure from the U.S. State Department. [Description from the Stanford Liberation Curriculum Project lesson called “Human Rights, By Any Means Necessary.”]
Malcolm X at the United Nations in 1963. Photo by Robert Haggins.
In July of 1964 Malcolm X attended the second meeting of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). He presented a petition asking,
In the interest of world peace, we beseech the heads of the independent African states to recommend an immediate investigation into our problem by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.
According to UN procedures, a nation can request a human rights investigation of another country on behalf of the people whose rights have been violated.
The African heads of state discussed the proposition at the OAU summit but failed to bring the case before the UN based in part by pressure from the U.S. State Department. [Description from the Stanford Liberation Curriculum Project lesson called “Human Rights, By Any Means Necessary.”]
During the 1960s a free breakfast program for children in Oakland, CA was sponsored by:
Correct
Answer: The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense
During the 1960s, the Black Panther Party’s provocative rhetoric of armed self-defense often led to demonized representations of them as a violent group. The BPP actually presented a progressive party platform, which quotes the Declaration of Independence and advocates free health care for the poor, full employment, decent housing, and an end to police brutality. Projects like the Free Breakfast Program reflected the Panthers’ commitment to community service and organizing.
Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching
Pp. 36–37, The Black Panthers and Community Control. Brief excerpt on the Panther Party and their push for democracy and community control. Pp. 149, “What We Want,” by Kwame Toure (Stokely Carmichael) Pp. 145, LESSON: “The Black Panther Party Legacy and Lessons for the Future” by Debbie Wei. Pp. 153, LESSON: “‘What We Want, What We Believe’: Teaching with the Black Panthers’ Ten Point Program” by Wayne Au.
Incorrect
Answer: The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense
During the 1960s, the Black Panther Party’s provocative rhetoric of armed self-defense often led to demonized representations of them as a violent group. The BPP actually presented a progressive party platform, which quotes the Declaration of Independence and advocates free health care for the poor, full employment, decent housing, and an end to police brutality. Projects like the Free Breakfast Program reflected the Panthers’ commitment to community service and organizing.
Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching
Pp. 36–37, The Black Panthers and Community Control. Brief excerpt on the Panther Party and their push for democracy and community control. Pp. 149, “What We Want,” by Kwame Toure (Stokely Carmichael) Pp. 145, LESSON: “The Black Panther Party Legacy and Lessons for the Future” by Debbie Wei. Pp. 153, LESSON: “‘What We Want, What We Believe’: Teaching with the Black Panthers’ Ten Point Program” by Wayne Au.
Question 12 of 14
12. Question
In addition to African Americans, what other groups were fighting for equal rights and/or self-determination in the 1960s and 1970s?
Correct
Answer: All of the above
Muhammad Ali, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Floyd Red Crow Westerman, Harold Smith, Stevie Wonder, Marlon Brando, Max Gail, Dick Gregory, Richie Havens and David Amram at the concert at the end of the Longest Walk, a 3,600-mile protest march from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., in 1978 in the name of the Native rights. Photo: David Amram.
Too often history is taught as segmented, isolated incidents in time. Traditionally, the Civil Rights Movement is viewed solely as a struggle for black Americans, by black Americans. Actually, the Civil Rights Movement was a struggle for full democracy for everyone in the U.S. Vincent Harding noted in “Black History IS America’s History” (1990), that:
One of the major challenges available to teachers in every possible institution is to introduce ourselves and our students to an alternative vision of the movement, to see it as a great gift for all Americans, as a central point of grounding for our own pro-democracy movement.
The modern Civil Rights Movement also inspired oppressed people nationally and internationally. As Bernice Johnson Reagon explains:
Few movements have created as many ripples [as the Civil Rights Movement], and certainly not ripples that crossed racial and class and social lines as happened in the 1960’s.
The Civil Rights Movement, being Black at the bottom, offered up the possibility of a thorough analysis of society…. The exciting thing about the Civil Rights Movement is the extent to which it gave participants a glaring analysis of who and where they were in society… People who were Spanish-speaking in the Civil Rights Movement, who had been white, when they got back, turned Brown. Some of the leaders of the antiwar movement were politicized by their work in the Civil Rights Movement…. The Civil Rights Movement was only a dispersion. Its dispersion continues to be manifested in ever-widening circles of evaluation of civil and human rights afforded by this society.
…You cannot present an accurate picture of the movements of the 1960’s and 1970’s unless you show them resting on the foundation of the Civil Rights Movement. A study that’s done from some other point of view will be a myopic report on those other movements. I find, generally, that people who participated in those other movements, especially if those other movements were predominately white, see whatever they participated in as central… It is, again, a a distortion of what Black people do to stimulate the salvation of this country… My point is the Civil Rights Movement [bore] not just the Black Power Movement and Black revolutionary movements, but every progressive struggle that has occurred in this country since that time.” [In an interview with Dick Cluster called “The Borning Struggle: The Civil Rights Movement,” South End Press, reprinted in Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching.]
More information
Putting the Movement Back Into Civil Rights Teaching: A Resource Guide for Classrooms and Communities. By Deborah Menkart, Alana Murray, Jenice L. View. 2004. Teaching for Change and PRRAC. “One of the only curricula to connect the Civil Rights Movement to the struggles of Native Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and women. It’s an incredible tool not just for teaching history, but also for teaching students to take up the legacy these movements helped to create.” —Ariana Quiñones, Deputy Vice President for Education, National Council of La Raza
Walkout. Film produced by Moctesuma Esparza. 2006. 111 minutes. The true story of the Chicano students of East L.A., who in 1968 staged several dramatic walkouts in their high schools to protest academic prejudice and dire school conditions.
Alcatraz is Not an Island. Website on the history of the 19 month occupation of Alcatraz by Indians of All Nations.
Summary of other groups fighting for civil and human rights and self-determination in 1963, prepared by Jenice L. View here.
Teaching resources: Lesson, books, films, and articles for K-12 can be found on the Zinn Education Project website here.
Incorrect
Answer: All of the above
Muhammad Ali, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Floyd Red Crow Westerman, Harold Smith, Stevie Wonder, Marlon Brando, Max Gail, Dick Gregory, Richie Havens and David Amram at the concert at the end of the Longest Walk, a 3,600-mile protest march from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., in 1978 in the name of the Native rights. Photo: David Amram.
Too often history is taught as segmented, isolated incidents in time. Traditionally, the Civil Rights Movement is viewed solely as a struggle for black Americans, by black Americans. Actually, the Civil Rights Movement was a struggle for full democracy for everyone in the U.S. Vincent Harding noted in “Black History IS America’s History” (1990), that:
One of the major challenges available to teachers in every possible institution is to introduce ourselves and our students to an alternative vision of the movement, to see it as a great gift for all Americans, as a central point of grounding for our own pro-democracy movement.
The modern Civil Rights Movement also inspired oppressed people nationally and internationally. As Bernice Johnson Reagon explains:
Few movements have created as many ripples [as the Civil Rights Movement], and certainly not ripples that crossed racial and class and social lines as happened in the 1960’s.
The Civil Rights Movement, being Black at the bottom, offered up the possibility of a thorough analysis of society…. The exciting thing about the Civil Rights Movement is the extent to which it gave participants a glaring analysis of who and where they were in society… People who were Spanish-speaking in the Civil Rights Movement, who had been white, when they got back, turned Brown. Some of the leaders of the antiwar movement were politicized by their work in the Civil Rights Movement…. The Civil Rights Movement was only a dispersion. Its dispersion continues to be manifested in ever-widening circles of evaluation of civil and human rights afforded by this society.
…You cannot present an accurate picture of the movements of the 1960’s and 1970’s unless you show them resting on the foundation of the Civil Rights Movement. A study that’s done from some other point of view will be a myopic report on those other movements. I find, generally, that people who participated in those other movements, especially if those other movements were predominately white, see whatever they participated in as central… It is, again, a a distortion of what Black people do to stimulate the salvation of this country… My point is the Civil Rights Movement [bore] not just the Black Power Movement and Black revolutionary movements, but every progressive struggle that has occurred in this country since that time.” [In an interview with Dick Cluster called “The Borning Struggle: The Civil Rights Movement,” South End Press, reprinted in Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching.]
More information
Putting the Movement Back Into Civil Rights Teaching: A Resource Guide for Classrooms and Communities. By Deborah Menkart, Alana Murray, Jenice L. View. 2004. Teaching for Change and PRRAC. “One of the only curricula to connect the Civil Rights Movement to the struggles of Native Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and women. It’s an incredible tool not just for teaching history, but also for teaching students to take up the legacy these movements helped to create.” —Ariana Quiñones, Deputy Vice President for Education, National Council of La Raza
Walkout. Film produced by Moctesuma Esparza. 2006. 111 minutes. The true story of the Chicano students of East L.A., who in 1968 staged several dramatic walkouts in their high schools to protest academic prejudice and dire school conditions.
Alcatraz is Not an Island. Website on the history of the 19 month occupation of Alcatraz by Indians of All Nations.
Summary of other groups fighting for civil and human rights and self-determination in 1963, prepared by Jenice L. View here.
Teaching resources: Lesson, books, films, and articles for K-12 can be found on the Zinn Education Project website here.
Question 13 of 14
13. Question
The struggle led by John Conyers, Shirley Chisholm, Coretta Scott King, Stevie Wonder, and countless others to make Martin Luther King Jr. birthday a federal holiday, recognized in all states, took how many years?
Correct
Answer: 32 years
Protest for Dr. King Day recognition.
The movement to establish a holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement began when U.S. Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich) proposed such legislation on April 8, 1968, just four days after King’s assassination.
Six million signatures were collected to petition for the holiday and Stevie Wonder went on tour with his song “Happy Birthday” in support of the campaign. Year after year the bill faced defeat and vicious red baiting.
The bill was finally signed in 1983 and 17 years later, all 50 states recognized the holiday.
The movement to establish a holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement began when U.S. Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich) proposed such legislation on April 8, 1968, just four days after King’s assassination.
Six million signatures were collected to petition for the holiday and Stevie Wonder went on tour with his song “Happy Birthday” in support of the campaign. Year after year the bill faced defeat and vicious red baiting.
The bill was finally signed in 1983 and 17 years later, all 50 states recognized the holiday.
According to the 2010 federal census, the most segregated city in the United States is:
Correct
Answer: Detroit, MI
Segregation has always been a national phenomenon rather than a purely Southern one, even when most African Americans lived in the South. Blacks started to move north at an accelerated rate during World War I in what came to be known as the Great Migration. Most settled in racially divided neighborhoods in the North, with little choice to do otherwise due to widespread racism and discriminatory housing policies. In 2010, the ten most segregated cities were Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Detroit, Milwaukee, Chicago, Cleveland, Buffalo, New York City, Cincinnati, and St. Louis.
The Racial Dot Map: One Dot Per Person For the Entire U.S. – detailed color-coded map shows racial segregation in America. The section below shows Detroit’s 8 Mile Road:
Incorrect
Answer: Detroit, MI
Segregation has always been a national phenomenon rather than a purely Southern one, even when most African Americans lived in the South. Blacks started to move north at an accelerated rate during World War I in what came to be known as the Great Migration. Most settled in racially divided neighborhoods in the North, with little choice to do otherwise due to widespread racism and discriminatory housing policies. In 2010, the ten most segregated cities were Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Detroit, Milwaukee, Chicago, Cleveland, Buffalo, New York City, Cincinnati, and St. Louis.
The Racial Dot Map: One Dot Per Person For the Entire U.S. – detailed color-coded map shows racial segregation in America. The section below shows Detroit’s 8 Mile Road:
If you like the quiz, please share it and make adonation to Teaching for Change so that we can continue to develop and share resources on the people’s history of the Civil Rights Movement. Quiz prepared by Teaching for Change staff. Email Teaching for Change with corrections and/or additions.
Through this quiz, and the answers that appear after each question, you can learn some of the history of the Civil Rights Movement that is all too often omitted from the textbooks. Teaching for Change designed this quiz for teachers and parents to challenge assumptions, deepen understanding, and inspire further learning about the Civil Rights Movement. It is based on the publication, Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching. The quiz also contains questions that help set the context for the Civil Rights Movement and link to today.
Thank you for taking the quiz.
American Experience Reconstruction: The Second Civil War (PBS)
They Called Themselves the K.K.K.: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group. By Susan Campbell Bartoletti. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Books, 2010. Illustrated with archival photographs and drawings, this account reveals how this crushing evil was allowed to thrive.
The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks. By Jeanne Theoharis. 2013. A revealing window into Parks’ politics and years of activism.
The crucial roles of women, grassroots organizers, and rank-and-file citizens in the Civil Rights Movement are often minimized or left out of U.S. history books. Under the leadership of Jo Ann Robinson, a college English professor, the Montgomery Women’s Political Council began organizing against segregated buses in 1949. This lay the groundwork to mobilize the boycott quickly after Rosa Parks was arrested. NAACP leader and labor organizer E.D. Nixon bailed Ms. Parks out of jail and convened a meeting of ministers the first night of the boycott to provide leadership. At that meeting, the ministers formed the Montgomery Improvement Association and elected the 27-year-old Martin Luther King Jr. as its leader.
The Black Panther Party Reconsidered. Edited by Charles E. Jones. Baltimore, Md.: Black Classic Press, 1998.
