Female Leadership Behind the Scenes: Ella Baker and the Civil Rights Movement

BRIdge from the Past: Art Across U.S. History is a new YouTube series for students that explores an important historic image every episode to gain insights into the culture, politics, and society of a particular time in U.S. history. Host Mary Patterson will explain how each primary source is its own “window to the past,” revealing new areas for contemplation and discussion.

What claims about freedom were made in the 1960s? How did Founding principles become a reality for African Americans during this time? This playlist is a sub-set of primary sources that appear in Plainest Demands of Justice: Documents for Dialogue on the African-American Experience.

The Civil Rights Movement sought to win the American promise of liberty and equality during the twentieth-century. From the early struggles of the 1940s to the crowning successes of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts that changed the legal status of African-Americans in the United States, the Civil Rights Movement firmly grounded its appeals for liberty and equality in the Constitution and Declaration of Independence. Rather than rejecting an America that discriminated against a particular race, the movement fought for America to fulfill its own universal promise that “all men are created equal.” The Civil Rights Movement worked for American principles within American institutions rather than against them.